Customer Reviews

Quatermass 2

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The movie itself is great, but please be aware that this is NOT the original Anchor Bay edition of this dvd. I ordered this dvd, thinking that this rare dvd had finally been re-released by Anchor Bay, only to find out it's only a DVD-R copy of the original. Amazon needs to be much clearer in their description of this dvd & let buyers know that it is not a factory pressed DVD. I'm not sure how the licensing for such a DVD-R was worked out with Amazon & Anchor Bay (presumably it was or it would not be for sale on Amazon) but Amazon should not list it like the original Anchor Bay edition which is obviously still out of print and rare. I sent mine back for a refund since as a collector I want the real thing.

I first saw "Quatermas II" (it's original Hammer release title) almost 40 years ago and even today it maintains much of its original power and impact. The combination of talents (Nigel Kneale's script, Val Guest directing, even the high, tense string musical score blend together to make this a true classic, regardless of the fact that it was done on a pittance of a budget.

Val Guest's direction is almost flawless, blending overlapping dialogue and camerawork designed to draw the viewer into the moment by allowing them to observe from a "non-God" viewpoint, rather than throw the action into the face (as is common in most films today.) One example of this would be a scene, early on, when Quatermass and his assistant travel to a remote English village to investigate a report of strange goings-on at a secret plant of some kind. They drive down a clean, modern road that ends abruptly in the middle of nowhere. Confused and a bit unnerved we stand beside them on the road, watching them climb back into their car and pull away. A few moments later, distant, shadowy figures step out of the forest, stopping to watch them depart. It is the fact that we do not know who or even what these individuals are and are not drawn into a close-up of them that makes the moment especially unnerving and creepy. The entire film is rife with such suggestive, effective touches.

The dialogue, while witty and crisp, is still to the point and drives the story along in a sudden rush. The entire tale takes place over the space of only a few days, but the distance travelled is lightyears in terms of mood and power.

Even the musical score, a combination of rolling, threatening timpini and screeching violins, merely heightens the already anxious mood of the story.

The performances are competent, in come cases journeyman in caliber, but the real power of the piece is the barely suppressed hint of menace that flows through it, like a half formed nightmare.

If there is a flaw in the film it is one of budgetary constraints, particularly in the eventual appearance of "the monster" at the very end of the film. Even with modern special effects it is difficult to imagine that moment carried out with complete success, though it is clearly expected by the viewer to be presented eventually. But the scenes leading up to it drive ahead into a chasm of disturbing images that are difficult to ignore. (The scenes of the heros trapped in the control room at the plant alone are a tidal wave of paranoia, claustrophobia and horror without ever having to resort to trickery or special effects.)

By all means every student of film or science fiction fan should at least see this picture. And it is well worth adding to a collection. I view it at least annually.

I first saw this classic Hammer film (1957) when it premiered on US television in the early '60's on New York channel 9's (WOR-TV) "Million Dollar Movie". The idea was that the station would play the same film twice an evening (7 and 9 PM) and several times in a row on the week-ends. I happened to catch it early in the week and recall spending the rest of the week watching it over and over again (this was the age of "you miss the broadcast, you missed it entirely" television).

Of course, compared to the current age of CGI graphics and action sequences designed specifically to be as spectacular as possible, this 1957 low budget black and white British "pulp sci fi" film seems rather tame. But in terms of content, story, tightness in pace and execution it is a stunning example of how a brilliant director (Val Guest) can wring great things out of very limited raw materials.

Personally I would place this as one of my top 10 all time favorite sci fi films. I revisit it at least twice a year (I have the VHS release from long ago), and it never fails to impress and unnerve.

Even the strident performance by Brian Donlevy (best known as a B-Picture villian from the '30's and '40's) adds a sense of urgency to the tone of the picture. The action takes place over three days between the first hint of something not quite right in the little (and currently missing) village of Winerdon Flats, to the explosive conclusion when the alien infestation is defeated. In between the film presents an unrelenting atmosphere that is dark, creepy and rife with paranoia. It gets it's power not from what it shows but from what it implies. Like the American classic "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" there are contemporary political overtones rooted in the "Red Scare" of the 1950's, but "Quatermass II" does them better and crisper.

Also worth noting is how skillfully director Val Guest is able to infuse a sense of realism through overlapping dialogue and a hint of "happening right now" urgency in various scenes.

In general the performances are sharp, real and impelling. If it has a flaw it is that it must bow to its budget limitations for the final reveal of the monster in the final five minutes. You sense that director Guest had to suck it up and muddle through something he knew would never come off the way he might have hoped but was necessary to completing the film.

Even the musical score is startling, consisting of strings and timpani in a combination of "fingernails on a blackboard" screech and thunderous, ominous rumbling that gets the viewer in the proper (highly disturbed) mood before the action even begins.

On the whole it is an example of just how brilliant, insightful and disturbing a thing can be created with extremely limited resources and any sci-fi fan will be utterly delighted by this unique experience. Well worth the investment and likely to become a favorite.

This is not so much a review, but rather some information about this DVD. The movie itself is a great black & white British Sci-Fi thriller and I recommend it. I used to own the Anchor Bay release of this movie that went Out-Of-Production several years ago and started fetching big bucks on Amazon Marketplace and "that other auction site". As much as I liked the film, I sold original copy for a tidy profit and was hoping this film had been Re-released on DVD when I ordered this. After receiving it, I found out this was a DVD-R copy of the original. What that means is it is "burned" onto a writable DVD rather than being "pressed" or manufactured in a factory. DVD-Rs are pretty much the same as DVDs, but they don't play in some very old dvd players (1998 and earlier) there is some question as to their longevity. I sent it back for a refund, so I am not sure if it has the exact same features as the original Anchor Bay disc. If you are dying to see this movie, this is the only way to legally do it right now, but I think the asking price is too high for a DVD-R.

There's simply no equal to the Quatermass films in the effects-driven "science fiction" foisted on today's public. These films, adapted from much longer BBC television "miniseries", rely on intelligent plot development and attention to detail that is notably lacking in anything done in the genre lately.

In this film, Quatermass inadvertantly stumbles across a secret military base whose staff will shoot first and ask questions later. (Shades of Area 51!) Unfortunately, the secret of this base is *far* worse than reverse-engineering, and the safety of the world is (again) in Quatermass's hands.

It's too bad that Brian Donlevy really makes a poor Quatermass, but he's all we have. He seems to confuse bullying and shouting with projecting authority and confidence, and you end up somewhat surprised no one decks him. Andrew Keir (Quatermass and the Pit) presents a much more palatable Quatermass interpretation.

That said, though, I really give this a very high recommendation. When you consider the original was shown on British TV nearly 50 years ago, it is stunning to think just how far ahead of its time the Quatermass series was. They don't write them this well anymore.

First of all, if you've never seen a Quatermass film before, the name is pronounced KWAY-ter-mass. The three Quatermass films by Hammer are all adapted from British television serials in the 1950s; a fourth Quatermass series was televised in 1979. The general consensus is that of the Hammer films, _Quatermass 2_ is the best, and I have to agree. (As the British television versions go, I've heard several different opinions as to which Quatermass is the best, from the 1958 _Quatermass and the Pit_ to 1979's _Quatermass_. The stories of these television serials are much too complicated for an average 90-minute B picture.)

The screenplay for _Quatermass 2_ is a marvel of efficiency, setting up characters and situations with remarkable ease and confidence. Unlike other films in the series, this one doesn't seem burdened with too much exposition. Perhaps this is because most of us have already seen this story in a different form, as _Invasion of the Body Snatchers_. (The televised version of _Quatermass 2_ actually preceded _Invasion_ by a year or two.) But _Q2_ has a very different focus, articulating Britain's paranoia over a military-industrial complex that seems out of control. Sound familiar?

Although the script is quite good, it's the superb direction of Val Guest that really makes the film work. He makes it easy for viewers to keep track of a complex chains of events, often pulling suspenseful moments seemingly from thin air. Brian Donleavy's square-jawed, straight-arrow performance as Professor Quatermass is perhaps a little too much like Joe Friday for my taste. Still, I frequently enjoyed Donleavy's overbearing manner, even though it's the only aspect of the film that feels dated now.

One of the best and brainiest sci-fi films from the '50s ... well worth owning if you're a sci-fi fan, and well worth viewing if you're not. (By the way, the central ideas of John Carpenter's recent _Ghosts of Mars_ seem somewhat indebted to _Q2_, although _Q2_ is by far the better film.)

With exception made for the films of George Pal and Andrei Tarkovsky, science fiction cinema appeals to me mostly in black-and-white. Cameron Menzies' Things to Come (1936), for example, would look gaudy and toy-like had it been filmed in one of the color processes; but in black-and-white, the war scenes acquire a documentary grittiness (which Menzies certainly meant them to have) and the miniature work looks grand and convincing. Byron Haskin originally planned to shoot his big-bug flick Them! (1954) in color and 3-D, but finally made it on a lower budget in desert- and storm-drain-friendly black-and-white. The nightmarish-ness of Don Siegel's Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) is drained away in the two remakes from the late 1970s and early 1990s; Siegel's own vision puts Kevin McCarthy and Dana Wynter in a labyrinth of threatening shadows where the merest hint of color would spoil the creepy mood. Director Val Guest's Quatermass II (1958), known in its original American release as The Enemy from Space, has a number of points of contact with The Body Snatchers, and is equally effective in conjuring an atmosphere of occult paranoia over a contagious loss of humanity. Brian Donlevy reprises the character of Professor Bernard Quatermass, head of the British "Rocket Program" and scientific jack-of-all-trades. In the first Quatermass film, The Creeping Unknown (1952), the redoubtable professor battles a gelatinous carnivore that started its human meal by devouring a crew of astronauts pioneering the way into earth orbit. The nemesis in Quatermass II is more diffuse, more intelligent, and potentially far more deadly. It is a collective intelligence able to possess human hosts and coerce them into service. These "zombies," as the film calls them, have taken over a remote government facility and are systematically dispossessing the bodies of government officials, whom they lure into the place in the pretence that it is a "synthetic food factory" about to make agriculture obsolete. Quatermass discovers the place when he goes looking for a meteor-fall detected by radar from his rocket test range. He finds that someone has built, on the site of a demolished village, the "moon base" for which he has just conspicuously failed to get funding. Sinister looking guards appear and take away the professor's aid, who has received a characteristic v-shaped wound from a meteor that he has picked up from the ground. The things crack apart when held. A dark blotch appears on the neck or face of the victim. All the guards show the same lesion. After considerable frustration and a hair's breadth escape from the conversion process, Quatermass penetrates to the truth behind all the skullduggery: aliens are indeed invading the earth, taking over humanity, and growing huge masses of parasite-creatures in the pressure-domes. Guest's direction is stark: he filmed many scenes at a Shell Oil refinery on the Welsh coast and he skillfully inter-cuts location footage with one or two matte-shots, a couple of miniature sets, and some studio interiors. The "alien base" looks steely and inhuman; the parasite-ridden hosts behave in convincingly dehumanized ways and are efficiently monomaniacal. There is no bravado from the players. The superb editing packs much incident into eighty minutes. In one horrific scene, an investigating parliamentarian falls into a vat of alien "food" and is covered head to foot with corrosive slime. All of the Quatermass films are intelligent and Quatermass II is no exception. The musical score contributes a good deal to the atmosphere. Recommended for aficionados of Cold War sci-fi for the silver screen or for fans of The Body Snatchers who are curious about that film's less well known British counterpart.

One of Hammer's relatively few sci-fi thrillers, and a sequel to the Quatermass Xperiment, this film is a minor classic of cold chilling paranoia. Adapted by Nigel Kneale from his classic BBC serial, this film has a basic premise similar to Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but taken into very different directions. Not to give too much away, but the joy of this film is not in watching the alien plot to take over earth unfold, it's in watching Professor Quatermass uncover the already widespread conspiracy. Photographed in beautifully stark monochrome with a great pseudodocumentary approach, Quatermass 2 is a great example of the sort of sci-fi/horror hybrid that became popular later with films like Alien and, along with the other two films in the series and the sadly unavailable The Damned, one of Hammer's best attempts at science fiction.

Having now bought both versions of this 50s classic of paranoia and sheer tension on DVD and VCR, I can tell tou that both versions were worth every penny spent, apart from the shoddy trailer on the VCR version. The atmosphere of suspence in this film is beyond belief, as aliens from an orbiting asteroid orbit the dark side of the earth, sending projectiles to the earth, which on contact with human life infect an individual, and possess thier minds, so that the aliens can manifest themselves in a replica of Professor Quatermass' Moon Project, which basically looks like an oil refinery with an addage of huge pressure domes, which harbour the alien organisms as they are collected by armed guards who protect the base. 'Quatermass 2' location actually was an oil refinery, SHELL to be precise at Coryton in Essex, sometimes refered to as SHELLHAVEN. The film does have it's share of shock moments such as the rebellious worker's bodies being pulped along the pipes from the domes, to stop oxygen from being pumped into it. Vincent Broadhead's death is quite horrible too, as he staggers from an alien food sphere covered in disgusting, black and corrosive food, which is what the plant is reportedly supposed to be producing. Anchor Bay produce a nice crisp and clear print of this film, also the feature has a trailer (US), and an episode of the series 'World of Hammer', a delight to own, and the ultimate in Quatermass stories (MY FAVE MOVIE) to be produced so far, let's hope it gets a remake in the future, because ever a stor deserved it, it's this one.

Quatermass 2 (pronounced like equator and not quarter) is utterly flawless. This DVD B/W film is superbly vibrant and crisp. The dialogue however seems to drown on occassion while conversely the accent music will send you seeking a lower setting on the volume control. This was one of the scariest movies I can remember from my youth when it was titled "Enemy from Space", and believe it or not, it still maintains some of its punch.

The movie starts with Quatermass avoiding a car accident with a young couple, one of which is delirious with a strange V-shaped blister on his face. Quatermass, averting the accident, lends his assistance. In trying to ascertain the delirium of the man, the women tells Quatermass they heard "falling" sounds. She gives him a medium size rock she says her friend was investigating when it exploded in his face. The name of a town where the blister was received is mentioned.

Quatermass is a rocket scientist with a government grant-supported research facility to build a rocket to colonize other planets. Unfortunately he has chosen nuclear propulsion to power the untested rocket. The idea of a mishap during launch or recovery has caused the government to withdraw support of his project.

Upon his return to his facility, Quatermass notices that his radar dish is pointed abnormally low to the ground. Quatermass indignantly chastises his top two scientists for the low radar dish and gives them the broken rock from the accident for classification. The scientist do not get to explain that have been tracking a continuous cascade of objects to the earth about 90 mile away. Quatermass, realizing his anger is over his concerned for the lack of funding for the project apologizes and moans over a 3D model of a colonization facility envisioned for the moon. The fellow scientist are informed of the lack of future funding as Quatermass leaves to confer with his nuclear engineers at the nearby launch pad.

The next day, when Quatermass returns, another scientist questions him about the rock. He tells him he cannot classify it and that it is cylindrical in shape both inside and out. When asked where he got it from, they are informed of Quatermass' near accident. When the name of the town is mentioned the scientists realize that this is the approximate landing location of the tracked falling objects. They check a map and Quatermass and one of the scientist travel to the area the next day.

Upon arrival at the area the road forks into two directions. The fork to the map-indicated town is government-posted as NO ENTRY so they take the other fork which leads to an abrupt end of the concrete roadway. Getting out of the car, Quatermass warns his young assistant not to walk beyond the concrete for fear of government placed security mines. They get back into the car and to go back to the other fork. As they leave the scene, in the distance, armed uniformed personnel wearing gas masks emerge from the surrounding foilage.

Disregarding the government postings, they take the other fork. On a high ridge, Quatermass gasps. His assistant peers through Quatermass' window and says "Oh no!". In the distance is a fully functional replica of their 3D moon colonization facility, two miles square, surrounded by security fencing with three overpowering pressurized domes about 200 feet high. They get out seeing ruins they surmise must be the missing town. They also discover small rocks like the one given Quatermass scattered all over the hillside. Some of the "rocks" are old, some recent and all broken except one buried in the ground. The assistant digs it up as Quatermass protests to "leave it alone".....In the distance the loud echo of a siren begins

Its not my intention to narrate the complete story but as you can see, the plot compounds marvelously. The backgrounds are time-neutral, even the characters suits are even back in style. Vehicles are vintage and could be considered old, but current. Scenes (in London particularly) are somewhat devoid of anachronisms so much that if this film were colorized you could almost imagine a CG team cleaning up those period giveaways and updating this original film. But what the hey, this is truly a classic and if ever a movie deserved a remake, this is it. You could say, this is not rocket science.