X the Unknown

X the Unknown is a 1956 British science fiction horror film directed by Leslie Norman and starring Dean Jagger, Leo McKern and Edward Chapman.<ref name="BFIsearch">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It was made by the Hammer Film Productions company and written by Jimmy Sangster, at the suggestion of Anthony Hinds. This was the first film Jimmy Sangster ever scripted, and its success started his entire screenwriting career. The film is significant in that "it firmly established Hammer's transition from B-movie thrillers to out-and-out horror/science fiction" and, with The Quatermass Xperiment (1955) and Quatermass 2 (1957), completes "an important trilogy containing relevant allegorical threads revealing Cold War anxieties and a diminishing national identity resulting from Britain's decrease in status as a world power".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite newsTemplate:Dead link</ref>

The film's special effects were handled by Les Bowie and Jack Curtis, Bernard Robinson and Jimmy Sangster were Production Designers, Chris Sutton was Assistant Director and Phil Leakey did Makeup. As with Quatermass, Hammer played up the film's X Certificate in their advertising. Filming began the first week of January 1956, and premiered at the Pavillion on Sept. 21, 1956. In the UK, the film was released on a double bill with H.G. Clouzot's Diabolique.<ref>Johnson, Tom (1996). Hammer Films: An Exhaustive Filmography. North Carolina: McFarland. p. 114-115. ISBN 0-7864-0034-X.</ref>

Plot

The film opens in rural Scotland. In a deserted field, soldiers take turns familiarizing themselves with how to use a Geiger counter. Then, there is an explosion. One soldier dies of radiation exposure while another is badly burned. At the site, there is a Y-shaped crack in the ground with no apparent bottom. Dr. Royston of the Atomic Energy Laboratory, is called in to investigate. He is later joined by "Mac" McGill, who runs security at the UK Atomic Energy Commission. That night, a local boy witnesses an horrific off-camera sight. He dies the next day of radiation burns. Royston investigates and comes upon a tower occupied by an old man in possession of a canister left over from previous radiation experiments. Later, in a local hospital, a young doctor collapses and melts after witnessing the same off-screen horror as the boy.

The same evening, when two soldiers mysteriously die while guarding the Y-shaped crack, Royston's colleague Peter Elliott volunteers to be lowered into the pit to investigate. Before long, he encounters the same off-screen horror as witnessed before. However, he is pulled out of the pit in the nick of time. The army uses flamethrowers to try to kill the unseen creature but to no avail. Royston hypothesizes an explanation for the phenomenon. His theory involves a form of life that existed in distant prehistory when the Earth's surface was largely molten. This entity had been trapped by the crust of the Earth as it cooled. But every 50 years there is a tidal surge that these creatures feel, causing them to reach the surface and find "food" in the form of radioactive sources.

The thing is finally revealed – an ever-growing blob, now crawling its way toward the Laboratory to feed on cobalt being used there. Royston and McGill accurately predict its movement. They proceed to a location where they set up two large "scanners" on lorries and a canister of cobalt as bait. Peter drives the bait by jeep, drawing the blob's deadly attention. Eventually, the creature is neutralized and explodes. But as the team approaches the crack from which the monster had emerged, a second, more powerful explosion occurs, knocking several off their feet. Puzzled, the team continues approaching the crack, presumably to make further tests, as the film comes to an end.

Cast

• Dean Jagger as Dr. Adam Royston
• Leo McKern as "Mac" McGill
• Edward Chapman as John Elliott
• William Lucas as Peter Elliott
• Peter Hammond as Lieutenant Bannerman
• Anthony Newley as Lance Corporal "Spider" Webb
• Ian MacNaughton as Haggis
• Michael Ripper as Sergeant Harry Grimsdyke
• Michael Brooke as Willie Harding
• Frazer Hines as Ian Osborne

• Norman Macowan as Old Tom
• John Harvey as Major Cartwright
• Edwin Richfield as soldier burned on back
• Jane Aird as Vi Harding
• Neil Hallett as Unwin
• Kenneth Cope as Private Lansing
• Jameson Clark as Jack Harding
• Marianne Brauns as Zena, the nurse
• Brown Derby as the vicar
• Anthony Sagar as security man (uncredited)
• Edward Judd - small role as a soldier

Production

The film was originally intended by Hammer to be a sequel to the previous year's successful The Quatermass Xperiment, but writer Nigel Kneale refused permission for the character of Bernard Quatermass to be used.<ref name="quatermass">Template:Cite book</ref>

The original director of the film was supposed to be Joseph Losey, working under the name Joseph Walton – Losey was an American director who had moved to the UK after being placed on the Hollywood blacklist. Although Losey did begin pre-production on the film (casting the actors and building a number of sets), he was early on replaced by Leslie Norman purportedly due to illness. It is said the true story is that Dean Jagger refused to work with Losey because of his blacklisting.<ref name="tcmart">Stafford, Jeff. "X the Unknown" (article) on TCM.com</ref><ref name="rusc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="senses">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Norman was borrowed from Ealing. He had just made his directorial debut with The Night My Number Came Up (1955). He later said "I hated working at Hammer ... because I never got on with [Producer] Anthony Hinds."<ref name="brian">Brian McFarlane, An Autobiography of British Cinema, Metheun 1997 p441</ref> Cameraman Len Harris said none of the cast or crew liked working with Norman, because he was harsh with everyone (using abusive language) and always complaining.<ref>Johnson, Tom (1996). Hammer Films: An Exhaustive Filmography. North Carolina: McFarland. p. 115. ISBN 0-7864-0034-X.</ref>

Filming took place at Bray Studios in Berkshire, the Beaconsfield Gravel Pits and Gerrard's Cross.<ref>Johnson, Tom (1996). Hammer Films: An Exhaustive Filmography. North Carolina: McFarland. p. 113. ISBN 0-7864-0034-X.</ref><ref name="Maxford 2019 70">Template:Cite book</ref> Half the film's budget was provided by Sol Lesser, a producer for RKO Pictures.<ref name="Hammer"/> This amount, $30,000, went towards the salary for Dean Jagger.<ref name="hearn">Marcus Hearn & Alan Barnes, The Hammer Story: The Authorised History of Hammer Films, Titan Books, 2007 p. 18</ref> Nonetheless, the American distribution deal between Hammer and RKO fell through due to the latter company's pending demise, and the film was eventually distributed in the U.S. by Warner Bros.<ref name="tcmart" />

Critical reception

Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "X the Unknown intriguingly suggests a new addition to the science fiction repertoire of Things, but after a series of prolonged climaxes, with its potential victims staring directly into the camera and shaking with fright, the "Unknown" finally emerges as a type of rolling rubber mattress, disappointingly unhorrific in content and appearance. Scientific explanations for the object's arrival are disconcertingly vague; one is left with the impression that the "Unknown" has been created with the sole purpose of manoeuvring its elaborate destruction, and the script sometimes suggests this in a number of unintentionally comic lines. It seems likely, therefore, that enthusiasts may find the present adventure rather tame when compared with the more grisly experiments of Professor Quatermass."<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Variety reviewed the film twice. The first reviewer, "Myro", wrote in 1956:

X the Unknown is a highly imaginative and fanciful meller, with tense dramatic overtones which will help it along at the boxoffice. ... Made with creditable slickness, it tells a story which is completely absorbing, though totally unbelievable. There's little let-up in the action, and suspense angles are kept constantly to the forefront. Laboratory experiments in an atomic research station have an impressive, but familiar appeal, though ultimately they play a key role in the plot. War Office cooperated in the production, and its seal on a story of this kind should have some value. ... The scenes on the desolate moor, the sight of the grim atomic mass moving relentlessly towards its main target, the closeups of the radio-active victims, and the ultimate efficacy of the neutralizer combine in achieving a tense, almost horrific atmosphere. The acting, though mainly stereotype in style, is in the same vein, with Jagger, Edward Chapman and Leo McKern leading a vigorous cast. Marianne Brauns does a standout bit as the nurse, revealing a warm pert personality."<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

The next reviewer, "Whit", said the following year: "Poor and complicated science-fictioner not for discriminating audiences. ... This picture carries a complicated structure difficult to follow. The 'unknown' that serves as the menace in [this] science-fiction yarn is so vague that audiences may be overmystified. ...Roles are strictly static and Leslie Norman's direction isn't able to rise above what was handed him."<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

Films and Filming called the film "a welcomed change from interplanetary yarns."<ref name="tcmart" />

See also

• The Blob

External links

• [https://www.imdb.com/{{#if: 0049967

 | title/{{#if: {{#invoke:ustring|match|1=0049967|2=^tt}}
   | Template:Trim/
   | tt0049967/
   }}
 | {{#if: {{#property:P345|from=}}
   | title/Template:First word/
   | find?q=%5B%5B%3ATemplate%3APAGENAMEBASE%5D%5D&s=tt
   }}
 }}{{#ifeq: {{#invoke:If any equal|main|Q618779|Q67325957|Q33999|value=Template:Wikidata}} | yes 
     | {{#switch: Template:Wikidata 
       | Q618779 
       | Q67325957  = awards Awards for
       | Q33999  = fullcredits Full cast and crew of
       }}
   | {{#if: Template:Wikidata 
     | {{#switch: Template:Wikidata
       | Q63032896 
       | Q66763446  = fullcredits Full cast and crew of
       | Q107974527 
       | Q482994  = soundtrack Soundtrack of
       }}
     }}
   }} Template:Trim] at {{#if: | IMDb | IMDb }}Template:EditAtWikidata{{#invoke:Check for unknown parameters|check|unknown=Template:Main other|preview=Page using Template:IMDb title with unknown parameter "_VALUE_"|showblankpositional=1| 1 | 2 | 3 | description | id | link_hide | qid | quotes | title }}{{#switch: {{#invoke:String2|matchAny|^tt.........|^tt.......|tt|.........|source=0049967|plain=false}}| 1 | 3 = Template:Main otherTemplate:Preview warning| 4 = Template:Main otherTemplate:Preview warning}}{{#if: 0049967 {{#property:P345}} || Template:Preview warningTemplate:Main other }}{{#switch: Template:Wikidata 

| Q21191270 | Q21664088 | Q50062923 | Q50914552 | Q99079902 | Q123186929 | Q55422400 | Q61220733 =Template:Preview warning | Q3464665 =Template:Preview warning }}{{#ifeq: Template:Wikidata | Q21191270 |Template:Preview warning }}{{#if: 0049967 | Template:WikidataCheck }}

• Template:Rotten Tomatoes
• Template:TCMDb title
• Template:AFI film