L'astronave degli esseri perduti

Roy Ward Baker directed this belated(10 years later) third entry in the Quatermass saga, this time casting a proper British actor to play British rocket group scientist Bernard Quatermass, called in to investigate a skeleton found near a presumed undetonated German bomb in the London underground being excavated for a new subway line, that turns out to be an alien spacecraft with Martian insect-humanoids aboard. James Donald plays Professor Roney, in charge of the dig, and one of the few unaffected by the Martian attempt to use their human descendants to purge all those not part of the hive... Intelligent, ambitious, and audacious science fiction story may have some off-putting elements, and primitive model F/X, but remains a prime example of how to do this kind of story right. Based on the Nigel Kneale miniseries, this is by far the best of the trilogy.

A lot of nonsense is written about the significance and meaning and quality of Hammer Films, whereas mostly they were pedestrian and derivative. There were some gems in their output and this film is one of them. The science may be wayward but it unfolds plausibly from the initial discovery of the thing in the pit to mayhem and madness in the streets of London. The opening credits are sparse and it goes straight into the story and never lets up.

It has a clear narrative and each new discovery pushes the envelope of fear and amazement further out. There is no romantic interest (though I must declare the Miss Judd character is pretty darn attractive) to hold up the driving plot. If there is a fault it is that the story can scarcely contain the wealth of material that Nigel Kneale puts in the script. Presumably there isn't a longer director's cut in some film archive!

With limited resources at hand the director, Roy Ward Baker, directs some great scenes, weird and strange and scary. He is served well by the acting of James Donald, Andrew Keir and Barbara Shelley, which is perfect for their roles. As the alien presence become stronger you believe it when it affects the characters. The scene at the pit where Miss Judd has her visions recorded is excellent. The special effects are varied but the green arthropods and the space ship look quite malevolent. The ending is great and somehow disquieting as the closing credits slowly roll.

This is a good example of an interesting intelligent film, costing less than the catering budget of the elephantine mega-budget film we have these days, but much more effective and memorable.

Hammer Films have a lot to thank writer Nigel Kneale and his most popular character Bernard Quatermass for. When the BBC originally broadcast The Quatermass Experiment to a terrified audience, Hammer producer Anthony Hinds saw the potential for a movie adaptation and quickly snapped up the rights. At the time, Hammer were enjoying modest success making low-budget second features, but 1955's The Quatermass Xperiment (named so to highlight the X rating dished out by the BBFC), known as The Creeping Unknown in the U.S., became a hit and put the company's name on the cinematic map. Quatermass 2 (a.k.a. Enemy From Space) followed shortly after, and the rest is history.

It seems like they were saving the best for last, and waited a whopping 10 years to deliver it. When skeletal remains are dug up during an extension to the London Underground, Palaeontologist Dr. Mathew Roney (James Donald) is called in, who concludes that the remains are that of an ancient race of 'apemen', possibly from 5 million years ago. Bernard Quatermass (Andrew Keir) disagrees however, and when further digging reveals a large metallic object, he believes it may be of alien origin. Colonel Breen (Game of Thrones' Julian Glover) insists that it is an unexploded bomb from World War II, and refutes Quatermass' claims. As the mystery unfolds, the discovery may lead to shocking revelations regarding man's evolution, and one that we are not ready to face.

Quatermass and the Pit may feature some incredibly dated effects, but this is sci-fi as complex and intellectual as 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968); a film it is often compared to. Based on the six- part series, Pit's main issue is the difficulty in condensing hours' worth of material into a 98-minute movie, hitting the audience with one theory and revelation after another. But great sci-fi is primarily built on a singular great idea, and this is up there with the best. While the twists and turns are often a struggle to keep up with, the frantic pace created by the lack of running time means that we're kept on the edge of our seats for the duration. Keir is also an improvement on American Brian Donlevy (who played the professor in the previous two films), infusing Quatermass with warmth and a distinct Britishness.

This film is not your usual sci-fi monster from the deep or outer space but a story based on comprehensible logic - the suggestion that the human mind and it's psychic and sixth sense qualities was the result of alien intervention with our ancestral primates millions of years ago. Andrew Keir plays a fine role as the tweedy dressed sometimes gruff gentleman professor, Bernard Quatermass who teams up with equally amiable James Donald as Dr.Mathew Roney and his attractive female assistant Barbara Shelley as Barbara Judd to solve the riddle of a strange craft and several ape like skeletons unearthed during the reconstruction of an underground London railway station. At first thought to be an unexploded second world war missile an Army demolition team is brought in to disarm it, led by the bombastic single minded military thinking Colonel Breen played by Julian Glover who scoffs at the theories of the two scientists that this could be anything more than a German V weapon. The finding of large insect like creatures preserved within the hull of the craft and an analysis of their physical attributes leads Quatermass and Roney to conclude that they are Martians who along with their ape like passengers were killed as a result of a crash landing five million years beforehand. Quatermass also speculates that the apes had been previously taken from Earth to Mars and altered in order to give them Martian thinking characteristics which were then inherited by their human descendants. Breen dismisses the insect creatures as fakes and convinces his government superiors that the missile is safe, against the advice of Quatermass, Roney and Judd who have already discovered sinister awakenings within the craft after a workman dismantling his drill therein is seized upon by an invisible propelling force along with terrifying mental images. When the public and press are admitted to the site the craft comes to life generating a ghostly devil looking apparition, along with the now mind affected local population banding into groups and unleashing a killing spree on their own kind. Quatermass and Roney must now pool their scientific expertise to neutralize the menace and restore order. Nigel Kneale's compelling screenplay is sheer brilliance and gives this film a distinct and special uniqueness in the world of science fiction. A must see for the serious minded movie watcher.

I remember seeing this movie as a kid in Compton on my small black and white TV. The eerie holographic image of the Martian Devil's Head floating over the wreckage of London stayed in my mind, and led to more than a few nightmares. Still, I can't deny this film's pull after the decades, and it is a Guilty Pleasure that I often pull from the DVD cabinet. And no, I'm not a Quatermass Fan.

Even today, despite the film's fair degree of dating, I am impressed and staggered by the conceptual genius of Nigel Kneale's script, and Roy Ward Baker's ability to mesh sci-fi and "Spiritual Evil" (as a disturbed Parson notes) in a product that is well removed from the standard Hammer fare. There is a real subversive pull to this little film, which piles on concepts such as Race Memory, Evolution, Conformity, Alien Colonization, Belief in "The Devil" and the occult, Ethnic Cleansing, Human Supremacy, and the arrogance, stupidity and mendacity of politicians and the military. On some level, it's hard not to be awed by the film's ambitions..

(****SOME PLOT SPOILERS BELOW****)

The plot: progress on The Hobb's End Underground Transport comes to a halt when the subway workers unearth what appear to be primitive apelike skeletons and a mysterious "craft" which is initially believed to be an unexploded bomb left over from The War. Professor Bernard Quatermass (Andrew Keir), at odds with the government over the planned military use of his "rocket group" investigates, with the assistance of two paleontologists, Dr. Mathew Roney (James Donald), and Dr. Barbara Judd (Barbara Shelley). Disturbed and intrigued that the skeletons were found IN the ship and appear to date nearly 5 millions years, and that the largely vacated Hobb's End Lane area has been a site for of "demoniac activity," for centuries.

Given the film's rather meager resources, it is hard not be impressed by the story, acting, and general mood of growing apocalyptic. In the usual Hammer film, the nemesis is clearly the supernatural: in these movies, we fear violent death at the hands of vampires, werewolves, ghouls, etc. The horror on hand in this movie, which doesn't show itself in all its preening glory until the end, is far more insidious and devastating. The Evil that threatens human civilization itself, questions our Evolution, Intellect, and Spiritual Beliefs. Because The Evil in Quatermass is, in essence, Dead from the get-go, it can't be easily faced, conquered, disputed with and laid to rest. The evil is, in fact, rooted firmly in the collective Mind of Man, and given the right "trigger", is able to manifest itself on a staggering, all-encompassing level. It shows itself in small clues: the scratches on the walls in the houses on Hobb's Lane, old local newspaper pieces and local history tomes, skulls, pentagrams on spaceship hulls, etc.: but when it finally does arrive, it upends Mankind's very identity, and the damage that is done, doesn't look like it can be repaired or explained away. Even when the "Pit's" alien ghosts are defeated, the victory seems pretty hollow.

Keir, whom I remember from such films as "Fall of The Roman Empire," and "Dracula Has Risen From The Grave", plays his role with gruff conviction ("I never had a career, I just had work!" He grouses to his unwanted colleague Colonel Breen), and I have always liked the amiable Donald, who was terrific as the most sane character in one of my favorite movies, "Bridge on The River Kwai.". The two are well-matched by the excellent Barbara Shelley, who brings a fair degree of wild sensuality to her role when she's possessed by an alien race memory. Still, I have to give some major plaudits to Glover, whose character is such a smug and supercilious ass, that it's fitting when you do see him kneel in lethal supplication to The Truth he has been dismissing throughout the movie. The occasional moments of dry as well as bumptious British humor are truly appreciated, offering occasional respite from the overall sense of rising darkness.

Many have pointed out that "Quatermass and The Pit", in its theme of alien intervention in human evolution is the dark flip-side to "2001," and that is certainly true. I also saw echoes of this film in Tobe Hooper's Lifeforce (1985), especially in the climactic scenes of London's devastation at the hands of its "space vampires.". You could also throw in Stephen King's novel, "The Tommyknockers". Even so, I was and still am, spellbound by the movie's novelty, its thought-intriguing meld of science-fiction and horror, the juxtaposition of skulls and sleek extraterrestrial metal, the Martian spaceship standing in quite nicely for the proverbial Haunted House. The movie does have its share of gaffes: the "alien locust" carcasses should have been seen as little as possible, and a scene where a soldier goes bonkers after seeing an "apparition of a small, hideous dwarf" inside the ship, lacks the timing to pull it off.

Still, given its execution and drive, the movie's coda of Keir and Shelley leaning wearily against the rubble of London as the city burns in the background, nicely sums up what horror films should be about: Things Are Not Okay, and may never be Okay anytime in the near future.