User Reviews

MGM brought this film out as part of their Midnight Movies series in 2001 on tape . . . it just cries out for a good DVD release now.

The first of 3 film versions of Nigel Kneale's Quatermass BBC serials, the odd choice of Brian Donlevy as lead may ultimately end up what is the most distinctive element of Val Guest's direction for the first two films.

My copy of the tape is the MGM/UA film from 1996 . . . the International Version - which apparently has 3 extra minutes. I know watching "THE CREEPING UNKNOWN" on TV when I was young, there were none of the fairly grisly corpse-shots.

Oddly enough, one of the CREEPING UNKNOWN posters features a creature that is somewhat reminiscent of Godzilla (though I suppose it's suppose to be an unseen phase of the creature that exists after it absorbs the lion and other big cats in the zoo).

Richard Wordsworth (who is also very memorable in REVENGE OF FRANKENSTEIN and CURSE OF THE WEREWOLF . . . as well as THE TRIPODS on TV much later) is great as the astronaut possessed by an other-worldly presence. At times his performance seems a bit inspired by Boris Karloff's Frankenstein . . .as do events like his brief encounter with the young girl by the bank of the river. Wordsworth is not only great at conveying the pain of the transition, but also at getting across the impression that the mind of astronaut Victor Carroon is still fighting to gain control at times.

Of course, the thing that struck me when I was young was the fact that he could absorb other life-forms, squeezing a cactus to bring about the thorny,gray cactus hands that he (off-screen) uses to clobber and absorb others. But then there's the horrific shot of his face from the bushes and the trailing whatsit (his pants, his leg, a tail) as he goes hunting for the zoo animals. The piece of Carroon that Quatermass finds and later feeds white rats to (until it's big enough to break out of a glass aquarium and crawl around the room) is a really clever touch that helps us visualize just how BAD the monster probably looks . . . and of course it's a touch of genius to have the BBC crew doing a documentary on Westminster Abbey, where the monster ends up finally, so that details can be obscured on the small screen. (Of course by this time the monster leaves a slug-like slime trail wherever it goes . . . and like the Thing it's going to let loose spores.) Apparently Les Bowie used bovine entrails and tripe to help embellish the monster - tripe is a quality it shares with it's later cousin, the ALIEN, of course.

As well, cut-away edits to an Octopus eye are quite effective and pretty much consistent with what we see of the monster.

There's been frequent talk of a re-make of this film, and I worry a bit about that, since the fairly restrained details and the generally competent cast are what make this film scary. Like Jan de Bont's awful re-make of THE HAUNTING, a bunch of CGI details and too much viewing of the monster could make the events seem a bit laughable . . . it's the actors like Jack Warner and Lionel Jeffries that pull the film off, as their reactions make you believe.

That said, my favorite Quatermass is Andrew Keir, and I find Brian Donlevy a nasty piece of work (he was nicer in GAMMERA). Basically Quatermass seems like a blustering thug . . . completely unapologetic for the near disaster he has created. Admittedly sometimes, as when he stalks past all the police and government officials to find his men and "start again" on his deadly Xperiment - the film has a kind of giddy noirish quality.

So I guess in some ways, I am interested by the way that Val Guest plays Quatermass like a monster himself. (When Carroon's wife springs him from the hospital, she has to hire a private detective - again, very noir - and tells Carroon she's going to "get you out of his (Quatermass') clutches!")

Still, I'm sympathetic to writer Nigel Kneale, who felt his sympathetic scientist had been turned into a bully.

Anyway, this is a great, atmospheric, and scary science-fiction horror movie, and well worth catching up with.

The Quatermass Xperiment is the first of the well-written British Sci-fi films based on Nigel Kneale's Professor Quatermass. The film tells the story of how a rocket had been sent up to space with three aboard and how it lands with seemingly two missing. The man in charge of everything is the professor himself, played starchily by Brian Donlevy. Donlevy's professor has no purpose except to succeed and to do anything and everything his way. He is certainly one of the prototypes of the determined, logical scientists to grace films afterward. The film has a slow start as it really spends a great deal of time showing the two different ways of looking and doing things. On the one hand is the Quatermass way, the logical, scientific, and survivalistic way, and on the other hand is the government way, slow, plodding, and indecisive. Through these the story unfolds that the one man that returned is in actuality a carrier of an alien that has grown through the consumption of human vitals into a slithering blob, growing bigger in stature all the time. Quatermass, with the aid of a Scotland Yard Inspector Lomax, wonderfully played with an amusing turn by Jack Warner, finally succeeds in saving our planet from the menace he was responsible for bringing down. Is he contrite? Does he see the errors of his ways? The film ends with his sending another rocket into space to explore the unknown. The film definitely sees the value of science over all us, including life here on Earth, through the vision, imagination, and drive of Donlevy's Professor Quatermass.

In the first of the Hammer Horrors, a spaceship crashes to earth in the English countryside, containing a mute, catatonic astronaut Victor Carroon (Wordsworth) - and no sign of the other two pilots except some traces of gloop.

It transpires Carroon has been infected by an alien parasite, responsible for the deaths of his fellow crew. As space program head, the ruthless, monomaniacal Professor Quatermass (Donlevy) says, "It's almost beyond human understanding: some fantastic invisible force converted two men into... jelly!" A rapidly mutating Carroon goes on a murderous rampage, pursued by Quatermass and Scotland Yard's Inspector Lomax (Warner, best known as 'Dixon Of Dock Green'). The chase culminates in a showdown with the comprehensively mutated Caroon in Westminster Abbey.

Based on Nigel Kneale's 1953 BBC TV serial (now mostly lost; it was transmitted live and only partially recorded), The Quatermass Xperiment benefits from its documentary-style approach, menacing score, and some sterling performances.

Particularly notable is Wordsworth (great-great-grandson of the poet) as the pitiable 'monster', whose horrified visage and total lack of dialogue simply adds to the poignancy of his condition (there's an air of the classic Universal Frankenstein Monster's pathos).

Conversely, Donlevy's aggressive performance has been the subject of continued controversy, but his casting was a sop to the Stateside market. The ex-soldier and Hollywood tough guy replaced the first, very English and very cerebral Quatermass, played by Reginald Tate.

In the original TV version, Tate's Quatermass had 'talked' the monster to death, appealing to the last vestiges of its humanity. As Kneale (who due to contractual obligations, had no input) griped, "Mr Donlevy? He could have taken on aliens bare-handed".

Despite these potential drawbacks, Guest makes a virtue of the low budget (£42,000), substituting genuine chills for effects and action - although a culminating glimpse of the hideous beastie leaves viewers in no doubt about the horrific consequences, should this one get away (it's potential to reproduce is as terrible as that of The Thing).

While the final shot, of an unrepentant Quatermass - perhaps the real 'monster' here - launching another rocket, is arguably the most chilling image of all.

One of the most impressive things about "Quatermass" is that the creators involved with the concepts seem to be consistently good at making a modest budget go a very long way towards an impressive story.

I remember seeing the "Quatermass II" television serial a few months back and being completely pulled into the suspense and mystery of the story in spite of the tiny budget for special effects because the writing was intelligent, well thought out, and without a dull moment in the screenplay. The same is true here.

While the budget is obviously considerably higher, it's still a modest little thing compared to contemporaries like "This Island Earth" and "The Day The Earth Stood Still", but it doesn't matter, because this is a movie about ideas. It works well on many levels, from the underplayed makeup and transformation effects for the "returning" astronaut to the staging and execution of the final showdown in a local British landmark.

It's also pretty cool that the creators stayed with the idea of Quatermass as a gruff, headstrong and abrasive man. But the character always means what he says and has solid reasons for his actions; and when a character like Quatermass starts showing concern and anxiety, it's much more effective in enhancing the suspense than if he were usually a "warm fuzzy" kind of guy.

In short, this is a minor classic, well worth taking the time to see if you get the chance.

Brian Donlevy is a scientist at the head of a space exploration program. One of his rockets returns from space with two of its crew missing and the third in a kind of waking coma. Film from the flight suggests to Donlevy that perhaps there is some life form floating around in space, intelligent, but without matter, just pure energy, and that it latches on to any living organism it happens to encounter and reproduce itself.

That's quite a stretch. As it turns out, Donlevy is correct. The comatose survivor of the space ship is smuggled out of the hospital by his unsuspecting wife (Margia Dean). This is a big mistake on her part. The victim, Richard Wordsworth, has been compelled by the force that occupies his body, to smash his hand into a cactus plant, thus turning his hand into a spiny glob. He's already killed on man with it. When his wife discovers his hideous deformity she shrieks and Wordsworth exits the car and stumbles off into the night.

Donlevy and the police are in pursuit, and a good thing because the victim of this infection is slowly turning into a blubbering blob, from his arm up. There is an encounter with a cheerful young girl who wants him to play with her, but Frankenstein's monster -- I mean the lumpy Wordsworth -- smashes her dolly and heads towards the zoo for a meal of antelope, lion, and whatever else he happens to find. By this time, he's sliding like a slug rather than walking.

The thing is now the size of a giant octopus and is accidentally discovered during a BBC broadcast in Westminster Abbey. Donlevy manages to electrocute it -- it's no longer a "him" -- and stalks off to begin the space exploration program anew.

I saw this when I was a kid and it scared the pants off me. Now, more mature, more experienced, a man of more substance, I found it a little embarrassing. The budget must have been minuscule. I still sympathized with Wordsworth as he slowly, agonizingly, is transformed by the force occupying his body, and in fact Richard Wordsworth's performance is very good. Donlevy is a barrel-chested actor without much range, though he was an interesting man. He was dogged by an alcohol problem and was part of General Pershing's punitive expedition into Mexico after Pancho Villa's incursion in 1916. Some of the supporting cast were good enough to go on to substantial careers in British cinema -- Lionel Jeffries and Gordon Jackson, for example. The performances of one or two others induce winces of pain. Margia Dean sounds dubbed -- and does not utter a believable line. David King-Wood, as Donlevy's assistant, actually commits the fundamental error of glancing at the camera during a scene -- not his fault. Maybe not the director's either. There may not have been enough money for another take.

The logic behind the monster's development is also befuddling. What is "intelligent energy"? If the thing can live off plant matter, as it apparently can, else why absorb the cactus, then why does it seek out animals? And why does it take so long to absorb the energy or the cells or the ectoplasm from Wordsworth, when it can do the same to a human victim in a few minutes? You're better off approaching this with your mind in neutral and treating it as a horror show that is far too delicate for anything resembling close examination. Put aside all thought and just let your skin crawl.

An experimental space rocket crashes on re-entry with two of the crew missing and the survivor in a catatonic state. The scientists slowly diagnose some form of alien space virus invaded the ship, but not before the astronaut, whom they now realise is gradually transforming into some kind of monster, escapes ...

Nigel Kneale's original series of Quatermass BBC TV plays are amongst the best sci-fi / horror yarns ever written; gripping, suspenseful, intelligent, imaginative and scary as hell. The ideas are fantastic but the reasoning behind them is well worked out, and this movie of the original story is a wonderfully creepy affair, beautifully played straight by an entire cast of authority figures (a complete contrast to the equivalent Roger Corman films of the time). Even the London locations seem to add authenticity (Westminster Abbey, the zoo at Regent's Park, the old docks at Deptford) and the movie explains just enough of what's going on to leave the viewer puzzled, intrigued and worried. Guest's direction is first-rate with unobtrusive photography and editing, shooting the movie almost like a documentary and capturing the tensions perfectly. This was a very big influence, both stylistically and thematically, on a lot of subsequent films (for example, John Carpenter's The Thing) and is undoubtedly one of the most important science-fiction films of the fifties. Featuring several British cult stars - Warner (Dixon of Dock Green), Jeffries, Jackson, Hird and Asher (the little girl with the dolly). The first great movie by Hammer Studios (here billed as Exclusive Films), released in the US as The Creeping Unknown, and followed by an even better sequel, Quatermass 2 / Enemy From Space. Magic stuff.

(Some Spoilers) Crashing back on earth Rocketship Q1 is later found to have only one of it's three astronauts on-board Victor Carroon, Richard Wordsoort, who's alive but that's about all he is. Q1 is the brainchild of Prof. Bernard Quartrmass, Brian Donlevy, who comes across so arrogant and self-centered that you find it very hard to like him even though he's supposed to be the star and hero of the movie "Quartermass Xperiment".

Victor unable to speak or even communicate can't explain to Prof. Quatermass and his fellow scientists what exactly happened to him and his fellow space travelers who disappeared without a trace. On top of that he, Victor, is slowly changing into what looks like some kind of interstellar amoeba that not only attacks and sucks the life's blood out of anything it comes in contact with plant man or animal. Victor is ,like an amoeba, splitting into two then four then eight different "Things" until it, or Victor, will eventually cover the entire world and devour every living thing on it. It's later found out from a movie camera installed on Q1, that was filming during the flight, that the two other astronauts other then Victor simply disintegrated. Still it takes a while for Prof. Quatermass to realize that the two were absorbed by the space amoeba that took over Vctor's body.

Starting with plant life, like flowers and cactus, Victor goes on a rampage when he's foolishly taken out of his hospital room by his wife's Judith, Margia Dean, friend Christie, Harold Lang, who ends up getting killed and partly absorbed by Victor for his effort. The Thing impersonating Victor then kills and absorbs people and animal's, mostly in the local zoo, all over town until it's tracked down at the famous Westminster Abbey. I's there where it plants itself on the church's balcony almost daring the army and police to take it on.

Trying to figure out just how to destroy this "Thing", that by now looks more like and octopus then an amoeba, without spreading it and it's reproducing spoors all over the place Prof. Quatermass comes up with this brilliant idea to cook, and shrink, it with massive doses of electricity from all the power stations in and around London. Predictable ending with the "Thing" being shrunk out of existence but what really surprised me was how Prof. Quatermass acted at the end of the movie looking as if he lost his best friend in the world,The Thing! Prof. Quatermaster walks away mad as hell, when he should have been celebrating, and not talking to anyone with only one and only one thing on his mind : to start this whole mess, and Thing, over again for the good and future of scientific research!

Dr. Quartermass (Brian Donlevy) sent a rocket into outer space with three men aboard. It unexpectedly crash lands back on Earth with only one man still on board (Richard Wordsworth) and he's very ill. It seems he's been infected by an alien fungus which is devouring him and everything he touches...

It is serious and well-made with some good acting but I wasn't impressed. I'm not a big sci-fi fan so I'm probably not the best judge of this film. I found it mildly interesting...but only VERY mildly. This film was obviously filmed on a low budget--the sets look very cheap (look at the cockpit of the ship!). Also the very few glimpses we get at Wordsworth as he becomes a monster are pretty laughable with terrible makeup. The final few shots of the full fledged "monster" are giggle-inducing. The big finale at Westminster Abbey seems terribly rushed. The main problem with this film is Donlevy--he's VERY wooden as Quartermass and gives a terrible performance. Hard to believe this got an X rating in Britain at the time of its release.

So this might be pretty good for some sci-fi fans but I was bored. I give it a 5.