Aka The Giant Ymir. Man’s first interplanetary voyage. The first American spaceship to Venus the XY-21, crashes into the Mediterranean sea off Sicily. Fishermen from the village of Gerra board boats and head to the spacecraft, entering it through a hole and pull two spacemen from the nose-down craft before it completely sinks. In Washington DC Major General A.D. McIntosh (Thomas B. Henry) discovers that the missing spaceship piloted by Colonel Bob Calder (William Hopper) has been located. As McIntosh flies to the site, little Pepe (Bart Bradley) finds and opens a translucent cylinder marked USAF on the beach. It contains a gelatinous mass, which he presents to zoologist Dr. Leonardo (Frank Puglia) whose medical student granddaughter Marisa (Joan Taylor) is summoned to take care of the injured spacemen. When Calder regains consciousness, he finds his crewmate, Dr. Sharman (Arthur Space, believe it or not) in the last throes of the fatal disease that killed his crewmen. After Marisa returns to the trailer shared with her grandfather, a small creature hatches from the egg, and Leonardo locks it in a cage. By morning, the creature has tripled in size. McIntosh arrives, accompanied by scientist Dr. Judson Uhl (John Zaremba) and meets with two representatives of the Italian government, informing them the spaceship has returned from Venus. Leonardo and Marisa hitch the trailer to their truck and travel to Rome. Calder’s spacecraft carried a sealed metal container bearing an unborn Venusian species. As police divers begin to search for it, McIntosh offers a large reward for the capsule’s recovery, prompting Pepe to lead them to the empty container. When Pepe tells them that he sold the mass to Dr. Leonardo, McIntosh and Calder pursue him. That night, Leonardo discovers that the creature has grown to human size. Soon after, it breaks out of the cage and heads to a nearby farm, terrorizing the animals. The creature eats sulphur and rips open several bags it discovers in a barn. While feeding, the creature is attacked by the farmer’s dog, and the creature maims the dog, alerting the farmer. Calder and the others reach the barn, trapping the creature inside. Calder explains that the creature is not dangerous unless provoked. However, he provokes it by trying to prod the creature with a pole into a cage-like cart, and the creature injures the farmer after he stabs the creature with a pitchfork. After the creature breaks out of the barn and disappears into the countryside, the police commissioner insists that it must be destroyed ... I’ve had nightmares in my time but I’ve never dreamed of anything like this. Nowadays this sci-fi outing is mostly enjoyable for the foregrounding of Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion animation and the concept of the film was from his story with Charlott Knight (albeit Harryhausen is uncredited) The Giant Ymir; and the other fun fact is that this was shot in Italy because he wanted to go on holidays there. This setting then lends itself to a finale of unusual pathos inasmuch as following the clash of animals in Rome Zoo, with their fabulous rumble in the streets reminding us of both King Kong and Godzilla, the ultimate contest takes place in the arena of the Coliseum, making it a gladiatorial fight to the death. There is a deal of humour from the word Venusian (sounds like: Venetian) but mostly this has the conventional deadly serious approach to the material typical of the era although this was produced by Columbia Pictures not Universal-International who more or less cornered the market. Hopper (son of notorious gossip columnist Hedda) is probably best remembered for playing Natalie Wood’s dad in Rebel Without a Cause and he has some ripe innuendo-laden sparring with Taylor (candles, lit and unlit, and so forth) but that other film is paid perhaps unintentional homage in the film’s final overhead shot of his Jeep leaving the scene. Originally shot in black and white this was eventually colourised honouring Harryhausen’s wishes five years after his death: this was his favourite of all his fantasy films. The screenplay is by Bob (Robert Creighton) Williams & Christopher Knopf. Directed by Nathan Juran. You caught me unprepared. I’ve been cooking over a hot creature all day
mondomovies 
The creatures have arrived…