Monday, May 18, 2026

Movies in 2026 155

 

The Thing From Another World (Christian Nyby, 1951)

And this is about as far removed from Blue Is the Warmest Color as you can imagine (and such is the cinematic life of the cabin): Christian Nyby's 1951 classic film The Thing From Another World.  I don't know how many times I've watched this film, but it never grows old. It's part of the current Criterion Channel featured collection on 1980s remakes, where they tie the original to the 80s version - as I mentioned previously, the later remakes are all pretty dreadful, with the notable exception of John Carpenter's reworking of this film (which I will doubtless watch again before it disappears). Over the years, people given Nyby little credit for directing this film, and instead proposing that was really Howard Hawks (who produced it) who did the directorial heavy lifting. On some level I think I believed that, mainly because I've just heard people say it so often (including Michael Weldon in his Psychotronic Guide to Film), but Nyby always kicked back against that notion - and, rightly so, found it insulting. Nyby had worked with Howard Hawks for years, serving as an editor on some of Hawks's classic films, and he proposed that of course his film would have felt like a Hawks's film because of the influence of his mentor. It's a good argument, and I think people haven't given Nyby enough credit for this effort. Anyway, highly recommended.

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