Product Details
- An MVD Exclusive
- Version: 2021 Twilight Time Edition
- SKU: TWILIGHT393-BR
- Format: Blu-ray
- UPC: 700261486161
- Street Date: 12/28/21
- PreBook Date: 11/09/21
- Label: TWILIGHT TIME »
- Genre: Horror
- Run Time: 94 mins
- Number of Discs: 1
- Audio: STEREO
- Year of Production: 1960
- Region Code: 0
- Box Lot: 44
- Territory: NORTH AMERICA
- Language: English
Cast & Crew
- Director: Vittorio Cottafavi
Product Assets
Messalina (aka Messalina Venere Imperatrice)
Scheming Messalina marries Roman Emperor Claudius but goes too far with a gladiator.
- List Price: $39.95
- Your Price: $39.95
- In Stock: 221
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Both opulent and humanly scaled, director Vittorio Cottafavi's Messalina (1960, aka Messalina Venere Imperatrice) is a rare Italian-made historical spectacle headlined by a solo-above-title female star, the ideally cast English-born Belinda Lee, in one of the final roles of her tragically shortened life. Playing the young beauty plucked from country life as the Vestal Valeria to enter an arranged marriage with the newly crowned Roman emperor Claudius, she ably portrays the sexual manipulativeness and raw hunger for power of the murderous empress of legend. Seducing several high-born lovers to gain political influence, Messalina learns that balancing her grasp on the aristocracy and the common folk is too much to handle, even as she longs for the affections of her true love, the ultimately incorruptible tribune Lucius Maximus (Spiros Focas).
Media
Sales Points
- From director Vittorio Cottafavi (Il diavolo sulle colline).
- Stars Belinda Lee (Marie of the Isles (1959), Spyros Fokas (Rambo III, The Jewel of the Nile) and Giuliano Gemma (Day of Anger)
- Co-written by Ennio De Concini (Divorce Italian Style)
Press Quotes
The most fun of Lee's European movies was Messalina (1960), a silly sword and sandal epic with Lee having a high old time as the notorious empress, taking milk baths and seducing gladiators.
—Filmink
