The Viking Queen (1967)

To honour her father's dying wish, Queen Salina shares the rule of Icena with Justinian, a fair and just Roman. This displeases the bloodthirsty Druids on one side and the more hard-line ... See full summary »

Director:

Don Chaffey

Writers:

Clarke Reynolds (screenplay), John Temple-Smith (from an original story by)

Stars:

Don Murray, Carita, Donald Houston

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Don Murray	...	Justinian
Carita	...	Salina
Donald Houston	...	Maelgan
Andrew Keir	...	Octavian
Adrienne Corri	...	Beatrice
Niall MacGinnis	...	Tiberian
Wilfrid Lawson	...	King Priam
Nicola Pagett	...	Talia
Percy Herbert	...	Catus
Patrick Troughton	...	Tristram
Sean Caffrey	...	Fergus
Denis Shaw	...	Osiris
Philip O'Flynn	...	Merchant
Brendan Matthews	...	Nigel
Gerry Alexander	...	Fabian

Storyline

To honour her father's dying wish, Queen Salina shares the rule of Icena with Justinian, a fair and just Roman. This displeases the bloodthirsty Druids on one side and the more hard-line Romans on the other. As Salina and Justinian fall in love their enemies start to plot, and blood soon stains the green hills of Britain.

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Plot Keywords:

celtic | ancient rome | queen | love | dying wish | 

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Taglines:

SEE! Bladed chariots of death! Occult terrors of the druids! Men roasted alive in the cage of hell! Mighty legions of Rome! Barbarism of the mad emperor! Savage rites of the Icena!

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Genres:

Adventure

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Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

16 August 1967 (USA)

Also Known As:

A Rainha Viking

Filming Locations:

Ardmore Studios, Herbert Road, Bray, County Wicklow, Ireland

Box Office

Budget:

£471,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Hammer Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

91 min 80 min (censored)

Sound Mix:

Mono (RCA Sound Recording)

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This was Carita's only starring role in a film. Her only other on screen appearance was a small role in Ladies' Man (1962).

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Goofs

The fact of a soldier wearing a wristwatch has passed into movie folklore as the favorite goof of many moviegoers. Similar stories are told of Ben Hur (1959) and Spartacus (1960). For The Viking Queen no still or precise reference has ever been found, and it is likely that the story is either apocryphal or that one of the wristbands worn by the soldiers was mistaken for a wristwatch.

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Alternate Versions

The original UK cinema version was cut by the BBFC to heavily edit shots of Salina being stripped and flogged, and scenes of caged prisoners being lowered into a fiery pit. The 2006 Optimum DVD is uncut.

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Connections

Featured in The Props That Hammer Built: The Kinsey Collection (2012)

User Reviews

Low-budget and low-brow, but has some degree of camp appeal

During the height of the breasts-on-display, low-budget-epic era in the mid-60's, Murray got off at the wrong "Bus Stop" and wound up flailing around in this sword and sandal howler. He plays the Roman ruler of a Celtic tribe in ancient Britain. The Celtic King dies and appoints one of his three daughters to rule in his place (even though she is virtually a figurehead because of the Roman occupation.) He picks Carita and, because her mother was a Viking, she is dubbed The Viking Queen. (Apparently, she picked up her mother's accent along the way even though she was raised in Britain?) Murray and Carita have an affection for one another, but it is put to the test when he leaves to fight an enemy and his second-in-command starts wreaking havoc on her people. Finally, she's had enough and rises to battle the Romans even at the expense of her relationship with Murray. Carita is lovely (as any former model should be), but her acting inexperience shows much of the time. Murray couldn't possibly be more miscast and he and Carita have only adequate chemistry at best. They do have their own little mini-Ben Hur chariot race which ends up in a swamp, but their great love is not aptly demonstrated in the film. Corri and Pagett play her sisters. One looks old enough to be her mother and dabbles in the occult while the other has a tentative love affair with a local bruiser played by Caffrey. Houston is a raving, rabble-rousing Druid priest who, at times, makes Victor Buono look subtle. Actors like Keir and Troughton attempt to give real performances, but are done in by the pedestrian script. The ad copy for this film promised all sorts of wild events on screen, but most of them are presented in a more-than-tame manner. There is also a heavy dose of hilarious feminine pulchritude on display as scantily-clad ladies show off their bodies with strategic arm, pasty and hair placement to cover the naughtiest bits while they lie around stroking and petting the various men of the cast. One, in particular (referred to as the Nubian slave) is an obviously Caucasian girl in blackface with "Star Trek" make up who probably has more costume changes than the lead! It's not the dullest film ever made and has a few intriguing moments and some eye-catching scenery and costumes, but doesn't hold up as history, nor as titillation.