Talk:The Thing from Another World

External Links?

Is it permitted to enclose an external link for a site where the film in question is reviewed and presented? The external link points to a site run by a published film writer, director, actor and television personality in Tokyo, Japan (English language).

I am trying to keep the link to The Cinemated Man alive and well because it is informative, useful and the author is a recognized authority.

But each day the links are removed under the guise of 'personal website'. The Cinemated Man site is published by blogspot and the editors are removing it for that reason or claiming the edit is 'spam'.

First of all, it is clearly not spam.

Secondly, even though is is published by blogspot, it is not a daily blog but rather a film review and presentation site. The site is non profit and contains no ads of any kind - not even ad sense, it is informational and is not a 'social networking' entity such as Myspace or Facebook.

Finally, the inclusion of The Cinemated Man link on Wikipedia is a helpful resource for those interested in the films in question. Keeping the link alive can only add to the wealth of resources at Wikipedia. Deleting it can only narrow Wiki's scope.

Also, the external links to Google Video, which has the film in its entirety are also being removed by the same editors for the same reasons. Humbleradio (talk) 01:49, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Conflict of Interest?

"Conflict of interest is not a reason to delete an article, but lack of notability is."

Why are you deleting the link without discussing the issue? Why are you not letting the community decide whether or not the link is spam, self promotion, or conflict of interest?

Your actions are that of vandalism. I am at a loss as to why you feel the need to squelch certain links, and yet let other remain, even those that are invalid and pointing to inactive sites.

Please explain. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Humbleradio (talk • contribs) 03:25, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

The Film's Title

It is my experience (although I'm sure that contemporary usage will support it) that the film was universally called simply The Thing, with its extended title forgotten, for three decades. The " ... From Another World" only resurfaced in order to distinguish it from the remake when that project came along. WHPratt (talk) 13:38, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Someone thoughtfully updated the lead paragraph to include this fact, but it was later removed, probably for simplicity. I still think it’s important, as someone doing research would search in vain for “… From Another World” prior to 1982. Only the most pedantic used the full title.

Carlos Clarens, in An Illustrated History of the Horror Film (1967) calls it The Thing, and no more wherever it’s mentioned. John Baxter, in Science Fiction in the Cinema (1970) calls it The Thing in the text, and only mentions the extended title (“also known as …”) in his Filmography. So does everyone quoted in William Johnson’s (editor) Focus on the Science Fiction Film (1972). These were pivotal reference books in their day. WHPratt (talk) 05:41, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Thanks to user Doniago for restoring that piece of information. If anyone finds that sentence awkward, I'd suggest adding the fact elsewhere in the article.

Here’s a quasi-scientific justification. I scanned the Pro-Quest national newspaper databases for the Los Angeles Times (covering 1923-1992) for the phrase “thing from another world”. The search produces a breakdown of hits via decade (e.g., 1950-50, 1960-69 …). We get the following results.

LA Times: 1950s 2, 1960s 3, 1970s 2, 1980s 13 and 1990s (partial) 5. That’s just 7 uses over 30 years, jumping to almost double that when the new movie appears on the scene. Were they ignoring the 1951 film in general? Searching for “the thing” AND “Howard Hawks” we get: 1950s 62, 1960s 11, 1970s 25, 1980s 50, 1990s (partial) 2. Not ignored (though somewhat forgotten in the 1960s).

Checking the New York Times (holdings 1851-2012), for “thing from another world”, we find no mention at all prior to the 1980s! That’s 1980s 5, 1990s 2, 2000s 44 and 2010s (partial) 11. Seems as if they only took to using the longer title once historians began to analyze and discuss the films together.

Searching NYT for “the thing” AND “Howard Hawks” we get: 1930s 3 and 1940s 4, which suggests that the producer’s name and that phrase do occur in other context (and that the LA Times data may also have a few false positives in it as well). Continuing, we find: 1950s 15, 1960s 5, 1970s 8, 1980s 18, 1990s 16, 200s 11 and 2010s (partial) 5. The first joint reference is Bosley Crowther’s May 3, 1951 review, and of course, he uses only the shorter title.

I don’t feel that much more digging is warranted, but I think that these patterns confirm my assertion that hardly anybody used the longer title until the remake came along. WHPratt (talk) 17:03, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

Well, to be fair, my change was somewhat incidental, but the editor I reverted had inserted some nonsense (possibly unintentionally) which I felt called their edit into question. They're welcome to re-add their changes if they're more careful and clear about what they're doing and why. DonIago (talk) 20:10, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

I concur with your other changes, by the way. WHPratt (talk) 20:23, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

This got removed, and I restored it. I feel it's important for reasons stated above. Yes, the posters use the extended title -- however, they downplay the last three words to the point of obscurity. WHPratt (talk) 12:56, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

I agree that if there are outside sources which make this point, then it should be included. Whether or not in the lead is another question, but might be that important. The issue is, that without sourcing this is original research. Onel5969 ^{TT me} 13:34, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

I did mention that the works of Clarens, Baxter and Johnson -- which were amongst the earliest works on science fiction film -- used the short title without elaboration, something that wouldn't usually be tolerated in scholarly work. If that's not enough, I'm not going to bother with it any more. WHPratt (talk) 16:28, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

Infobox

Why are my edits being reverted and considered vandalism? All I'm doing is updating the infox according to the manual of style. Which now include screenplay fields, based on fields and studio fields.173.88.129.35 (talk) 20:58, 25 October 2010 (UTC)

Preservation and restoration

IMO the article could use some mention of preservation problems with this classic film. It was shot at the tail end of the nitrate film era, and the original negative, although still extant, is apparently now an unusable mess. I have yet to see a really good print, either in a theater or on video; they always look to be a couple of generations down the line, maybe even blown back up to 35mm from a 16mm reduction element made for TV syndication in the '50s. Sound quality is also suggestive of the limitations of the smaller format, to the detriment of Tiomkin's dramatic music. Compare the clearer sound and clean sparkling B&W in good prints of the same year's Day the Earth Stood Still. Entirely watchable, but the audiovisual experience is not what it could be. Maybe digital restoration software has matured to the extent that we can now pull it back to something much closer to the quality of an original 1951 release print without doing anything arbitrary or dishonest? 66.249.174.92 (talk) 18:06, 2 October 2015 (UTC)

the blu-ray disc looks very good 50.111.216.187 (talk) 16:14, 28 November 2022 (UTC)

Cleanup and Expansion

This article is incomplete and needs to be expanded in more detail than what it currently is. The production section seems to be too short and should be expanded in more detail than what it currently has. Information on the film's development, casting and filming should be added to the article with proper citations for its information. Then article is also missing important information on the film's theatrical and home media releases which needs to be added to the article, again with proper citations. The reception section also seems too short and more reviews from notable critics added to it (Box office grossing should be moved to a release section), and information on the film's legacy should be split into it's own section and expanded upon. This article, like most articles, has potential. It just needs more work done to it in order to qualify for GA and FA status.--Paleface Jack (talk) 16:22, 24 October 2017 (UTC)

The Thing (character)

So I've noticed for a while now that there isn't any article on the character of The Thing, which is kind of sad considering how significant the character actually is. As such I started a draft for the character which people can work on expanding. I will include the link to it here.--Paleface Jack (talk) 17:01, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

John Carpenter quote

I removed the quote that had been in Note 1, "And let's get the record straight. The film was directed by Howard Hawks. Verifiably directed by Howard Hawks. He let his editor, Christian Nyby, take credit. But the kind of feeling between the male characters — the camaraderie, the group of men that has to fight off the evil — it's all pure Hawksian". This quote is cited to, but not specifically attributed to, John Carpenter, who would have an interest in the subject as the director of the remake, The Thing (1982 film), but who was 3 years old and living in upstate New York when The Thing from Another World was made and thus would have no personal knowledge of the direction of the film. In any event, the fact that the film was "Hawksian" can be explained by the fact that Hawks was the film's producer and, by the accounts of all involved, deeply involved in the making of the film, without necessarily establishing that he was the director. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 06:09, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

Several actors and film crew have attested that Hawks really directed the film and/or supervised the scenes b Nyby .... 50.111.216.187 (talk) 16:16, 28 November 2022 (UTC)