Planets destroy earth!
1951-09-14
$0.9M
83 min
When a group of astronomers calculate a star is on a course to slam into Earth, a few days before, it's accompanying planet will first pass close enough to the Earth to cause havoc on land and sea. They set about building a rocket so a few selected individuals can escape to the planet.
"Suggest we fly to another world"
Whilst I wholeheartedly agree with other amateur reviewers on line that stress you have to put yourself back to 1951 to appreciate the film more, it still doesn't take away from the fact that the film is one of the poorer offerings from the disaster/sci-fi genre of years gone by.
The methodical build up of characters is fine for adding weight to the final reel, the effects are solid for the time, and the ending has an element of heart tugging hope to it, but the film still remains a drawn out laborious watch.
No amount of shouting about lack of budget and the time frame of its birth can't detract that the film over relies on heavy dialogue to keep the viewer interested. This is all well and good if the pay off is handsome in the extreme, which sadly isn't the case on this occasion.
I have taken myself back to 1951, and for that reason alone I give it the average rating of 5/10, while I certainly have no hesitation in recommending this to genre fans for at least one watch. It deserves to be looked at, and it deserves respect of course, but that doesn't mean it's particularly above average either.
