*RIP* Val Guest - classic sci-fi film writer/director

[Shawn]

From Yahoo News:

Director Val Guest Dies at Age 94

Mon May 22, 5:51 AM ET

PALM DESERT, Calif. - Val Guest, the versatile British director and screenwriter best known for directing science-fiction classics "The Quatermass Xperiment" and "The Day the Earth Caught Fire," has died. He was 94.

Guest died of prostate cancer on May 10 in a Palm Desert hospice, said his wife, actress Yolande Donlan.

He "brought a lot of intelligence to a genre that is often sorely in need of it," said director

Joe Dante, a longtime fan of his films. "Every single one of his pictures is thoughtful and well-done."

After becoming a director in the 1940s, Guest made comedies, thrillers and musicals, but he was best known for his science-fiction works.

"The Quatermass Xperiment" was a 1955 science-fiction horror thriller with a semi-documentary feel about an experimental rocket ship that crashes in rural England with only one surviving crew member. An invisible force gradually transforms him into a monstrous creature as he consumes plants, animals and humans.

In the 1961 film "The Day the Earth Caught Fire," simultaneous nuclear explosions by the United States and the Soviet Union knock Earth off its axis and send it hurtling toward the sun. The picture earned Guest and co-writer Wolf Mankowitz best British screenplay awards from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.

Guest also was one of the five credited directors on the 1967 James Bond spoof "Casino Royale."

"He was a jack-of-all-trades," Dante said. "But there are a lot of little gems in his output that, hopefully, will come to light now."

Article

[Shawn]

Here are two more little known but GREAT films by Val Guest. Both well worth the price of a rental.

[Daniel A]

R.I.P., Val.

Watched 'Quatermass 2' on TV a late night some 16 years ago. As Shawn says, a great movie.

[Swinger]

Rip!

It must have been somewhere around 15-16 years as well in my case since I've seen "The Quatermass Xperiment".It's truly one of the better sci-fi movies made during the cold war years.

[BruceH]

Heard about his passing on Glen Erickson's "DVD Savant" site. Can't say I ever liked any of his movies though.