QUEEN OF OUTER SPACE (1958)

Queen of Outer Space is a 1958 American science fiction film shot in DeLuxe Color and CinemaScope. Produced by Ben Schwalb and directed by Edward Bernds, it stars Zsa Zsa Gabor, Eric Fleming, and Laurie Mitchell. The screenplay by Charles Beaumont, about a revolt against a cruel Venusian queen, is based on an idea supplied by Ben Hecht and originally titled Queen of the Universe. Upon its release, the film was promoted by Allied Artists and distributed to some locations as a double feature with Frankenstein 1970 starring Boris Karloff.

Plot

Drive-in advertisement from 1958
In the year 1985,[1] Captain Neal Patterson (Eric Fleming) and his spaceship crew, Lt. Mike Cruze (Dave Willock), and Lt. Larry Turner (Patrick Waltz), are assigned to escort Professor Konrad (Paul Birch) to an Earth space station. While en route, the space station is destroyed by a mysterious interstellar energy beam, which also damages their rocketship, and causes it to crash land on a planet that Konrad reveals to his shocked companions as Venus. The four men are later captured by an army of aggressively beautiful women with ray guns. The men are brought before the governing council where they learn the planet is under the dictatorship of the cruel Queen Yllana (Laurie Mitchell), a masked woman who has had most men killed, keeping only male mathematicians and scientists on a prison colony moon orbiting Venus.[2] In a detainment area in the queen's palace, Patterson tells his men that he believes that the beam not only destroyed the space station and caused their rocket ship to crash on Venus but he also believes it may have originated from Venus. They are later aided by a beautiful courtier named Talleah (Zsa Zsa Gabor) and her Venusian friends Motiya (Lisa Davis) and Kaeel (Barbara Darrow). The women long for the love and attention of men again and plot to overthrow the evil queen to reestablish the "old order".

The masked queen later has her guards bring Patterson to her bedchamber and once he is alone with her, Patterson has the opportunity to remove the mask, revealing her horribly disfigured face. This was caused by radiation burns received during a war between Venus and the men of another planet "10 Earth years ago". Later, in a fury, the queen decides she must destroy Earth in order to protect her world and preserve her power. In the presence of Yllana’s armed guards, Talleah and the crewmen can only watch as the queen aims the energy-beam "disintegrator" at Earth. Just after Yllana activates the weapon, Talleah's allies arrive and a struggle begins between the queen’s guards and the men. The disintegrator immediately begins to malfunction and finally explodes, killing Queen Yllana.

Talleah becomes the new leader of Venus. At a subsequent ceremony, she announces that Patterson's rocketship has been repaired and that he and his crew can now return to Earth. Talleah's technicians have also repaired the "electronic televiewer", which allows space command on Earth to contact Patterson. Command orders him not to attempt a return but to remain on Venus for at least a year, until an Earth relief expedition can arrive. Although the crew could return home in their repaired spaceship, they are elated to follow orders and stay. They begin celebrating with the Venusians in a flurry of hugs and passionate kisses.

Cast
Zsa Zsa Gabor as Talleah
Eric Fleming as Captain Neal Patterson
Dave Willock as Lt. Mike Cruze
Laurie Mitchell as Queen Yllana
Lisa Davis as Motiya
Paul Birch as Professor Konrad
Patrick Waltz as Lt. Larry Turner
Barbara Darrow as Kaeel
Marilyn Buferd as Odeena
Mary Ford as Venusian
Marya Stevens as Venusian
Laura Mason as Venusian
Lynn Cartwright as Venusian
Kathy Marlowe as Venusian
Coleen Drake as Venusian
Cast notes:
Also included in the cast are Guy Prescott as Colonel Ramsey (uncredited), Gerry Gaylor as the base commander, Ralph Gamble as the officer in the anteroom (uncredited), and Joi Lansing as Turner's girlfriend (uncredited). The Venusians are played by Tania Velia, Norma Young, Marjorie Durant, Brandy Bryan, Ruth Lewis, June McCall, and Marilyn Buferd, who was a former Miss America (1946). This was Buferd's final role in her decade-plus film career.