Clay Pigeons and Quatermass's Xperiment

[trekgeezer]

Clay Pigeons (1998) - Poor Clay (Joaquin Phoenix) witnesses his best friend commit suicide right in front of him because Clay is sleeping with his wife. The thing is the suicide is set to make Clay look like he killed the friend, so he has to change things so he doesn't get the blame.

Clay is still nervous and feeling guilty, and it doesn't help that the friends wife Amanda is still pressuring him to have sex with her. While at a local night club Clay is befriended by a truck driver named Lester Long (Vince Vaughn). The next day Clay and Lester go on a fishing trip and find the body of a young woman Clay had also slept with.

Clay should have listened to the Sheriff advice not to find anymore dead bodies. As the tale progresses and Amanda ends up brutally murdered after bringing Lester home, Clay begins to really regret his friendship with the Lester.

Janeane Garofalo and Phil Morris show up as FBI agents when the body count starts to rise.

This movie works pretty well as a black comedy. Phoenix does a good turn as the hapless Clay and Vaughn is maniacally funny as Lester.

Some reviewers have called the ending a cop out, but I found it quite amusing.

The Quatermass Xperiment (1955) - A secret rocket crashes in the English countryside supposedly carrying three astronauts. When Quatermass and crew arrive and are finally able to get inside the ship they find only one of the three and two empty space suits.

The survivor is not is good shape and they eventually find out he is infected with a alien spore. The fellow's determined wife breaks him out of quaratine and the search is on. With his body morphing into an alien organism he must take the life from living beings to survive and multiply.

This was a story that had not been done to death at the time this film was released. We have seen the same story done on numerous TV programs. However in 1955 it was quite fresh and probably raised the hair on some necks. The movie actually got an X rating in the UK at the time of  it's release and Hammer Films took advantage of it in their advertising.  

Brian Donlevy does an interesting take on Prof. Quatermass. He's not the usual doty, absent minded scientist. Instead he stomps around like a drill sergeant barking orders most of the time. The interplay between him and the quirky Inspector Lomax (Jack Warner) is quite entertaining. Richard Wordsworth turns in a very good performance as the infected crewman.

The effects are good for the time period, especially the rocketship,  though the end result of the metamorphosis is a bit disappointing.

[Rombles]

I take it the Quatermass in this is the same character as in "Quatermass And The Pit"?  Are there any other Quatermass movies - I loved The Pit, and was not aware of this one.

[trekgeezer]

There were three Quatermass movies, this one, Quatermass 2, and Quatermass and the Pit (known in the U.S. as 5 Million Years to Earth).

Brian Donlevy stars in the first two and Andrew Keir in the third. They were all based on BBC serials produced in the 50's.

Gerry Carpenter who posts here has a lot of good info about the series on his site SciFilm.org.

[Gerry]

trek_geezer Wrote:
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> There were three Quatermass movies, this one,
> Quatermass 2, and Quatermass and the Pit (known in
> the U.S. as 5 Million Years to Earth).
>
> Brian Donlevy stars in the first two and Andrew
> Keir in the third. They were all based on BBC
> serials produced in the 50's.
>

There was also a fourth Quatermass story, called simply "Quatermass" starring John Mills as the Prof.  It was made in 1978 for BBC televsion as a 4-hour miniseries.  There is also a hacked up version that runs about 2 hours called "The Quatermass Conclusion".  Avoid that one like the plague.  The miniseries is actually very good (if annoying at points), and available on a very nice R1 DVD release.  It was directed by Piers Haggard of BLOOD ON SATAN'S CLAW fame.

The original BBC serials for "The Quatermass Experiment" (1953), "Quatermass 2" (1955) and "Quatermass and the Pit" (1958) are available on R2 DVD in a beautiful restored DVD set.  Unfortunately only the first two eps of "The Quatermass Experiment" have survived (and are included on the set), but the other two are complete and look and sound better than they ever have.

In addition, BBC TV produced as new version of "The Quatermass Experiment" in 2005 that runs about 90 minutes and is based on the original miniseries screenplay.  It is very good and also available on R2 DVD.  It stars Jason Flemyng (LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS) as Professor Quatermass. In an unusual move, BBC produced the new version as a live performance, which is the way all of the original serials were produced and performed.  It's very slick for a live performance though by necessity rather slim on the special effects.

There's more information than you probably ever wanted to know about the Quatermass series...and I've got more...lot's more!

[Just Plain Horse]

I love Quatermass and the Pit, but Xperiment puts me to sleep every time I try to watch it... Seeing Brian Donlevy always makes me think of Gamera, and the movie takes forever to develop. The wierd, octopus-like monster at the end had potential, but I always wished it could have had more screen time. I once saw a Doctor Who episode that kind of reminds me of Xperiment, complete with a humaniod cactus monster!

[AndyC]

Just Plain Horse Wrote:
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> I love Quatermass and the Pit, but Xperiment puts
> me to sleep every time I try to watch it

Same here.

Thinking of things that remind me of Quatermass, I always thought Lifeforce had a real Quatermass feel about it.

[Just Plain Horse]

Yeah, I can see that- except I don't think of full frontal nudity when I think of Quatermass :D I do find it interesting the way both blend the almost esoteric into hardcore scifi...