A rocketship returning to Earth from Venus crash-lands in the Mediterranean. It's precious cargo, an alien life form, is set free and grows to tremendous proportions. Terrified, it is hounded and hunted until it is finally cornered atop the Coliseum.
20 Million Miles to Earth (1957) is a giant monster on the loose movie from Charles Scanner, Nathan Juran and Ray Harryhausen, the same team that would bring us The 7th Voyage of Sinbad a year later. Unlike most other giant monster movies of the 50s, 20 Million Miles to Earth hearkens back to movies such as King Kong and Mighty Joe Young, by giving us a sympathetic creature who only acts out because it is frightened or under attack itself. Harryhausen's stop-motion animated Ymir gives a wonderfully nuanced performance, and the plaintive sounds it is given only add to the creature's distress.
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