Complete credited cast: | |||
Claude Rains | ... | Prof. Benson | |
Bill Carter | ... | Cmdr. Bob Cole | |
Umberto Orsini | ... | Dr. Fred Steele | |
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Maya Brent | ... | Eve Barnett |
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Jacqueline Derval | ... | Cathy Cole |
Renzo Palmer | ... | Barrington | |
Carlo D'Angelo | ... | Gen. Varreck (as Carlo d'Angelo) | |
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Carol Danell | ... | Mrs. Collins |
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Jim Dolen | ... | Boyd |
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Joe Pollini | ... | Pat (as Joseph Pollini) |
John Stacy | ... | Dr. Cornfield | |
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Aldo D'Ambrosio | ... | United Commission Member |
Massimo Righi | ... | Lewis Boyd | |
Giuliano Gemma | ... | Moran | |
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Annamaria Mustari | ... | (as Anna Maria Mustari) |
A stray planet on a collision course with Earth instead takes orbit around our blue marble. What seems like a dead planet suddenly launches a fleet of flying saucers which attack our space fleets. Written by Humberto Amador
The one problem with Battle of the Worlds is that it tries to be a lot of things and doesn't quite pull any of them off. It tries to be a regular Italian space opera. It tries to be intelligent science fiction. Claude Rains definitely tries to make it a monodrama.
Unfortunately, the script doesn't let it be any of these things, and Claude's overacting makes you almost want to take a swing at the poor guy...I'm hoping that he had a good time while he did this movie (since it was really his last film), because it really was fun to watch him in this movie. His performance as a cantankerous, pajama-wearing, genius of a hermit who can answer any problem through calculus just didn't help things, and his character's attitude toward everything that wasn't math or himself make me wonder why his co-workers didn't lock him up in a rubber room.
The effects are a little on the loq quality side, even considering the general quality of Italian Sci-Fi movie SFX, but they don't really detract that much from the movie.