The Day the Sky Exploded (1961)

The Day the Sky Exploded was a science-fiction film originally released in Italy in 1958, and in the United States in 1961. It starred Paul Hubschmid and Fiorella Mari, and was also released in France and West Germany. It was also known as Death Comes from Space and Death From Outer Space.


An atomic rocket is launched on a manned moon mission, but one of the engines malfunctions. The rocket's steering is broken. The pilot disengages the capsule and returns to earth. The atomic booster, however, continues on, eventually crashing into and exploding in an asteroid belt. The explosion dislodges many asteroids from their orbits. They coalesce into one giant cluster and are heading for earth. As the cluster approaches earth it causes global scale disasters: tidal waves, wind, fire storms and earthquakes. Mankind's only hope is to arm every missile on earth with a nuclear warhead and fire them all at the cluster. One scientist loses his sanity in the crisis and disables the great computer needed to calculate all the firing data. He is stopped and the data provided. The nations of the world band together and fire the volley. The cluster is destroyed.


THE DAY THE SKY EXPLODED
PAOLO HEUSCH   (1961)
79 MIN
ITALY/USA