More faithful to the John W. Campbell short story than the 1951 version, but I found it hard to care much about the unattractive characters in the movie. Rob Bottin's special effects were state of the art at the time, and are still not for the squeamish. The movie grew on me over time, and has held up I think better than much of Carpenter's other stuff. ( )

The rare remake that is as good as the original. ( )