X the Unknown

X the Unknown is a 1956 British science fiction horror film from Hammer Film Productions, directed by Leslie Norman and starring Dean Jagger, Leo McKern and Edward Chapman. The screenplay was written by Jimmy Sangster, his first for a feature film. In the film, a group of scientists and military personnel investigate a mysterious series of deaths by radiation exposure in rural Scotland. The film was originally conceived as a sequel to The Quatermass Xperiment (1955), but writer Nigel Kneale refused to let the character Bernard Quatermass be used, so the film was retooled into a standalone project. X the Unknown is significant in that "it firmly established Hammer's transition from B-movie thrillers to out-and-out horror/science fiction" and, with The Quatermass Xperiment (1955) and Quatermass 2 (1957), completes "an important trilogy containing relevant allegorical threads revealing Cold War anxieties and a diminishing national identity resulting from Britain's decrease in status as a world power". As with Quatermass, Hammer played up the film's X Certificate in their advertising. The film premiered at the London Pavilion on 21 September, 1956. In the UK, the film was released on a double bill with Les Diaboliques. It was released in the United States on 2 May, 1957, on a double feature with The Curse of Frankenstein.