Herr der Welt, Der
Entry updated 30 June 2025. Tagged: Film.
German film (1934; vt Master of the World). Ariel-Film. Directed by Harry Piel. Written by Georg Mühlen-Schulte. Cast includes Walter Franck, Walter Janssen, Sybille Schmitz and Siegfried Schürenberg. 90 minutes. Black and white.
In conversation with mining engineer Werner Baumann (Schürenberg), industrialist Dr Erich Heller (Janssen) – owner of the Heller Corporation – extols Technology and explains he is developing Robots as a means of liberating people from physical work. Baumer worries that this might mean the end of the human race (see Disaster), but the other disagrees, insisting all would benefit. Baumann returns to the coal mine where he works; shortly after, he is injured in a catastrophic tunnel collapse.
Heller has been abroad and on returning to his factory learns his most talented Scientist, Professor Wolf (Franck), has not been allowing anyone into his laboratory; Wolf lets Heller enter, to proudly show him the result of his labours – a giant robot, an army of which (he boasts) could conquer the world! Heller is furious and points to the worker robots built earlier: these are what he wants, machines to free humanity "from the burden of dangerous, unhealthy and mind-killing work". He orders the giant robot destroyed. Wolf tries to dissuade him, turning on the robot and explaining it will be able to fire Death Rays, though confessing he has not perfected them yet. Heller attempts to turn the robot off, but is killed by one of its rays; Wolf explains this away as an industrial accident.
Vilma (Schmitz), Heller's widow, becomes a recluse until she meets Baumann, recently recovered from his injuries: they are drawn to each other. Baumann learns the mining company has begun using Heller's worker robots and is firing the miners (see Economics); remembering Heller's insistence that the robots were to benefit everyone, he goes to Vilma – fortuitously arriving in time to dissuade her from signing away ownership of the company to Wolf. He meets with the scientist, who is indifferent to the suffering he is causing, instead showing Baumann a map of the world, lit up to show where the company's robots have been rented out; they are numerous and to be found in most countries. When the other points out the unemployed workers will revolt, Wolf smirks and reveals the giant robot – a "kampfmaschine" ("fighting machine") – which will defeat any such insurrections. Outraged, Baumann insists he will be fired; Wolf will not allow him to leave, refusing to open the laboratory's automatic doors.
Vilma gains entrance to the laboratory: she and Baumann confront Wolf and the latter demands he leaves. Wolf, shocked by this attempt to frustrate his ambitions, sets the giant robot on the couple (see Mad Scientist): as it rolls towards them the terrified Vilma agrees to sign over the company, to Wolf – who, delighted, goes to turn it off ... but its death ray proves unreliable once more, killing him. Fortunately Baumann notices a room beneath the laboratory and they shelter there as the robot's rays bombard the factory, which collapses and destroys it. Somehow the couple survive, and Baumann takes control of the Heller Corporation: its robots are now used as Heller intended: we see the mine where Baumann worked, with re-employed workers controlling or overseeing the machines, usually remotely. Where there are redundancies, company profits are shared with the unemployed; some of the ex-miners have bought farms (see Pastoral).
One of Harry Piel's previous films was the lost Die große Wette ["The Big Bet"] (1916) where a scientist builds a remote-controlled robot as part of a bet with a sportsman. In 1933 he had become a patron member of the SS and joined the Nazi party (see Politics); after World War Two he was imprisoned for six months. Writer Georg Mühlen-Schulte was one of 88 German writers and poets who vowed allegiance to Adolf Hitler in October 1933; he co-wrote at least one anti-Semitic film, Nur nicht weich werden, Susanne! (1934).
Der Herr der Welt does not appear to have any obvious Nazi propaganda elements (based on the English subtitled version viewed), though the four young women Baumann flirts with before he meets Vilma are very blonde; Vilma herself tends to let the men make the decisions, in keeping with though hardly unique to the Nazi view of women (see Women in SF). The film is concerned with the replacement of workers by technology and how this should be ethically dealt with. Its highlights are scenes set in the mine: the early disaster and, at the end, the robots working with human supervisors. The giant robot is suitably ominous, though its mobility might be called into question (it has no legs and presumably moves on wheels or tracks). Der Herr der Welt is an interesting work, though awareness of its context makes viewing a little uneasy. [SP]
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