X the Unknown
It’s a routine training exercise in the north of Scotland, soldiers stomping through icy puddles in a muddy field as they learn how to use a Geiger counter to locate a canister containing low-grade nuclear isotopes, a practice drill for what might be a more hazardous radiation threat in the event of war or a leak from an atomic power plant, warned to make themselves scarce and safe should such circumstances occur.
Yet that is what is found, strong readings where there should be none, the puddles bubbling with heat and the ground splitting open, Private Lansing dying shortly after from exposure to radiation and a colleague scarred, McGill from the UK Atomic Energy Commission’s Internal Security sent to investigate, out of his depth and calling on Doctor Adam Royston, based at the Lochmouth research facility, for insight and expertise.
Released in November 1956, a year after The Quatermass Xperiment and conceived as a followup featuring that character before Quatermass 2 but produced as a standalone when Nigel Kneale denied permission to use the Professor, understandably considering the BBC had denied him proper remuneration when his teleplays had been adapted for the feature adaptation, X the Unknown continued Hammer’s exploration of science fiction and horror.
Once again using an American lead for commercial reasons, Academy Award winner Dean Jagger was cast as Doctor Royston, practical, calm and unflappable, more akin to Bernard Quatermass as imagined than Brian Donlevy’s blustering impatience, with The Prisoner’s Leo McKern as McGill, two top notch leads in one of Jimmy Sangster’s best scripts in terms of character and dialogue though the science drifts increasingly into fantasy.
A more human film than either of the better-known classics it stands between, directed by Leslie Norman the threat rises from Cold War fears of fallout, radiation sickness and, as expressed in the title, the unknown, the war having ended when the bomb dropped on Japan a short decade before but the science behind it a mystery to the general public who had little understanding of a field which was literally exploding upon a frightened world.
Confusion and distrust going hand in hand and turning to anger when the father of a dead child confronts those he sees as responsible, the special effects of the rolling blob crackling with energy in the night and the melted victims are excellent for the time and likely shocking to a contemporary audience, former production manager Sangster understanding what could be reasonably achieved when writing his first feature script, a challenge received by default rather than aspiration or planning.
With a supporting cast including Kenneth Cope, Edwin Richfield, Anthony Newley and future Monty Python director Ian MacNaughton as the squaddies served up as cannon fodder and Hammer regular Michael Ripper as their sergeant as well as Frazer Hines as a local boy who has a lucky escape, not even in his teens but an experienced actor already, Things to Come’s Edward Chapman is John Elliott, the head of the Lochmouth facility.
A tiresome bureaucrat resentful of those in his employ whose abilities surpass his, even his own son Peter (William Lucas) who bravely descends into the fissure, the resolution of X the Unknown is as far-fetched as the theorised origin of the amorphous threat, a subterranean menace exacerbated by a fifty-year gravitational alignment of the planets which hungers for radiation, yet despite the limitations the film stands as a superior and particularly British science fiction thriller where intellect casts a light into the darkness of terror.
Restored in 4K and presented in UHD and on Blu-ray, the four-disc set includes three versions of the feature film in 1.66:1 widescreen, 1:37 fullscreen and as the US version in 1:85 widescreen, new and archive commentaries with genre experts Toby Hadoke and Andy Murray, film historians David Kalat and Constantine Nasr, producer Doctor Steve Haberman and writer Jimmy Sangster with Hammer expert Marcus Hearn.
In addition, the set also carries A Man on the Beach, a Hammer short written by Sangster and directed by Joseph Losey, features covering the production, the special effects and the career of Losey, director of The Damned and Modesty Blaise, who was originally attached to the project, as well as trailers, publicity material and essays looking at the connections between X the Unknown and Quatermass.
X the Unknown will be available on 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray from Hammer from Monday 27th July
