Queen of the Amazons

Wife looking for her husband who disappeared on a safari finds her first clue in Akbar India, which leads to another safari in Africa. Her husband turns out to be living with a white woman named Zeta in the jungle, and he's not really interested in leaving.

This low budget movie is surprising in that it really makes you feel that you're in the jungles of India and Africa. The African footages are beautiful and for that alone, this movie might be worth a watch. It also has the most scenes with tiger and lion actually wrestling a man - something we don't see n more modern movie.

Acting and the entire mood of the movie is good. It's very watchable even if the premise of the story is little unbelievable.

Although low budget, this movie is lot better than many modern fantasy movies that their artificial props takes away from the atmosphere.

I just watched this film on my computer at work (on my lunch break). What I find amazing is how a whole movie could be constructed around some African safari stock footage and still be entertaining in a junky way. The 1940's stock character actors do their best to put the plot across and for me it works as a grade B campfest. The men are either handsome and stalwart or older and rather dithering and the women look great in that 1940's glamor sort of way. I love that all the jungle amazons look like they stepped out of a Hollywood beauty parlor in full make up. The action scenes are hilariously hokey and you'll have fun pointing out the mistakes in continuity. As the way to pass an hour I prefer this kind of fun trash to some TV reality show or CSI Wherever.

Jean Preston travels with her intended father-in-law, friend Wayne Monroe, and a milquetoast professor to the Middle East to find her fiancé who disappeared when his safari was attacked. Jean's movements are shadowed which leads to the death of a native who knows where and what purpose the safari was to meet. She learns he was last seen at a point in Africa and plans to trek into the jungle with guide Gary Lambert (who resents traveling with a woman in the jungle) and a cook Gabby. Lambert also takes the journey since the safari was searching for ivory poachers and after being attacked, Wayne is mysteriously killed, and the safari is led off course on occasions,and Jean later begins to suspect someone into the troupe is sabotaging the traveler's efforts. Eventually the safari makes its way to the village where Greg (Jean's fiancé) is, which is an all white woman group, the only survivors of a shipwreck, and Greg and Zita, chief of the Amazonian tribe, have fallen in love. Will Jean be able to cope, as well as survive, with the safari attacks by a hostile group of natives led by the mysterious leader? The movie started off well with nice mysterious angles to the story, but after the 12 minute mark, it turned into every minute of new footage is three of stock footage, which rarely matched what was being filmed and served no purpose but to pad the film (and unintentionally bore the audience). The script was predictable, the mystery villain was sure simple to figure, acting wooden, and has an ending to make anyone groan. Rating, based on B movies, 2.

I got this in a science fiction collection. I kept waiting for some technological or science oriented event to take place. This is a bad jungle movie. That's it. It's about a group of people who go to Africa to find some guy who disappeared during a safari into the bush. His fiancée is with the group. She gets to go along because of the way she handles a gun. We are led to believe that the women in this movie are formidable and capable. One can out shoot the male lead. However, when faced with danger, they shrink back and scream. The Amazon Queen is the same way. She has built a society in the jungle, showing no mercy at times, but when it comes time to confront the villain, all she can do is plaster herself against a wall and howl. The men are just as bad. Most of the film is stock footage from African newsreels. It allows you to get a sandwich between plot elements. At times it appears that the safari has about 400 native supply carriers. At other times they have about five. People get eaten by lions and killed with spears. A romance develops between the great white hunter and the other guy's fiancée. The evil Amazon Queen doesn't do much of anything except make idle threats. And when push comes to shove, she doesn't seem to have any power at all. What a worthless movie!

Queen of the Amazons is an ambitious low-budget hoot.

Because the production staff tried to make the most of its resources, it's actually for the most part a reasonably paced film with plenty of fun things to see behind the director's curtain. You get silly dialogue, narration written after the movie was shot, a boom mike dropping into view, an artsy silhouetted villain, the sharpshooting female lead who is suddenly helpless with a gun when her beloved is being attacked, and acres of stock footage.

It appears that large portions of the film were written around the most interesting stock footage they could find, both in India and Africa. The Indian stuff is unnecessary to the plot, other than they had the neat footage, or so it seems. But watching them try to write around all of the unrelated (but somewhat intriguing) material is great fun.

The climactic fight scene has one of the most delightfully difficult-to-follow brawls I've ever seen, because the villain looks nothing like his stunt double and looks an awful lot like the other stunt double! Time and again they cut in to a closeup with the regular actors and I was surprised, thinking that the villain was the other guy in the long shots!

There are a couple of unique characterizations as well mixed in among the cliché's, including the Queen herself, a low-key 40s starlet with an accent, and a pre-beat period poetry-spouting cook.

The trained animals are quite good and have a bit of fun footage, including a playful tiger who does a couple of great romps on some stunt doubles.

I saw this movie as part of the 50 Sci Fi(!) Classics DVD collection from Treeline, which is a low-budget and IMDb low-rated movie fan's dream.

Enjoy!