Villain(s)  Radioactive walking tree

Actor(s):  Tod Andrews, Tina Carver, Linda Watkins, John McNamara

Brief Description  From Hell It Came is a 1957 low-budget American horror film directed by Dan Milner. It follows Prince Kimo, a wrongfully executed South Sea islander who returns from the grave as the Tabonga—a murderous, walking tree stump with a scowling face—to terrorize his tribe and local American atomic researchers. The movie weaves a unique blend of Polynesian kitsch, voodoo folklore, and Atomic Age anxieties into a campy creature feature.

Plot:
The story takes place on a remote South Pacific island where American scientists are conducting radiation research. The local tribal chief is mysteriously murdered, and his son, Prince Kimo, is falsely accused of the crime by a corrupt witch doctor and a scheming rival. Before Kimo is executed—by having a dagger driven through his chest while placed upright in a tree trunk—he vows to return from the dead to exact a brutal revenge on his betrayers. Shortly after Kimo's burial, the American scientists (led by Dr. William Arnold and Terry Mason) discover an bizarre, rapidly growing tree stump atop Kimo's grave. Driven by scientific curiosity, they investigate its glowing, radioactive green sap. They even unearth the stump and bring it back to their laboratory, where they detect a faint heartbeat.

The combination of the prince's supernatural curse and the island's ambient nuclear radiation mutates the stump into the Tabonga—a living, mobile tree creature with a permanently angry, stone-faced expression. The dagger used to kill Kimo remains visibly protruding from its chest. Once fully animated, the Tabonga breaks free from the laboratory and tracks down the tribal elders and witch doctors who framed Kimo, tossing them into quicksand and crushing them. While the slow-moving, rubbery creature is a terror to the villagers, it also target the scientists, eventually kidnapping a female doctor. In the final confrontation, the islanders and scientists track the monster. A well-placed rifle shot hits the dagger still stuck in the Tabonga's chest, driving the blade deeper into its heart. The creature falls backward into a swampy bog, sinking out of sight and ending its reign of terror.