Undescribable Perfection
Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,
View MoreAt first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
View MoreThrough painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable
View MoreThe 1957 film version of "Quatertmass II" was superior to its predecessor, and one can only assume that the serial was too; again, it obviously goes deeper into the various themes than the film does, but it's interesting to see how Kneale was able to compress his own work without losing the essential quality and potency of his concept (we've seen several films which have had large chunks removed from them with the result that one would hardly recognize the original - but it's certainly not the case with the Quatermass series!).All things considered, I guess I prefer the films to the serials for two reasons: one, the fact that the former - even if still done on a low budget - were invariably more polished (given their crisp photography as opposed to the fuzziness of a TV program); the other reason is the essential tautness of the films - the serials don't necessarily feel draggy and are certainly never boring but, watched in one sitting (which, I guess, was never the intention to begin with!), Kneale's gripping and thought-provoking plots could make for a tiresome overall experience!! John Robinson replaced Reginald Tate (who had died in the meantime) as Professor Quatermass; he does a good job at it but, from the three actors who performed the character on TV (I haven't watched John Mills in the final serial, named simply QUATERMASS, from 1979), he's the one who comes closest to Brian Donlevy's interpretation in the first two films and which so dissatisfied Kneale! The cast also features Hugh Griffith as Quatermass' assistant and future stalwart of British horror cinema Rupert Davies as a government official.The fact of these being live broadcasts was betrayed more than anything else during this particular serial by the surprising number of lines flubbed by the actors throughout - chief among them Robinson himself! Besides, even if scenes that were made memorable by the films (which I obviously watched prior to the serials) generate their own tension and excitement on the small screen, the film's ending is preferable to the one presented here - in which Robinson and Griffith are flown into outer space in order to destroy the planet which was attempting to colonize Earth.
View MoreI could never get totally comfortable with a Quatermass who looks like and spoke like an American gangster. In spite of Brian Donlevy's fine acting skills, I thought he was totally mis-cast in this early sci-fi techno thriller. His gruffness, rudeness, and curtness, especially to women, especially date this story and get downright annoying at times. And his diction hardly creates the illusion of a top level scientist. He says things like "What's dat?" and "Both aya" (for "Both of you").It's the story that carries the movie, and a great story it is. "Meteorites" that are actually carriers of alien germination cells rain down on earth. Once a human gets too close, a meteor bursts open with a jet of ammonia gas and shoots a tiny stinger or spore into the intended carrier. Thus, humans are taken over as hosts to these aliens. Quatermass is pulled into the government conspiracy to hide the beach head "factory" of the alien invasion force when his subordinates spot the unusual series of meteor showers and his own assistant is spirited away by guards of the mysterious plant.Less is definitely more in this story. Granted, the scene where a man, coated with the pitch- like "food" manufactured at the forbidden factory, dies in agony in front of Quatermass is horrifying, even now. Otherwise, the suggestion is more powerful than the special effects. As people are taken over, and Quatermass's search for his missing assistant is thwarted again and again, the tension builds. The "tour" of the plant builds to near terror. But after that, as the viewer actually sees what Quatermass is talking about, the story becomes a lot less powerful. BBC special effects diminished the impact. As any Doctor Who fan can tell you, what the story places in your mind is far superior to what it actually depicted.The enemy forces blocking the pipe with "human pulp" struck me as absurd. And an untested atomic rocket in the backyard of the research HQ was another impossible device in the plot. Ultimately, the story reached for one horror too many, and was further undercut by the especially poor special effects at the end.That being said, it was terrific Sci-Fi for 1955, imaginative, technological, and filmed locally to enhance a "this is now" feel to the horror.For Doctor Who fans, the similarities to SPEAHEAD FROM SPACE and INFERNO are unmistakable. Some of the long shots of the plant look like shots from INFERNO (and, much later, from THE HAND OF FEAR). Another Doctor Who tie-in is the presence of Roger Delgado (the Master, from Doctor Who) as Conrad, though I never was able to spot Conrad in the film. (However, Delgado shows up in the credits, so he's got to be in there somewhere.)It's apparent that the first season of the Third Doctor era borrowed heavily from Quatermass. I'd recommend that hard-core Whovians drop the pence to buy this two-DVD set. You'll enjoy the stories and will be entertained by trying to tie in the plot lines to Third Doc/Liz Shaw era stories. The DVD Double Feature (Quatermass and the Pit and Quatermass 2) are sold by Anchor Bay.
View MoreHaving recently come by a pirated copy of this on VCR recently, I can honestly say after several viewings that this has to be the best of the Quatermass seriels made by the BBC in the 1950s. Broadcast live on UK TV in 1955, this is an altogether more together piece than the remade Hammer film of a few years later and has a much more involving plot. One of the main diferences in the story has Professor Quatermass actually travel to the alien asteroid with his assistant Leo Pugh to destroy the ammonid things before more of them reach the earth.Another plot addition is the introduction of little metallic cases to contain the aliens in and make them more readily available for transportation to one victim to another, a side plot sadly missing from the afformentioned Hammer film. The story is slow to build up, but once it gets going there is no stopping it and you soon become deeply involved in the plot. The character Broadhead from the film version is called Ward here and it is only a 3 man expedition that enters the Synthetic Food plant at Winnerden Flats, during this visit Ward dies covered in black slime and Quatermass and a character called Fowler discover to their horror that a nearby picnicking family have been gunned down by the impossing Zombie guards. Altogether a fantastic serial in all 6 parts (complete for those that are still hanging onto the belief that all or some of the episodes are missing). News is doing the rounds that the serial may be making it's way onto DVD this year and hopefully it will make it.
View MoreUnfortunately, at the current time Quatermass II is really only available in bootlegs of varying quality. That's how I saw it, though the copy I found is of pretty good quality considering the rarity of the material. Like most folks, I watched all the movie versions of the Quatermass saga before seeing any of the hard-to-find BBC television serials. The effects are, of course better in the silver screen treatments, but the television serials let a lot more exposition and explanations get out, so things make even more sense and characters and situations get fleshed out in some rather interesting ways...the movie (Enemy From Space) has an unmanned rocket being launched at the aliens, while the serial has Quatermass and a fellow scientist taking the rocket up to face the aliens.John Robinson makes a great Quatermass...very arrogant and domineering, but at the same time you can sense some concern for humanity in the man. He's no quite as good as John Mills in the last installment of the series (The Quatermass Conclusion), but he does make the serial much more enjoyable than the movie (nothing against Brian Donlevy in that particular production).It's also fun to see Roger Delgado (best known as The Master on Doctor Who) in the role of the reporter who comes with Quatermass to the strange little town of Wynnerton Flats.Unless you frequent the newsgroups and video-trading circles, you don't have much chance of finding this little gem...but if you do, remember that it is definitely worth the four hours to watch.
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