Last night in Santa Monica was the start of “Escape Artist: A Tribute to John Carpenter” at the Aero Theater. In addition to being treated to a double feature of “The Thing” (widely regarded as Carpenter’s best film to date) and “The Fog,” the writer/director/composer also showed up in between the screenings of both films to give us more insight on the films, and took questions from the audience. Even though these movies are 20 to 30 years old now and have been available on DVD for quite some time, they still resonate deeply for movie fans all these years later. This was proven true by the fact that the screenings were sold out and packed with biggest of all John Carpenter fans.
The show started off with the emcee announcing to the crowd:
“Are you ready to view the new M. Night Shyamalan movie “The Happening?” That’s right, you thought you were here to see some John Carpenter movies, but this is all part of the Shyamalan twist!”
Of course, he was just kidding as he knew the crowd was about to partake in the “Citizen Kane of horror movies” with his 1982 remake of “The Thing.” The emcee indicated that the print they had for tonight’s showing was the best they could find and that the film itself has faded a bit and did have scratches here and there, but that never took away from the enthusiastic response of the crowd as the lights went down, and the credits came up to thunderous applause every time Carpenter’s name came up. A few other names got applause as well like Kurt Russell and Dean Cundey among others.
John Carpenter’s “The Thing” is 7th on my list of my top ten all time favorite movies, and it remains to date the best horror film remake ever. That’s an especially high mark in cinema considering that today’s film market is overflowing with horror remakes, most of them being sacrilegious crap. While the movie was not a big hit when it was first released, it has since developed a huge cult following thanks to home video and DVD and has finally been recognized as the masterpiece it has always been. 80% of the audience there that evening has probably seen this movie at least several dozen times, but even if they have lines memorized and know everything that happens, they still jumped in surprise during the movie’s most shocking moments.
After the movie ended and the end credits were all finished, John Carpenter was brought out into the audience and was met with a standing ovation and thunderous applause from all those who came out to see him. Once the audience sat down, he immediately thanked them for coming on out to see this movie when they could have just watched it at home. One fan in turn thanked him for coming on out to visit with us as he has millions of fans all over the world, and yet he chose to hang out with us.
Today, as the emcee pointed out, many are surprised to hear that “The Thing” was not a big hit when it was first released back in 1982. Carpenter put it all the more bluntly:
“It tanked! 1982 was supposed to be the summer of love. It was the summer of “E.T.,” and it was the summer of freedom and hope, and “The Thing” was about as bleak a movie as any that could have been released that year. People hated it for that, and all the sci-fi fans out there absolutely hated it and trashed it when it first came out.”
As Carpenter pointed out to actor and friend Kurt Russell on the DVD commentary of the movie:
“We came out two weeks after “E.T.” And while there’s was all warm and cuddly, ours was ugly and hideous.”
Universal Pictures, which released both movies that summer, attempted to make it the summer of the extra terrestrials, but the timing did not work at all in Carpenter’s favor, and it later cost him the job of directing a Stephen King adaptation, “Firestarter.”
One fan pointed out that this film was unique in a sense in that this is one of the few John Carpenter’s that he did not compose the score for himself. While it does indeed have that Carpenter sound that we have come to recognize in his movies, the score was actually composed by Ennio Morricone. Carpenter replied that Morricone is one of the greatest composers of ever in film, and this was met with loud applause from the audience. John did point out that there is one synthesizer piece of music played in the music that was not composed by Ennio. Now he wouldn’t say who did it, but for those of you who did see the movie, I’m sure we can all say who it was.
Someone asked if it was possible for John to talk the powers that be in to getting the soundtrack to “The Thing” re-released, as it has been out of print now for several years. John replied that unfortunately he has no juice with the powers that be, so it looks like fans everywhere will still have to shell out an obscene amount of money in collector’s market to get the Varese Sarabande release at conventions or online.
Another guy in the audience pointed out that several of his movies have been remade such as “Assault on Precinct 13,” “The Fog,” and “Halloween,” and that a remake of “Escape From New York” is in the works. This guy said he found these remakes blasphemous, and he asked John how he felt about them. John replied:
“I actually find it flattering. They also have to pay me a lot of money when they do that!”
Dean Cundey, director of photography on “The Thing,” has worked on several of Carpenter’s movies including the all time classic “Halloween.” John has actually not worked with Cundey for a long time now, and one man asked why that was the case, and if there had been some falling out between the two of them. Carpenter replied that there has been no falling out between the two of them, and that he recently caught up with Dean at a movie shoot in Canada. John did however point out why they haven’t worked together in a long time:
“Dean wanted to be a director. And when you have a director on a movie, and a director of photography who wants to be a director, that’s just not gonna work out.”
Everyone who knows John Carpenter knows that he himself is a big fan of westerns, and he recently recorded a commentary track for the special edition DVD release of the John Wayne classic, “Rio Bravo.” Many wonder why he has never get around to doing a western of his own. John replied that he honestly didn’t know, but that he did come close several times. The closest he said that he had ever come to doing one was when he wrote the script for “El Diablo” which was made into a cable movie (he won a Cable Ace Award for his script that year). If you look closely at his film work, all of his movies do have western elements to them. The closest he has ever gotten to making a western is arguably “Vampires” with James Woods.
Carpenter also made it official that “Masters Of Horror,” the Showtime network’s original anthology series, is now dead. John directed two of the series’ best episodes with “Cigarette Burns” and “Pro-Life,” and he said that the show has now turned into an NBC show called “Fear Itself” which is being worked on by the same people. While this incarnation of the horror anthology series may open itself up to a bigger audience than it found on cable, Carpenter said that there is not much to be feared about it.
John Carpenter has not actually directed a full length feature film since “Ghosts of Mars” which came out back in 2001. Many are wondering, and it was asked, what future projects he has on tap, and of what his current passions are. His reply:
“Current passions? I’m playing Ninja Gaiden, I just got Metal Gear Solid 4 for Playstation 3… No seriously, I have a couple of things I’m looking at doing, so we’ll see what happens.”
Before he left, he did have some things to say about “The Fog” which start showing a few minutes later:
“I have heard that the print for this movie is not in the greatest shape, and that it is pretty faded. But keep in mind that when we made this movie, we made it for only $1 million dollars… So, please be kind.”
Rising again to a big standing ovation, John thanked everyone again for coming and strode out of the theater. He did however stick around outside of the theater for a bit to take pictures with the fans and sign autographs. I’ve seen John do many different showings of his movies, and of him talking with the audience after the movie ended. With this one, he seemed to enjoy himself a lot more than he usually does. I can imagine that he gets sick at times of talking about the same movies over and over again, and he has probably discussed them to death in different arenas, but he still shows up to meet with the fans. You have to figure that he has had the last laugh on the critics and audiences who tore his movies apart when they first opened years ago. Many of his movies were way ahead of their time, but people eventually did catch on to his work, and they love it just like they should have in the beginning.
The show started off with the emcee announcing to the crowd:
“Are you ready to view the new M. Night Shyamalan movie “The Happening?” That’s right, you thought you were here to see some John Carpenter movies, but this is all part of the Shyamalan twist!”
Of course, he was just kidding as he knew the crowd was about to partake in the “Citizen Kane of horror movies” with his 1982 remake of “The Thing.” The emcee indicated that the print they had for tonight’s showing was the best they could find and that the film itself has faded a bit and did have scratches here and there, but that never took away from the enthusiastic response of the crowd as the lights went down, and the credits came up to thunderous applause every time Carpenter’s name came up. A few other names got applause as well like Kurt Russell and Dean Cundey among others.
John Carpenter’s “The Thing” is 7th on my list of my top ten all time favorite movies, and it remains to date the best horror film remake ever. That’s an especially high mark in cinema considering that today’s film market is overflowing with horror remakes, most of them being sacrilegious crap. While the movie was not a big hit when it was first released, it has since developed a huge cult following thanks to home video and DVD and has finally been recognized as the masterpiece it has always been. 80% of the audience there that evening has probably seen this movie at least several dozen times, but even if they have lines memorized and know everything that happens, they still jumped in surprise during the movie’s most shocking moments.
After the movie ended and the end credits were all finished, John Carpenter was brought out into the audience and was met with a standing ovation and thunderous applause from all those who came out to see him. Once the audience sat down, he immediately thanked them for coming on out to see this movie when they could have just watched it at home. One fan in turn thanked him for coming on out to visit with us as he has millions of fans all over the world, and yet he chose to hang out with us.
Today, as the emcee pointed out, many are surprised to hear that “The Thing” was not a big hit when it was first released back in 1982. Carpenter put it all the more bluntly:
“It tanked! 1982 was supposed to be the summer of love. It was the summer of “E.T.,” and it was the summer of freedom and hope, and “The Thing” was about as bleak a movie as any that could have been released that year. People hated it for that, and all the sci-fi fans out there absolutely hated it and trashed it when it first came out.”
As Carpenter pointed out to actor and friend Kurt Russell on the DVD commentary of the movie:
“We came out two weeks after “E.T.” And while there’s was all warm and cuddly, ours was ugly and hideous.”
Universal Pictures, which released both movies that summer, attempted to make it the summer of the extra terrestrials, but the timing did not work at all in Carpenter’s favor, and it later cost him the job of directing a Stephen King adaptation, “Firestarter.”
One fan pointed out that this film was unique in a sense in that this is one of the few John Carpenter’s that he did not compose the score for himself. While it does indeed have that Carpenter sound that we have come to recognize in his movies, the score was actually composed by Ennio Morricone. Carpenter replied that Morricone is one of the greatest composers of ever in film, and this was met with loud applause from the audience. John did point out that there is one synthesizer piece of music played in the music that was not composed by Ennio. Now he wouldn’t say who did it, but for those of you who did see the movie, I’m sure we can all say who it was.
Someone asked if it was possible for John to talk the powers that be in to getting the soundtrack to “The Thing” re-released, as it has been out of print now for several years. John replied that unfortunately he has no juice with the powers that be, so it looks like fans everywhere will still have to shell out an obscene amount of money in collector’s market to get the Varese Sarabande release at conventions or online.
Another guy in the audience pointed out that several of his movies have been remade such as “Assault on Precinct 13,” “The Fog,” and “Halloween,” and that a remake of “Escape From New York” is in the works. This guy said he found these remakes blasphemous, and he asked John how he felt about them. John replied:
“I actually find it flattering. They also have to pay me a lot of money when they do that!”
Dean Cundey, director of photography on “The Thing,” has worked on several of Carpenter’s movies including the all time classic “Halloween.” John has actually not worked with Cundey for a long time now, and one man asked why that was the case, and if there had been some falling out between the two of them. Carpenter replied that there has been no falling out between the two of them, and that he recently caught up with Dean at a movie shoot in Canada. John did however point out why they haven’t worked together in a long time:
“Dean wanted to be a director. And when you have a director on a movie, and a director of photography who wants to be a director, that’s just not gonna work out.”
Everyone who knows John Carpenter knows that he himself is a big fan of westerns, and he recently recorded a commentary track for the special edition DVD release of the John Wayne classic, “Rio Bravo.” Many wonder why he has never get around to doing a western of his own. John replied that he honestly didn’t know, but that he did come close several times. The closest he said that he had ever come to doing one was when he wrote the script for “El Diablo” which was made into a cable movie (he won a Cable Ace Award for his script that year). If you look closely at his film work, all of his movies do have western elements to them. The closest he has ever gotten to making a western is arguably “Vampires” with James Woods.
Carpenter also made it official that “Masters Of Horror,” the Showtime network’s original anthology series, is now dead. John directed two of the series’ best episodes with “Cigarette Burns” and “Pro-Life,” and he said that the show has now turned into an NBC show called “Fear Itself” which is being worked on by the same people. While this incarnation of the horror anthology series may open itself up to a bigger audience than it found on cable, Carpenter said that there is not much to be feared about it.
John Carpenter has not actually directed a full length feature film since “Ghosts of Mars” which came out back in 2001. Many are wondering, and it was asked, what future projects he has on tap, and of what his current passions are. His reply:
“Current passions? I’m playing Ninja Gaiden, I just got Metal Gear Solid 4 for Playstation 3… No seriously, I have a couple of things I’m looking at doing, so we’ll see what happens.”
Before he left, he did have some things to say about “The Fog” which start showing a few minutes later:
“I have heard that the print for this movie is not in the greatest shape, and that it is pretty faded. But keep in mind that when we made this movie, we made it for only $1 million dollars… So, please be kind.”
Rising again to a big standing ovation, John thanked everyone again for coming and strode out of the theater. He did however stick around outside of the theater for a bit to take pictures with the fans and sign autographs. I’ve seen John do many different showings of his movies, and of him talking with the audience after the movie ended. With this one, he seemed to enjoy himself a lot more than he usually does. I can imagine that he gets sick at times of talking about the same movies over and over again, and he has probably discussed them to death in different arenas, but he still shows up to meet with the fans. You have to figure that he has had the last laugh on the critics and audiences who tore his movies apart when they first opened years ago. Many of his movies were way ahead of their time, but people eventually did catch on to his work, and they love it just like they should have in the beginning.
John Carpenter will be back tonight for a double feature of “Escape From New York” and the vastly underappreciated “Escape From LA.” Hopefully, we’ll see John make another big screen film at some point again in the future.
Written by Ben Kenber
Yeah, I wished AFI out here did these kind of revivals. That is what I love about New Beverley and the theater. you saw this at.
He is a very under rated director.
His more recent films lacked magic of his earlier films.
But he influenced more people today making films. You see his influence everywhere.
I can't believe I missed this! I can still remember the first time I saw "The Thing." It never seems to lose its brilliance.