#713. Viking Women and the Sea Serpent (1957)

Directed By: Roger Corman

Starring: Abby Dalton, Susan Cabot, Bradford Jackson




Tag line: "Fabulous! Spectacular! Terrifying! The raw courage of women without men lost in a fantastic Hell-on-Earth !"

Trivia: An alternate title for this film was Undersea Monster

The full name of this 1957 Roger Corman-directed cheapie is The Saga of the Viking Women and their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent. What more is there to say about this movie that its ridiculously long title hasn’t already said?

Let’s see….umm….

Ok, we’ll start with the synopsis. In an effort to locate their men, who set sail years earlier and haven’t been heard from since, a group of Viking women, led by Desir (Abby Dalton), climb aboard a ship and set a course for the open sea. Traveling in no particular direction, the ladies soon fall victim to a powerful sea serpent, which destroys their boat and strands them on the shores of Grimolt, where they’re immediately captured by the evil King Stark (Richard Devon). When Desir and the others learn their men are also Stark’s prisoners, they begin making plans for an escape, but will a traitor in their midst doom them to a lifetime of slavery?

Viking Women and the Sea Serpent (I’ve no intention of typing out its full title again) is a film that, from its earliest stages, was destined to fail. With such a limited budget at their disposal, Corman and his crew were dealing with obstacles they simply couldn’t overcome, like convincing an audience the beaches of Southern California are an acceptable substitute for the Nordic hinterlands (silly me; I always thought that region was cold), or, more importantly, that the film’s buxom beauties were ever in any real danger during their voyage to the waters of the blah blah blah. For one, the boat is clearly studio-bound (even in the strongest storm, there’s nary a hair on the girls' pretty little heads blown out of place), and as far as the dreaded sea serpent is concerned, I wasn’t holding out any hope it would look impressive, yet even that didn’t prepare me for how truly laughable it was. I could continue picking Viking Women and the Sea Serpent apart, but really…what’s the point?

Both Corman and the movie’s female cast make a valiant effort to put something of substance together here, and Albert Glasser’s musical score is pretty damn sweet, but in the end, Viking Women and the Sea Serpent proved every bit as bad as its title.