| Description |
Queen of Outer Space (1958)
Capt. Patterson and his spaceship crew witness the destruction of Earth's space station by a mysterious ray which accelerates the ship to a crash landing on Venus. They're captured by a troop of raygun-toting miniskirted lovelies who speak English. It seems Venus's men died in a recent revolt, and masked Queen Yllana intends the same fate for Earth. But there's an anti-war faction led by scientist Talleah, and as the only men on the planet, our heroes have no trouble making friends...
Zsa Zsa Gabor ... Talleah
Eric Fleming ... Capt. Neal Patterson
Dave Willock ... Lt. Mike Cruze
Laurie Mitchell ... Queen Yllana
Lisa Davis ... Motiya
Paul Birch ... Prof. Konrad
Patrick Waltz ... Lt. Larry Turner
Barbara Darrow ... Kaeel
Marilyn Buferd ... Odeena
Mary Ford ... Venusian Girl
Marya Stevens ... Venusian Girl
Laura Mason ... Venusian Girl
Lynn Cartwright ... Venusian Girl
Kathy Marlowe ... Venusian Girl
Coleen Drake ... Venusian Girl
Director: Edward Bernds
Runtime: 80 mins
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0052104/
Codecs:
Video : 783 MB, 1373 Kbps, 23.976 fps, 448*352 (5:4), XVID = XVID Mpeg-4,
Audio : 109 MB, 192 Kbps, 48000 Hz, 2 channels, 0x2000 = AC3 DVM, CBR,
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To the ranks of "Go ahead, make my day", "Badges? We don't need to stinkin' badges" and "You had me at hello," can now be added "Men cannot liff vizout vimmin," uttered dreamily by renowned philosopher Zsa Zsa Gabor in this no-budget sci-fi "epic". Everybody involved seems to be having a good time, with the exception of lead Eric Fleming, who goes through the movie with a "when this is done I'm gonna strangle my agent" look on his face, but it's a fun movie to watch. Director Ed Bernds made his name at the helm of some of the better Three Stooges shorts--including "Micro Phonies", considered by many Stoogephiles to be the team's best--so you know he couldn't have been taking this thing seriously while he was making it. (I've always wondered, however, how a writer with the stature of Ben Hecht--credited with the story--got involved in a project like this. Then a few years ago I read an article that said Hecht got loaded at a party one night and started spinning a yarn about a spaceship that crash-lands on a planet of beautiful, horny women. Somebody who heard that story passed it on to someone else, and eventually it became "Queen of Outer Space." Hecht sued the producers when he heard it was being made into a film, and as part of the settlement he got a story credit.)
It's still a fun movie, although by no standards could it be considered a good one. Just appreciate it for what it is--a chance for '50s teenage boys to see lots of tall, beautiful, leggy women running around in skimpy outfits and short skirts, for one thing--sit down with a six-pack and a pizza and have a good time.
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When one starts watching this movie, one gets a feeling that this might be a fairly serious, good sci-fi film...then the rocket lands on Venus, and all credibility simply vanishes. First, we all know that Venus is shrouded in poisonous clouds and has a surface temperature that will melt lead, right??? Well, in this movie, Venus looks like a discount store with lots of potted tropical plants strewn around, and the intrepid astronauts never even break a sweat. The astronauts are then captured by a patrol of women in high heels (who also shout "Bagino!" over and over), and the familiar "men-encountering-love-starved-female-civilization" plot begins.
The movie does have some interesting twists: The deadly "Beta Disintegrator" with which the evil queen is planning to destroy earth; the queen's advanced acne-like skin condition; gloriously saturated color photography; Paul Birch as the bookish scientist who is uninterested in the nubile Venusian women; and of course Zsa Zsa Gabor, who gives an interesting performance as the Chief Scientist on Venus (!).
This movie is outrageously male-chauvinistic (even for the 50s) and has some of the dumbest dialogue in the cosmos. For those reasons--and to see Gabor in her most ridiculous role--you should watch this. However, I doubt that you'll want to watch it more than once.
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This truly is my favorite for sheer enjoyment. This was featured on a low-budget TV station (WOR) back in NYC in the early 1960's. It could be shown up to 20 times a week and we watched it EVERY time. It has everything: the 1958 view of life in 1984, space catastrophe, sex (well, sort of), Zsa Zsa, a man-hating queen with a shocking secret, babes in short togas, and the funniest plot ever. It's colorful, hysterical and they even throw in an animated monster for a mercifully short period of time.
Any line of Zsa Zsa's (the chief scientist of Venus) is quotable. The best moment in the show happens when she tries to impersonate the Wicked Queen and they briefly fall for it, accent and all!
Don't miss it!
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* Costumes worn by the ship's officers and Motiya are re-used or copied from Forbidden Planet (1956).
* Many of the models, sets, and special effects are taken from World Without End (1956).
* In an interview, director Edward Bernds said that Zsa Zsa Gabor got very "testy" with the actresses playing the Venusian girls. They were mostly beauty contest winners, and were many years--and in some cases a few decades--younger than her. When she noticed that the crew was paying more attention to the tall, leggy, mini-skirted "Venusians" than they were to her, she became very difficult to work with. He said that Gabor gave producer Ben Schwalb such a hard time on the picture that Schwalb eventually wound up in the hospital with ulcers.
* The project was originally announced as "Queen of the Universe" by Allied Artists in 1951 and was to have been produced by Walter Wanger.
* The rocket ship model used in this film was also used as a comic prop by Huntz Hall in the 1954 Bowery Boys comedy Paris Playboys (1954).
* The film opens with a 15-minute prologue before the opening credits.
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