When Worlds Collide (1951)

Even though the acting in this 1951 production is mostly average, the film is nonetheless praiseworthy for its special effects and lickety-split pacing. From the opening scene to the last, the film races along as scientists scramble to cope with the ultimate disaster -- the end of the world. Legendary special-effects guru George Pal dots the sky with an ominous speck that soon burgeons into a great fireball -- a sun-sized body called Bellus -- as it hurtles toward earth. As civilization awaits doom, calendars display only one image -- the number of days remaining before impact. Americans work day and night to construct a rocket ship, a modern Noah's ark, to transport a lucky few to a new planet, Zyra, that will pass Earth just before the collision. The final scenes of the film stretch nerves as the sky reddens and a desperate mob storms the ship. Actors Richard Derr, Barbara Rush, John Hoyt, and Larry Keating play the principal roles with yeomanly competence, but the script is not strong enough to allow them to wax poetic or philosophical. The real star here, besides Bellus, is George Pal. Born in Hungary, Pal migrated to the U.S. after Hitler's rise to power and learned rocketry basics after befriending German immigrant scientists Willey Ley and Wernher von Braun. He used this knowledge to build the film's spaceship, a rocket that fires up in a horizontal position on a ramp. As the rocket gains speed, the ramp rises like a roller coaster. Artist Chesley Bonestell, who illustrated space scenes for scientists and writers and contributed to Life magazine, helped Pal create his special effects. ~ Mike Cummings, All Movie Guide