According to Heat Vision Blog, Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Grindhouse) and Joel Edgerton (Attack of the Clones) are set to star in the latest incarnation of The Thing, Universal’s take on “the shape-shifting alien who terrorizes a group of people in a remote facility.” Oh yeah, that one.
Winstead will play a Ph.D. candidate who joins a Norwegian research team in Antarctica after it discovers an alien ship frozen in the ice. When a trapped organism is freed and begins to kill, she is forced to team with a mercenary helicopter pilot (Edgerton) to stop the rampage. Matthijs Van Heijningen is directing the movie, which was written by Ronald D. Moore and Eric Heisserer.
Sadly, Van Heijningen has never directed a big budget feature film before, so he’s probably the best choice for this one. Yes, that was sarcasm.
The Thing has, of course, been made into a film at least twice before. The best (and best-known) of these is probably the John Carpenter version from 1982 which featured Kurt Russell as the titular “mercenary helicopter pilot.” That film was a contemporary remake of 1951’s The Thing From Another World, directed by Howard Hawks and featuring pre-Gunsmoke James Arness as the creature.
A March 15 start date in Toronto is planned with a very short theatrical run and swift trip to your local video store probably soon to follow.
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