Kurt Russell’s favourite John Carpenter movie: “His absolute peak”
Kurt Russell and John Carpenter worked together on five movies between 1979 and 1996. It’s safe to say that they had a profound impact on each other’s careers. They began working at a crucial point in their respective cinematic journeys, and they helped shape each other’s legacies and future work.
Carpenter got his start with dark science fiction and gritty thrillers like Dark Star and Assault on Precinct 13. 1978’s Halloween was his breakthrough film, a seminal work of slasher horror that remains one of the most influential and mimicked movies ever made. He will always be associated with horror, but Carpenter is much more than a one-trick pony, as evidenced by his films with Russell.
Their first and worst movie was a 1979 Elvis biopic, which has largely been forgotten. Carpenter wanted to try a dramatic film but ultimately found the process unsatisfactory when the studio shut him out of the editing room. Still, he gained one major coup: his collaboration with Russell.
At the time, Russell was still recovering from being a Disney child star. His association with Carpenter changed all that. Their second film was 1981’s Escape from New York, which is an all-time classic that redefined both their careers. Set in a dystopian future, it stars Russell as toughened criminal Snake Plissken, a prisoner who is promised a pardon if he can rescue the president from kidnappers.
The film remains a highlight of both Russell and Carpenter’s careers, but according to the actor, it was their third collaboration that showed the director at his finest. 1982’s The Thing was a horror creature feature in the mould of Ridley Scott’s Alien. Set on a remote research base in the Antarctic, it follows a group of researchers who are preyed upon by a mysterious entity that takes over the bodies of other organisms. As it infiltrates the base, everyone becomes paranoid as they question whether their colleagues have become The Thing.
The movie was received poorly when it was released. Its pervasively bleak tone probably didn’t help, while the special effects were much nastier and more prevalent than they were in Alien. There were also plenty of other science fiction and horror movies out that year, most of which stuck to one lane. ET, Tron, Star Trek II, and Poltergeist all did better business, and The Thing ultimately wound up at number 43 in the box office standings that year.
Decades later, however, it is widely regarded as one of Carpenter’s best, which is a high bar. One of its biggest fans is Russell himself, who said in a career retrospective with GQ that he thinks it perfectly showcases the director’s unique skills. “That to me was maybe John at his absolute peak as a director,” he said. “That’s really good filmmaking.”
It isn’t just the jaw-dropping, stomach-churning special effects that make the movie so memorable. It’s the ratcheting up of suspense, the gripping paranoia, and the slow setting in of doom. Carpenter demonstrated his mastery of tone-setting, and although The Thing isn’t the most fun and easy-going hang, it’s riveting and infinitely re-watchable.
