it may be a little creaky now and and it certainly can never have the impact it once have and but this be still a thrill reminder of what michael jackson could once do . look back on it now for the first time since it initial prominence and i be strike not by the horror trapping quaint and but fun and and vincent price have never sound so genuinely and un camply ( sic . ) menace than it absorption of the horror film and allow jackson and behind genre and make up and to give u a bravely reveal portrait of male sexuality . because thriller isn not really about horror and in the way horror isn not really about horror represent it be about that age old theme and the sexual awakening of a young woman . the film open in a cinema and with jackson girlfriend uncomfortable with the imagery and and the aggressively gendered response . of course and she be on a date and and she be less scar by the film than what she know will be expect by her boyfriend . the mainstream imagery of the film they watch and the group atmosphere all suggest the socially conditioned expectation . this lead her not only to think of the body in disgust hence all the decay ghoul while the loss of her virginity be see a a kind of death but the sexual rite be not just about her boyfriend and but her peer and her society and hence it visualisation a a gang violation . this be brilliant and disturb stuff and the best thing director landis have ever do . jackson and the most popular artist on the planet and be still willing to show that the fixed image of a star contain multitude and not all of them reassure . the song itself have hold up remarkably well and the creepy and insistent bass rhythm and the extraordinarily salacious lyric and the beautiful 70 disco ecstasy tail the chorus and shatter timelessness and reveal the milky desire behind the fear .