When Worlds Collide **** (1951, Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, Peter Hansen) – Classic Movie Review 491

Visionary producer George Pal’s and director Rudolph Maté’s quaintly charming 1951 end-of-the-world epic When Worlds Collide won an Oscar for Best Special Effects

Our planet is under threat of destruction when a rogue star comes speeding towards it. Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, Peter Hansen, John Hoyt, Larry Keating and co do the best thing: get the heck out in a spaceship bound for a new planet.

Our planet is under threat of destruction and extinction when another world, a rogue star called Bellus, comes speeding towards it through space. Richard Derr as David Randall, Barbara Rush as Joyce Hendron, Peter Hansen as Dr Tony Drake, John Hoyt as Sydney Stanton, Larry Keating as Dr Cole Hendron and co do the best thing: get the heck out in a spaceship bound for a new planet.

Visionary producer George Pal’s and director Rudolph Maté’s quaintly charming 1951 end-of-the-world epic When Worlds Collide might slightly need your bemused tolerance, since it is very much of its time. The appealingly wobbly, none-too-convincing special effects (highlighting with the flooding of New York City) won an Honorary Oscar for Best Special Effects for Gordon Jennings and Paramount Studios, incredible as that seems now.

You could complain about some stilted dialogue and feeble characterisation in Sydney Boehm’s screenplay, some stiff performances and the movie’s occasional plodding pace. But the strong premise from the 1933 science fiction novel stories in Blue Book magazine by Philip Wylie and Edwin Balmer and the movie’s general air of loving care and amateurish enthusiasm keep it going enjoyably for all the many fans of the sci-fi films of the Fifties.

[Spoiler alert] The book’s striking ideas come through with the nightmarish vision of a flooded of New York City with skyscraper tips just above the water and, its opposite, the optimistic dream climax of the space pilgrims landing with hope in their hearts on their new world.

Visually, too, it is still very appealing. John F Seitz and W Howard Greene’s interestingly faded Technicolor cinematography is quite beautiful and was Oscar nominated for Best Cinematography (Color). And Hal Pereira and Albert Nozaki’s production designs are extremely striking too. And, all in all, it is still a little sci-fi gem of its era.

Stuart Whitman appears as an extra in his second movie.

Filming started on 14 December 1950. Rudolph Maté said: ‘I tried to make the story as realistic as I could.’ The live action scenes took 27 days, with the effects taking twice as long.

Release date: November 15, 1951.

It was popular. On a $936,000 budget, it earned back $1.6 million at the US Canada box office in 1951.

Chesley Bonestell was an adviser, credited with the artwork used in the film, having created the design for the space ark.

In 2015, a remake was in development by writer-director Stephen Sommers, executive produced by Steven Spielberg, but there is no sign of it.

The 1933 science fiction novel When Worlds Collide co-written by Edwin Balmer and Philip Wylie was first published as a six-part monthly serial (September 1932 to February 1933) in Blue Book magazine, illustrated by Joseph Franké. Balmer and Wylie also co-authored the sequel After Worlds Collide (1934), which Producer George Pal had hoped to film, but the box office failure of his Conquest of Space (1955) ended that idea.

Peter Hansen (December 5, 1921 – April 9, 2017)

Peter Hansen, who was known for Branded (1950), Dragonfly (2002) and The War of the Roses (1989) and played Lee Baldwin on the ABC TV soap opera General Hospital, died on 9 April 2017, aged 95. He appeared in more than 100 films, TV series and made-for-TV movies, with major roles in the 1950 Western film Branded with Alan Ladd, the 1951 sci-fi film When Worlds Collide, and the 1952 Western film The Savage with Charlton Heston.

Barbara Rush (January 4, 1927 – March 31, 2024) 

Barbara Rush (born January 4, 1927) won the Golden Globe Award as most promising female newcomer for the 1953 sci-fi film It Came from Outer Space. She also starred The Young Philadelphians, The Young Lions, Robin and the 7 Hoods, and Hombre.

She died on March 31, 2024, aged 97.

The cast

The cast are Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, Larry Keating, Peter Hansen, John Hoyt, Judith Ames, Stuart Whitman, Stephen Chase, Frank Cady, Hayden Rorke, Sandro Giglio, Kirk Alyn, Gertrude Astor, Robert Chapman, Gene Collins, James Congdon, Marcel De la Brosse, Estelle Etterre, Sam Finn, Paul Frees, Art Gilmore, Charmienne Harker, Ramsay Hill, Walter Kelley, Hassan Kayam, Rudy Lee, Freeman Lusk, Chad Madison, Dolores Mann, William Meader Joseph Mell, Leonard Mudie, Mary Murphy, Gary Nelson, Keith Richards, John Ridgely, Kasey Rogers, Frances Sandford, Jeffrey Sayre, James Seay, Queenie Smith, Harry Stanton, Robert Sully, Richard Vath.

When Worlds Collide is directed by Rudolph Maté, runs 83 minutes, is made and released by Paramount Pictures, is written by Sydney Boehm, is shot in Technicolor by John F Seitz and W Howard Greene, is produced by George Pal, is scored by Leith Stevens, is designed by Hal Pereira and Albert Nozaki, with special effects by Gordon Jennings.

© Derek Winnert 2013 Classic Movie Review 491

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