Quentin Tarantino Calls This Kurt Russell Sci-Fi Horror Movie 'One Of The Greatest' Ever Made

Legendary filmmaker Quentin Tarantino has set a bar that few can match, but that's only because of the staple movies that inspired him to create the hits he's given us over the years. From WWII do-or-die missions to bloody affairs involving ninjas and assassination squads, there's been a variety of genres that Tarantino has dipped his toe (and others, for that matter) into, but one genre he's only skimmed over is horror. He both penned and starred in "From Dusk Till Dawn" and then ran over the slasher with a high-speed vehicle in "Death Proof," but what might come as a surprise is how one of the greatest horror movies ever made has had such a huge influence on a large portion of his career.

During an appearance on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert," the host and his guest shared their immense love for John Carpenter's bone-chilling body-horror classic, "The Thing," with the director explaining what got under his skin and stayed there for decades. As it turned out, some of Tarantino's greatest works have the DNA of Carpenter's remarkable remake stitched into them, whether it's the story or even some of the movie's creative forces eventually contributing to his own projects decades later.

Tarantino recalled the first time he saw the nightmare unfold at Outpost 31 and how much of it shaped his later ideas. "I don't get scared in movies. 'The Thing' I got scared in...," speaking of the cult classic that was a box-office bomb upon initial release. "I was scared, and it made me want to put it under a microscope about why I was actually frightened during that movie." It was here that Tarantino broke down his discovery. "The sheer paranoia of it. They're trapped in the Antarctic, in this shelter, and so the paranoia is bouncing off of the four walls until it has nowhere to go except through the fourth wall into the audience. I started feeling exactly like they felt."

It was this growing dread Tarantino felt from Carpenter's movie that he tried to replicate and reapply in his directorial debut, setting him on the path to becoming the revered movie maker he's regarded as today. "I was like, I need to have that aspect that's in 'The Thing.' I need to trap these bastards in this warehouse, and no one can trust anybody else... and I want the paranoia of what's going on in that warehouse to bounce across the walls and hopefully, like in 'The Thing,' it will go out into the audience." He certainly achieved that, along with immense success that would see Tarantino not only including that kind of tension in future films, but also using talents from "The Thing" in his own movies.

In 2015, Tarantino gave us what still feels like one of his most underappreciated entries in his filmography with "The Hateful Eight." The movie brought together an impressive cast, including Tim Roth, Samuel L. Jackson, future "Fallout" star Walton Goggins, and "The Thing" star Kurt Russell — who would reunite with Tarantino for their second project together. Just like Russell's chilly spine-tingler from the '80s, "The Hateful Eight" would also see a band of shady characters forced to hold up together in a snow-stricken location, with trust and deception shifting at every moment.

The tension and paranoia weren't the only things from "The Thing" making an appearance in Tarantino's ninth movie, as the score also came from the ingenious musical mind of composer Ennio Morricone, who also worked on the 1982 sci-fi horror movie. Additionally, the score we hear in Tarantino's movie includes unused music from Carpenter's film, as the director settled for synth music instead of what we ended up hearing 33 years later.

It's these additions that demonstrate just how far Tarantino has come and how his name is held in just as high regard as Carpenter's. But while there's no doubt the younger filmmaker has displayed talent through his time behind the camera, he's never managed to scare the living daylights out of audiences by turning someone's decapitated head into a spider from hell. Your move, Quentin.