The title has a footnote—a parodic gesture; it now quotes the relevant dialogue from The Thing, when the reporter implies that the scientist is “stuffed absolutely clean full of wild blueberry muffins.” This article was written for a special issue of Film Criticism called Interpretation, Inc.: Issues in Contemporary Film Studies, which appeared in 1993. Those invited to participate were asked to respond to the recent work of David Bordwell and to indicate what they thought were the important current issues in film theory as well as what kind of work they would like to see in the future. Most people wrote long articles; I wrote this short, frank manifesto. Bordwell later told me it was the only pluralistic piece in the issue. In tone, attitude, and content it was way out of sync with where the field was going.