Shatter (The Monolith Monsters 1957)

I remember watching a film on the black and white tv at Paul B's house. This would have been in the late 1970s. It had a science-fiction/disaster element, and seemed old even then - like a 40s or 50s film, though that could have been the small black and white box we watched it on.

There was a stone-like substance which presumably came from outer space; it reacted on contact with water, growing suddenly like a crystal into vertical columns, and immensely quickly. It would get to a hundred metres in height and then topple or shatter, and all of the shards that fell to the ground would themselves start growing if they were in contact with water. And so it would continue, indifferent to the plight of humanity. Mayhem ensues, women scream, children flee, men grit teeth bravely, etc.

The scene I remember clearly is when the clever scientists in the lab have discovered that water is an accelerant for this unstable stone-crystal they relax briefly at having at last explained the phenomenon, and ahead of the nearly insurmountable task of preventing it. And in that moment of relaxation, one of the scientists brushes a tiny chip of the stone, a flake, into the sink (which the camera notices but the scientist doesn't), and then turns on the tap. Down the plug it goes, and a second later the sink is burst open by a crystal column, then the whole worktop splits apart and a couple seconds later the roof is ripped off the building itself.

I forget how the film resolved, but watching it I do remember feeling that the situation was hopeless.

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Update: the film is The Monolith Monsters, 1957 (imdb, amazon). I love Matt Jones and I love the internet - thank you for finding this! Here's Monster Shack's summary of the film, which suggests that my unreliable memory is perhaps more sedimentary than it is crystalline...

Despite the fact that the title of the film would indicate so, the film's antagonist is simply rapidly growing crystals from space: albeit crystals that petrify humans on contact. These crystals grow to gigantic size upon contact with water, and absorb silica from whatever they come in contact with. Being that silica is the substance in the human body that gives our skin flexibility, humans become "petrified" if they touch the crystals. Once the crystals grow high enough, they topple over and crush everything in their path. Fragments of the crystals then go on to grow into giant crystals as well.

Nice Flintstonesy titles too. Did Robert Smithson watch Monster Monoliths?

Comments

[matt]

The simplicity of the 'macguffin' in this movie (is that the right term?) makes me think of the simple conceits behind each of Calvino's Invisible Cities...

It would be quite cool to do "Jerry Bruckheimer and Italo Calvino present: 100 Ends of The World" - each simple, generative terrifying, relentless armageddon presented in widescreen Magically-Real CataclymsoVision.

[rodcorp]

What a brilliant idea! Edited into catatrophic wallpaper like Powaspocalypsii. Lets write a pitch for BBC4/More4.

Would be nice if there were some mundane tropes too. Jack Bauer stars in #34 My Cellphone Battery Died, So I Couldn't Stop The Terrorists Releasing That Virus (sponsored by... :) ) ... Actually I think Stephen King's new novel has this form. Zombie apocalypse!: the world gets zombified via their mobiles.

[matt]

By the way - by the magical powers of the internet (and the fine folks of a private forum I belong to) I think this is your movie:

http://www.monstershack.net/Reviews/full/monolith.htm

[rodcorp]

wow thanks. yes, that's it!

[rodcorp]

PS: Monster Shack's page has moved to http://www.monstershack.net/reviews/full/monolith.php