El dueño del mundo

This is a fun movie to watch, full of charm and thinking characters in entertaining action, debate and introspection. With Vincent Price in the lead as Robur(who has declared war on warfare with his flying machine the Albatross) and Charles Bronson as his unlikely heroic nemesis Strock(almost an early era anti-hero), how can one not be intrigued? But also there's grand adventure, costumes and an 18th Century setting to boot. Also the main theme of the need to end warfare remains a very strong one and the film never loses sight of this. Just great stuff to watch.

Based on two Jules Verne novels. This is an exciting action adventure with an emphasis on world domination and flying machines. The evil Robur (Vincent Price) is the navigator of an airplane ship hell-bent on destructing all of the worlds war machines and armies for the purpose of peace on earth (what a mad case). He must be stopped by Strock (Charles Bronson) a government man whose tough but level headed.

The effects are brilliant for an early 60's film and the screenplay and music is spot on. This is a lot of fun.

Matheson's script took two Verne novels ("Robur the Conqueror" and "Master of the World"), and added touches of irony in the characters. (The "gentleman" Mr. Evans, when he sees his girl turning towards government agent Strock, tries to kill Strock at every chance.) William Witney, a famed second unit director, used every trick he ever learned in Republic serials to make the movie look slick on a low budget. (I've never seen such continuous use of a rear projection screen in any other movie.) But the real delight is Vincent Price's Robur, a man of good will but with some severe personality problems. I think he'd be a suitable children's introduction to the antihero and the character with a tragic flaw. For me, the romantic theme music by Les Baxter, especially over the end credits, makes the movie. (Fortunately, they didn't use the maudlin lyrics version in the film!) The recent video release of the film restores the theatrical prologue of "wacky" flying machines from silent movies.

I saw Master of the World mainly because of Vincent Price who is one of my favourite actors. It is far from perfect, but is fun and deserves better credit. The effects are not great where you can tell that they are low-budget, while the stock footage of other costume epics looks rather clumsy, the Globe theatre suddenly appearing in Victorian London also happens to be anachronistic. And Vito Scotti overacts to the verge of embarrassment. However, the costume and set designs are nice to look at and Master of the World is at least well photographed. The music score manages to be both rousing and bombastic, the script while talky is intelligent and humorous and the story is fun. Charles Bronson has been better but he is at least appealing, while Henry Hull is amusing. Stealing the film though is none other than Vincent Price, who commands every frame with his ever effortless suavity and panache, and he is also deliciously sinister when needed. All in all, an enjoyable film with a great Price but at the same time it could have been more. 7/10 Bethany Cox

I caught this one on cable recently, seeing it for the first time as an adult. I must admit to a slight bias toward this film: when I was growing up in the dreaded BC (before cable) days, it was standard Saturday afternoon TV fare on our local indie channels. I was surprised at how well it's held up after all this time.

Master of the World is actually based on two little-remembered Jules Verne novels. Price is his usual hammy self as the standard Verne not-quite-villain, Robur (read: Nemo in the air) who, like Nemo, seeks to end war through technology. The young Bronson, as a sympathizer who then rebels against Robur's violent methods, is far less wooden than in his later years. But the real star of this movie is its production design. The rendering of what an aircraft might have looked like in Victorian days (had such a thing been possible) is dead-on, and the special effects are pretty impressive for 1961. The script, by Richard Matheson, is a little overwrought, but true to Verne's spirit while eliminating the blatant racism of the original stories. This time around though, I found the sweeping, melodramatic score to be a bit overpowering.

In short, not a perfect film or even a great film, but Master of the World remains a well made, entertaining action fantasy. I'm surprised it isn't better remembered by fans of the genre.