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Released by: Anolis Entertainment
Released on: June 3rd, 2016.
Director: Val Guest
Cast: Brian Donlevy, Jack Warner, Margia Dean, Richard Wordsworth
Year: 1955
The Movie:
Directed by Val Guest and following hot on the heels of the popular British television mini-series featuring the same character, 1955's The Quatermass Xperiment begins when a pair of young lovers is out in the field about to indulge in some make out time. All of a sudden something comes hurtling out of the sky at them and they take solace inside the farm house where the young woman lives. As it turns out, a rocket ship has landed right near the house, and the man behind the space mission that sent it into the wild blue yonder in the first place, Professor Bernard Quatermass (Brian Donlevy), soon arrives to instruct the first responders on how to deal with this.
They hose down the ship to bring the temperature down and open the door to find that one man, Victor Carroon (Richard Wordsworth), has survived the crash, the other two astronauts apparently having vanished into thin air leaving only their empty space suits where their bodies once were. Carroon is taken to the hospital, his wife (Margia Dean) at his side, to heal but it soon turns out that he's not only been stricken mute but his right arm is starting to mutate. After some detective work, Quatermass figures that Carroon is hosting an alien, the same alien that likely took care of the two missing astronauts and which will probably do off with the Earth's population just as easily. He and Inspector Lomax (Jack Warner) wind up having to chase Carroon down after his wife helps him escape from the hospital, and as they track him down, he begins to very quickly lose whatever humanity he may have had left.
Better known in these United States under the alternate title of The Creeping Unknown, the film lets Donlevy bring a no-nonsense toughness to the Quatermass character (he'd bring it with him in his second stint as the character in the sequel, Quatermass II: Enemy From Space made in 1957, also directed by Val Guest). While it might seem a bit odd seeing the surly tough guy from Kiss Of Death zipping around England trying to solve a mystery originating from outer space, Donlevy is fun in the role even if he maybe doesn't come across as the most believable professor to ever grace the silver screen. The supporting cast are also good, with Jack Warner working alongside Donlevy well and with Wordsworth giving an excellent (and basically silent) performance as the increasingly off kilter infectee. He uses his body language very well here, really delivering a sense of increasing dread and hopelessness on the part of his character.
Slapped with an X by the BBFC in 1954 (now the title makes sense, right?), the film is quite a bit darker than a lot of other science fiction pictures made around the same time, giving this film plenty of crossover appeal and ensuring that those who dig Hammer for their horror pictures will enjoy this just as much as those who appreciate the studio's dipping its collective toes into other genres. There are some great make up effects on display here, a fun and fairly thrilling finale that takes place at one of England's most recognizable landmarks, and it's easy to see how this picture's almost instantaneous popularity encouraged the studio to head into darker and more macabre territory shortly after the film struck box office gold.
Note that this Blu-ray release contains both the English language version, which runs 1:21:41, that we've seen before as well as the German language version of the movie (that also runs 1:21:41) which is framed at 1.37.1.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Anolis presents the movie in an AVC encoded 1080p high definition transfer framed at 1.66.1 widescreen. Detail and texture get nice upgrades here over the standard definition presentation. You see this not just in close up shots but in medium and long distance shots as well. Contrast looks quite good here and black levels are pretty strong too. There is a bit of minor print damage here and there, some scratches mostly, but the picture is fairly clean. A natural amount of film grain is obvious throughout the movie but never to the point of distraction. The transfer is free of any obvious compression artifacting and there's no evidence at all of any noise reduction or edge enhancement. All in all, this is a pretty solid looking disc.
The English DTS-HD Mono track on this disc is also fine. The score sounds good, the dialogue is easy to understand the levels are properly balanced. There are no issues with hiss or distortion and everything comes through cleanly and clearly. As this is an older mono mix you obviously can't really expect much in the way of channel separation or fancy surround action but for what it is, this older single channel tracks sounds just fine. A German language track is also provided in DTS-HD Mono format, with optional subtitles provided in German only.
Extras on this release start off with a really informative audio commentary with director Val Guest moderated by Hammer Films historian Marcus Hearn. Guest is pretty talkative here, noting how he'd really only worked on lighter fare before taking on this project for Hammer. He talks about shooting on some interesting sets and how those sets came to be, what it was like directing Donlevy, his thoughts on some of the effects and performances and his appreciation for the script. He also explains a lot of what went into creating the movie's infamous finale. Hearn knows his stuff and keeps Guest on topic and talking, as such we get a well-paced and thorough history lesson. This is definitely worth listening to. This also appeared on the domestic Blur-ay release of the movie from Kino's Studio Classics line. Exclusive to this Anolis Blu-ray release is a commentary from Doctor Rolf Giesen that is in German only without any subtitles, so it's tough to really offer much insight into it's worth - though Giesen is rarely at a loss or words here, so German speaking Hammer fans could very well be in for a treat.
From there we move onto a few new featurettes starting with an eleven and a half minute long piece called The Quatermass Xperiment: From Reality To Fiction that is basically an interview with Guest in which he talks about the script, dealing with his producers and more. Marcus Hearn returns again in the last featurette, a thirty-six minute Interview With Val Guest shot in Manchester in 2000. Here Guest is interviewed by Steve Gallagher about his work behind the camera in the science fiction and horror genres, his work with Hammer, how he wound up living in Palm Springs, his work as a writer and his short stories, beginning his career in cinema and quite a bit more. He also gets into the specifics of his work on a few features, including the main attraction here, as well as what it was like working with Donlevy, working on The Abominable Snowman with Cushing, and more. Lots of great stories here, Guest seems to be really enjoying himself. Guest also looks awesome, sporting some sort of metallic pink ascot and a black three piece suit! There's also a featurette here called A Creeping Xperiment that runs just under seven minutes in length. This shows different title and credit sequences and a few alternate scenes for the feature with German text in between explaining the differences.
Outside of that we also get the US main Title sequence, a US trailer for the feature, a Super 8 version of the movie (26:48, presented in English in AVC encoded HD but looking a bit rough - but still, seeing alternate cuts like this is always fascinating and fans of the film should definitely check this version out), and still gallery versions of the comic adaption of the story (originally published in the Hammer House Of Horror comic magazine in 1977 but presented here with German word balloons), the original German language film program and a selection of promotional and behind the scenes images. Menus and chapter selections for the feature are also provided.
The Final Word:
The Quatermass Xperiment (or Schock if you prefer) remains a really well made mix of horror and sci-fi, a very tense film with some great effects work and a solid lead performance from Donlevy as the film's titular hero. Anolis' Blu-ray is a winner, offering the film up in great quality and with a very nice selection of supplements (some of which are different than the US Blu-ray release) to accompany the strong high definition presentation. Highly recommended.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
