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THE ULTIMATE IN ALIEN TERROR

Over the years, star Kurt Russell and master of horror John Carpenter have teamed up on a multitude of films (Big Trouble in Little China and Escape from New York to name a few) but of all their collaborations, 1982 s horror/sci-fi amalgam The Thing surely tops the list.

A research team based out in the snowy wilds of Antarctica find themselves besieged by a terrifying, shape-shifting creature which has found its way into their base. When it becomes clear that the creature can take the form of any organism it so chooses, the tension within the team reaches breaking point any one of them could be... The Thing.

Critically panned at the time of its release, John Carpenter’s The Thing has rightly gone on to become one of the most celebrated sci-fi horror efforts ever made now newly restored by Arrow Video in a stunning 4K transfer supervised by Carpenter and director of photography Dean Cundey.

CONTENTS

• Brand new restoration from a 4K scan of the original negative, supervised and approved by director John Carpenter and director of photography Dean Cundey
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original Mono and DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Audio commentary by John Carpenter and actor Kurt Russell
• Who Goes There? In Search of The Thing an all-new feature length documentary produced by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures exploring the history of The Thing, from the original novella to John Carpenter's terrifying science fiction classic. Featuring new interviews with the cast and crew, as well as authors, historians, and critics
• 1982: One Amazing Summer an all-new retrospective documentary produced by Ballyhoo Motion Pictures about the unforgettable films released in the summer of 1982
• John Carpenter's The Thing: Terror Takes Shape archive documentary on the background and production of the film
• Vintage Featurettes
• Outtakes
• Behind-the-scenes
• Trailers, Teasers, TV and Radio Spots
• Still Galleries
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Gary Pullin

rapta wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 23, 2017 5:46 pm

John Carpenter's THE THING is confirmed to be coming from Arrow Video later this year!

Best ever news, in my opinion. Potentially could be the same transfer - and possibly some common extras too - as the Shout Factory release, but there's potential for improvements. My favourite Carpenter film, and one I've requested from Arrow for years, so very happy about this.

Yes, good news, a major title indeed.

Agreed, there are minor complaints about the Shout release regarding grain and colour timing. Arrow are better at restoration and encoding than Shout.

Almost bought the Shout release but will now wait for Arrow.

Will have to wait and see whether Universal allow Arrow to do their own scan of this. Shout's was a 2K scan of the interpositive, and I dunno if things could be improved in 4K, or why the OCN apparently wasn't available.

Recent Universal titles from Arrow - Matinee, Raising Cain - used off-the-shelf masters, as did Second Sight for their release of Midnight Run, which makes me wonder if Universal are slightly uncooperative with UK labels when it comes to accessing original film elements. Perhaps Shout Factory have a better relationship with Universal, or just had to shell out more than they would've wanted to do these restorations?

Either way, the least we're gonna get is the same 2K interpositive scan as the SF release, no doubt with some tweaks like you say. And I'm sure there will be at least one or two things in the extras department to make it even more attractive than that release (if that's possible). I dunno what though...they may have to try and license the soundtrack or something at this point, since the SF release has so many extras already!

Are Arrow *better* at encoding? Shout's Raising Cain is an impressive 40+ mbps; I think they're both very good at it, regardless. But I expect this essentially be for the most part a port of the Shout, possibly with an extra feature or two.

Our own David Mackenzie does much of the encoding for Arrow and discs he produces often look superior to ones he doesn't.

I just think it's an odd statement; as far as I'm aware, Arrow's top of the class but Shout is no slouch. I have a hard time imagining the Arrow version of this will be *that much* better than the 35mbps encode on the Shout disc.

Sorry, yes - if I wasn't clear, I was saying the least we can expect is a match of the already very good Shout transfer with one or two new extras added (similar to their Raising Cain release), but Arrow being Arrow they might manage to negotiate something even better (such as their own restoration).

I won't mind either way though, just happy they managed to get it for us UK collectors. I actually just sold my Universal disc (technically OOP over here).

I hate to bring up Caps-a-holic, but the ping pong ball is still missing from this shot on the new Shout disc, just as it was on the first BD. This just made me very skeptical of the release, and suspicious that too much digital meddling occurred. I'm sure it mostly looks great in motion, but I already have the original disc and have seen it in 35mm, so if I'm double dipping I want to be more confident in the release. And there's enough wrong with a bunch of recent Shout releases to make me less than excited to buy some releases.

I wouldn't be so sure the auto-cleanup has been performed at Universal restoration level. I recall such discussion popping up about Arrow's Runaway Train BD release, and the auto-cleanup was visible on a release-level, not a master one.
It could be the same here and that the ping pong ball is a result of Shout! additional clean up, not something baked in the master supplied by Universal.

Yep, which is why I was holding out for a different release.

Will this turn out to be another Arrow-Shout collaboration like To Live And Die In LA? I'd imagine they might do a limited edition first like the one for Deep Red and include Morricone's soundtrack on a separate disc. I just bought the Shout edition during the Carpenter sale so I can't imagine how many more extras they could add. Unless they want to film a new interview with Carpenter or include a book with new writing.

It won't be like To Live and Die in L.A. because that was a collaborative effort to restore the film and produce new extras for both labels to release in their respective territories, whereas The Thing has already been restored by Shout Factory so it would most likely just be a case of Arrow porting their restored master - and presumably their extras too - for the UK, similar to what they did with De Palma's Raising Cain. Though for that, they have apparently swapped the John Lithgow interview with a different one, and added a couple other extras that weren't on the Shout release, as well as adding a booklet and slipcover - and the Director's Cut is on a single-layered disc, but still well-encoded.

You may be right about the soundtrack CD, but that might depend on licensing costs (or whether they are able to license it at all). Second Sight released Assault on Precinct 13 with a soundtrack CD, so it's probably not impossible. Also, I suppose they could also do their own exclusive interview with Carpenter if they catch him whilst he's in the UK - he's been touring over here a lot recently!

And of course, they're bound to produce an in-depth booklet for this one, similar to Donnie Darko/The Hills Have Eyes/Deep Red/Videodrome. I expect there will be a few different releases of this, considering it's arguably their most popular acquisition yet, starting with a deluxe one and moving on to more stripped-back editions (just like they did with Donnie Darko). I'd be surprised if they just did a modest slipcover or steelbook and nothing more, but would still be happy with either option.

Ribs wrote:Are Arrow *better* at encoding? Shout's Raising Cain is an impressive 40+ mbps

Bitrate doesn't tell anything like the whole story.

Go to caps-a-holic, look at the bitrate graph on the Shout encode and compare it with the one on the Arrow encode.

You'll immediately notice that the Shout has been set at the same bitrate throughout, regardless of whether the material really needs it - I suspect they used an automatic setting.

By contrast, the Arrow was clearly encoded manually, with all that that implies in terms of the care taken to give each shot an appropriate bitrate.

And why this matters is revealed by the Shout peaking at just 42184 MBps, while the Arrow goes all the way up to a whopping 55,574, making savings elsewhere - for instance, over the end credits, where the Arrow bitrate plunges through the floor because white text on black simply doesn't need very much. By contrast, the Shout stays at 40+MBps even over this setting, unnecessarily wasting disc space.

So while I haven't compared the two, I suspect the Arrow will be noticeably superior in motion in a way that mere screengrabs can't convey.

Shout used to have quite a bad rep for compression.

Shout have messed up releases with crushed blacks and blown out whites. They lack a certain sensitivity to the texture of some films and some films have been afflicted with weird, unwanted yellows. Films as recent as 1990s. Even new, sparkling looking films like Fessenden's Beneath and the more plain McNaughton's The Harvest, films you'd expect to come out perfect, have not emerged unscathed. If I have the option I'll buy a release by a different label. Or even iTunes if it's an HD download. Yes sometimes Shout are at the mercy of the transfer given to them, and making their own 2k scans is commendable...but:

Their 2k scans are a mixed bag, Escape From NY barely looking better than the flawed previous release that it's supposed to better. Invasion of the Body Snatchers, I've read, has brought greater levels of detail and colour separation yet introduces new errros such as crushed blacks. The Thing has been acclaimed as a great release, but not without minor controversy involving colour. So there's a missing ping pong ball, like Phantasm II has a missing doorknob? ... intriguing comments by Michael on compression, manual versus auto. I presume, there are ways to do good scans and bad scans also?

I'm hopeful for the TCM2 transfer, but have yet to see a major website review it.

Cheers. I usually like to read Blu-ray.com and DVDBeaver but if there's issues, one of those you linked might pick up on it.

Adam Grikepelis wrote:Here you go.

Just watched it. TCM 2 by Shout. This is one anaemic and disappointing transfer. It actually looks more like a decade old MGM master than the criticised DoP approved version, even though it's a 2k scan(from the IP). It has that lean toward pink, amber, orange in the skin tones. Night scenes suffer with soft grey shadows. Contrast is not good. Every scene looks like it was shot the same. I prefer the Arrow version, even though it's brightened somewhat; with the more vibrant colour it just seems more alive and the lair sequences are far more effective in this version.

First time I've not enjoyed this film in a long time, Shout's overrated new scan.

4K coming!!!
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Damn, how many times am I going to have to buy this thing?

Until all you discs are unidentifiable as The Thing.

Considering how good the extras and presentation were on the Shout Factory, the only way Arrow can possibly make me want to buy it again is if they score an HD transfer of the original "The Things from Another World" as a bonus. Who knows? Both owned by Universal in the UK.

I think all the UK rights to the RKO stuff is now with Warner Brothers, so The Thing for Another World isn't going to be included.

Arrow tweeted a pic of a monitor with a scene from The Thing and the caption said "Our new 4k restoration for The Thing is underway."

Elsewhere they have also confirmed it's being overseen by both Carpenter and Cundey. Rejoice! This is bound to be best-of-the-year stuff, for me at least.

They did let slip this was 4K a while ago - in a stray Tweet; I forget from whom specifically - but I thought it might have just been a typo, assuming they'd use the same 2K scan from the IP as Shout Factory did. Very cool that they convinced Universal to let them restore it themselves from the ON, since they generally seem hesitant to let labels do that (unless it's Criterion). Perhaps they were convinced by some of the top-notch work Arrow have done over the years.

This is bound to be a huge release, so I hope they don't make the inevitable Limited Edition release too limited. Perhaps it'll be as much as 10,000 - judging by the response on social media alone, this is going to attract a huge amount of interest both in the UK and abroad.