Most actors take up a job because they actually think the project is meaningful in one way or another. Strange, then, that Kurt Russell once said that John Carpenter's horror masterpiece The Thing was anything but.
Russell and Carpenter created five projects together between the late 1970s and mid-1990s. Not every project was a major one, and, in fact, their first was a total blow. But then came Escape from New York, and then The Thing, the horror widely considered as one of the best in all of film history. Russell himself has praised Carpenter for his work on the movie, even calling it his best work. Or, as he told GQ, it was his "peak as a director".
Elsewhere, however, he elaborated on what he actually thought of the film, and while he stands by his point about it being Carpenter's best work, he's less sure about whether it actually holds any message worthwhile - but that's also entirely the point. Even if it meant there wasn't really any challenge for him to be involved, from an actor's point of view.
"I'm the first to admit that The Thing isn't a relevant, meaningful movie. It isn't," he admitted to Starlog. "I wouldn't put too much value in it. It's a monster movie. A really good monster movie. And it's not easy doing a good monster movie for anyone involved. It's tough on the director. It's tough on the actors. There's no real challenge to it for an actor. You're not doing a hell of a lot except reacting to the monster, creating a backdrop for the effects."
He then reflected on why he felt they "succeeded" as actors to bring the whole thing to life, saying that it was the atmosphere they managed to create, as characters getting more and more paranoid in this solitary environment, that made it as good as it was. And what made it even better was that it seemed like real people who were slowly reaching their "breaking point".
When The Thing was first released, however, it didn't get many glowing reviews. In fact, critics hated it left, right and centre, making its delayed cultlike status especially poignant. According to Russell, however, the reason why audiences couldn't get behind it in the beginning wasn't anything other than the monster itself, which people struggled to understand.
Eventually, though, people began to commend the acting, narrative, and special effects, and slowly, they started to come around. It's also probably one of the reasons why a sequel never materialised, even though Carpenter always liked the idea. Something so iconic and symbiotic to a specific moment in time will always contain an essence that's hard to replicate, especially for a movie like The Thing, where its nostalgic aesthetic is a major part of its charm.
And when it comes to narrative and not having anything "relevant", that's also a major reason why it withstood the test of time. The premise of The Thing is fairly basic, and it plays on many of the major features that we still enjoy today - from pushing the human psyche to its limits and exploring the boundaries of realism versus our own innate anxieties.
Maybe it never had an overt political leaning or something that gives away its own time period, but that's part of the charm, too. After all, what's scarier than the feeling of fear itself, manifested in one simple scenario where no one knows where to place their trust? That thread will always be relevant, no matter the details of the story it finds itself tucked within.