X the Unknown

Dean Jagger battles radioactive goo from the center of the earth in this 1956 Hammer outing. Unlike "The Blob", released 2 years later, this creepy little horror story is played straight; no attempt at camp here! Dean Jagger, Leo McKern, and Anthony Newley play their parts with a subtlety and professionalism that's rarely matched in similar period pieces. While this film was overshadowed by it's American counterpart (see above), it remains one of Hammer's better efforts and should be judged on it's own. Yes, the premise is a bit hard to believe, but, once you get past that, everything else in this film works, from the direction to the score to the dialog, and of course the acting. In short, this is an underexposed, tight little chiller that has just the right amount of genuine suspense and believable characters. Don't miss it.

Hammer Films was known mostly for its horror outings like the Dracula, Frankenstein and Mummy films. It did, however, score well in the science fiction department with such hits as the Quatermass series, "The Lost Continent" and this movie.

The film was originally pitches as a potential sequel in the Quatermass series until author Nigel Kneale objected. Thus, the scientist became Alan Royston (played by Dean Jagger of "Twelve O'Clock High" fame) who worked at a nuclear plant instead of a rocket base and the location was moved to Scotland to avoid comparisons to Quatermass.

Ironically, the film still kept the same black & white photography, as well as the creepy string score.

The story involves radioactive mud (sounds silly unless you actually stayed awake during physical science class) that makes it way up to the surface of the earth every so often looking for new energy. Previous trips found nothing but fossil fuel. Now, however, nuclear energy is abundant. The race is on to not just figure out what is turning people into crispy critters, but how to stop something made of pure energy.

Dean Jagger as Royston is quite good and the exact opposite of Brian Donlevy's Quatermass. Leo McKern (of "The Prisoner") is on hand, as is the late British pop star and actor Anthony Newley as a soldier unfortunate enough to be on guard duty when X, the Unknown strikes.

The special effects are adequate, although British films still couldn't show explosions that didn't look like match heads flaring. The visual effects are really creepy, from radiation burns on a boy's chest to a doctor's face melting like wax to a security guard's body literally deflating like a balloon. The ending features a surprise, as well, leaving the viewer with the feeling that, although man appears to have triumphed again, something may still be amiss.

All in all, a good film, especially late on a Saturday night.

X: The Unknown from Hammer Films was intended to be a sequel to the film, The Quatermass Xperiment. Objections from the writer Nigel Kneale meant that the plot of the film was reworked.

The original director was slated to be the noted American blacklisted Joseph Losey who started shooting the film but due to illness had to be replaced by Leslie Norman (Father of film critic Barry Norman.)

This is an unpretentious film dealing with issues with nuclear radiation very much in vogue in the 1950s in horror and sci-fi films. The films also predates The Blob by a few years which was more campy.

Soldiers in Scotland discover a bottomless crack in the ground with a mysterious source of radiation activity. An explosion kills a few of the soldiers from radiation burns. Soon several more people die of radiation burns.

American actor Dean Jagger plays Dr Royston from an Atomic Laboratory who hypothesized that a form of life from prehistory trapped in the crust of the Earth, tries to reach the surface every 50 years depending on the alignment of the sun and tidal waves in order to find food from radioactive sources.

As the entity, a glowing blob feeds on radiation its mass increases as it tries to make its way to nuclear plants to find more radiation.

The film has a mix of good special effects especially with people melting and some ropey ones as the blob moves taking over the town or with fire explosions that look like a match going off. A lot of the horror is off camera but the film maintain its thrills.

The acting from Dean Jagger and Leo McKern is straightforward. It has a fair amount of thrills such as a little girl being left behind in a church as the blob approaches or at the climax when a jeep gets stuck in the mud.

Sometimes these low-budget science fiction features are amusing for unintended reasons, but this one is enjoyable because it has an interesting story and because it is well-crafted for such a low-budget movie. Since its effectiveness comes mostly from the story and from the solid acting, even with a bigger budget it might not have been significantly better.

The menace of "X the Unknown" is based on a far-fetched but interesting concept, and the story gets good mileage out of the premise, without pushing it too far. There are a couple of plot holes, but not so bad that they pull it down, and in general the story has the kind of internal logic that holds it together as long as you grant the premise for the sake of a good story.

The cast does surprisingly well. The characters are not the kind of roles that are particularly difficult to play, but they are the kind of roles that are easy to overplay, and that often are overplayed. Here the actors make their characters lifelike without trying to grab the attention, and it works pretty well.

Dean Jagger has good presence as Professor Royston, yet he avoids the kinds of stereotypes that sometimes make such characters annoying. Some of his little habits and mannerisms help to make the professor more human. Leo McKern also turns in a good performance. Edward Chapman's character is quite one-dimensional, yet he does a creditable job with it. It's also rather fun to see a very young-looking Anthony Newley in a small but entertaining role.

All of the cast members do a good job with a script that is plain but workmanlike. The special effects are rudimentary in technique, but they are good enough, and it's certainly preferable to have plain-looking special effects and a good story than to have flashy visuals and a dreary, pointless story. As a whole, "X the Unknown" delivers good science fiction without frills or padding, and it's easily among the better of the 1950s low-budget sci-fi movies.

X the Unknown is an excellent sci fi movie from Hammer. It was made a year after The Quatermass Experiment.

Drilling at a remote location in the Scottish Highlands attracts a strange force from below. It turns out to be a blob like creature that feeds on radiation, which gets bigger as a result. After several people are killed by it including a young boy, a scientist finds a way to kill it and succeeds at the end.

This films stars American actor Dean Jagger and is joined by several familiar British stars: Leo McKern (The Day The Earth Caught Fire), Anthony Newly (Killers of Kilimanjaro), a young Frazer Hines (Dr Who, Emmerdale) and Hammer regular Michael Ripper (Curse of the Werewolf, The Mummy).

The movie has a very creepy score and location photography, a lot of which was shot at night.

This movie is a must if you are a fan of 1950's science fiction and Hammer.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.