X the Unknown

X the Unknown is a 1956 film about a radioactive, mud-like creature that terrorizes a Scottish village.
 * Directed by Leslie Norman and Joseph Losey. Written by Jimmy Sangster.

Can anything escape its terror? (taglines)

Dr. Adam Royston

 * It's on its way for the biggest meal of its life.

Peter Elliott

 * How do you explain it, sir? All this extraordinary damage just to steal an old sample container?

Other

 * Major Cartwright: You know this Royston chap. Brilliant, of course, I'm sure. But the trouble with these scientific types is they can't see the easy way out of anything. It's got to be complicated if it's going to work.

Dialogue

 * Peter Elliott: What happened, sir? I don't understand.
 * Dr. Adam Royston: Peter, I'm afraid I don't either. Yesterday the material in that container was giving a danger-point radiation reading. Now, as you just saw, it's nothing.
 * Peter Elliott: But that's impossible! Isn't it?
 * Dr. Adam Royston: Yesterday I would have said yes, but this fact is inescapable: The energy trapped in that trinium has been sucked right out of it. And furthermore, that window was barred and these doors were locked all night. So whoever it was came in here must be most ... unusual.


 * Dr. Adam Royston: Now, Mac, how would you go about killing that?
 * Inspector McGill: What is it?
 * Dr. Adam Royston: It's a particle of mud. But by virtue of its atomic structure it emits radiation. That's all it is. Just mud. How do you kill mud?

Taglines

 * Can anything escape its terror?
 * NOTHING CAN STOP IT!
 * It rises from 2000 miles below the earth to melt everything in its path!

Cast

 * Dean Jagger — Dr. Adam Royston
 * Leo McKern — "Mac" McGill
 * Edward Chapman — John Elliott
 * William Lucas — Peter Elliott
 * Peter Hammond — Lieutenant Bannerman
 * Anthony Newley — Lance Corporal "Spider" Webb
 * Ian MacNaughton — Haggis
 * Michael Ripper — Sergeant Harry Grimsdyke
 * Michael Brooke — Willie Harding
 * Frazer Hines — Ian Osborne
 * Norman Macowan — Old Tom
 * John Harvey — Major Cartwright
 * Edwin Richfield — Soldier Burned on Back
 * Jane Aird — Vi Harding
 * Neil Hallett — Unwin
 * Kenneth Cope — Private Lansing
 * Jameson Clark — Jack Harding
 * Marianne Braun — Zena, the Nurse
 * Brown Darby — The Vicar