SYNOPSYS : In a phisics laboratory in Florida, Prof. Wayne and his team are trying an experiment of tremendous scientific importance: to revive the cell of an animal that had disappeared from the Earth several thousands of years ago. A trusted cine operator, Craig, who has been given permission to make a documentary for a TV station, is filming everything seen through the electron microscope. But, when the cell starts to show signs of life, a microlamp shortcircuits and the spark strikes the cell with violence. Something disconcerting now takes place: a mysterious wind stirs the calm atmosphere of the laboratory, while life-size human images hover in the air like ghosts, accompanied by strange, articulated yet incomprehensible sounds which seem to belong to an unknown language. Craig records the whole scene. The next day, someone enters the laboratory and kills Prof. Wayne and his collaborators. Then the killer -Roach - takes the chemical and biological material that had formed part of the experiment, and subsequently hands it all the Anderson, the head of a mysterious organization. Quite apart from the police investigations into the massacre at the laboratory, one of Wayne's young assistant, Elliot, joins Craig in examining the various hypotheses that could have aroused the interest of the mysterious killer. Among these, the most outlandish, but at the same time the most plausible explanation, is that the revived cell is most probably of alien origin: reaching the Earth thousands of years ago from another world. The somewhat skeptical investigations in this direction proceed with the help of Joanna, a famous young glottologist, who tries to interpret and decipher the sounds recorded by Craig according to the well-known theory of parallel universes and the cosmic reservoir of thought energy. But more strange "coincidences), occur during Craig's investigations: the material he has filmed disappears; Joanna discovers that she resembles extraordinarily one of the figures fluctuating in the phisics laboratory, she is unable to decipher the misterious sounds but has the clearcut feeling of imminent danger and alarm; in Craig's presence she is struck and almost crushed by a violent invisible force which terrifies her. In the meantime, the mysterious group led by Anderson goes on with the experiments on the alien cell which is by now developing by selfcloning in an abnormal and unforeseen manner. Roach makes a number of attempts to eliminate Craig who is becoming dangerous to the group because of his excessive curiosity and interference. With one coup de theatre after another, Craig finds himself having to fight on the one hand against an ever more pressing alien presence, and on the other against Anderson's powerful and ruthless organization determined to use this obscure scientific discovery to the detriment of all mankind. All this while Joanna's very identity is brought seriously into question by a sequence of strange facts that even go so far as to cast doubt on her actual existence. Everything leads back to the alien cell. Recklessly aroused out of its millenial lethargy, it reveals itself to be a virtually invincible cosmic killer. In a hallucinating crescendo, the sacred and the profane, reality and fantasy, oneirism and premonition, time and space, merge together until, finally, the alien being is destroyed.
