8

Years ago I saw a movie where a glowing rock was found on a beach. Bad things happened to people who touched it. I think it glowed (possibly red, which would suggest this was a colour film, but that could just be my memory playing tricks).

I think it had fallen from space onto a beach in Scotland, and the military became involved. The rock may have been a living thing. Very Quatermass-y. I would guess it was an early 60's British movie.

2
  • Maybe some movie variation of Lovecraft's The Color Out of Space ?
    – Joe L.
    Commented Feb 1, 2015 at 11:55
  • I saw a movie a while back which vaguely matches your plot description, but unfortunately I can't remember the title and my searching doesn't turn anything up. The plot concerned some alien object that either fell to earth or washed up in a cave on the beach near some off-base military housing. Women and children who go into the cave meet with some terrible fate I can't recall. Eventually the local fathers (and therefore the military) get involved. The movie was from approximately 1960.
    – Paul
    Commented Feb 4, 2015 at 13:38

3 Answers 3

5

The Jules Verne novel Chasse au météore features a glowing meteorite on a beach in Greenland. The rock is made of gold, and it's about a hundred meter in size, so it is considered very valuable. As such, the rock inspires greed and animosity among people coming from all around the world to see it. The military gets involved, because a dozen countries are trying to acquire the rock for themselves.

Luckily, the rock can protect itself. It is glowing hot from the heat it's got when falling through the atmosphere, so nobody can even go near it without burning from the radiation. One of the characters, doctor Hudelson, almost dies when he tries. It would take months for the large rock to cool down enough.

The rock isn't living, though before it crashed to earth, it had followed an erratic pattern instead of a regular orbit, thus baffling the astronomers examining it.

The novel has been turned to a black and white movie in 1966 titled in English ''The Meteor Hunt''. I don't know anything about the movie, so I can't tell how much it differs from the novel.

(Illustration of the glowing rock from the novel)

The above picture is an illustration of the glowing rock from the novel (not the film). The illustrator is George Roux, and the digitization is by all the kinds folks at http://jv.gilead.org.il/rpaul/

3

I can see two possibilities here. The plot sounds very like Dune Roller based on a Julian May Story. Here is the link to the IMDB page.http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0717059/ however this film is not in colour as far as I can tell. This was filmed again as the Cremators in the 1970's. Haven't seen this one so don't know how much it resembles the original story. Here is the link to some info on SF Encyclopedia. Are you sure the film was set in scotland?

One further idea is that it might be the second season episode of Space 1999 called All that Glisters which features a glowing rock although obviously this does not take place in scotland.

1

This might be the 1972 film The Cremators

Dr. Iane Thorne is an entomologist working on research as he lives by himself in a remote location. While recording field observations one day, he notes some unusual blue and green marbled mineral nodules in a shallow pool. He picks them up, checks them in the lab, and then decides to mail to a colleague for his opinion on their composition. The package never makes it because the postal carrier transporting it in his car encounters a huge glowing ball of light and matter that completely incinerates him. The same thing happens to another man; just a smudge of ashes is left. Jeanne, the niece of Iane's friend and a high school sweetheart, comes to visit. She is attracted to the nodules and he gives her a pair of them. It is only in a nick of time that Iane determines that the nodules are alien "children" who were separated in a fiery impact millennia ago that are being reclaimed by the mother mass as they are discovered.

Image of the rolling ball of flame

Trailer

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.