Cleopatra's Daughter
Cleopatra's Daughter
| 16 February 1963 (USA)
Cleopatra's Daughter Trailers

The beautiful young Sushila is forced into a political marriage with young Pharaoh Nemorat in order to consolidate power. However, the young Pharaoh is beset with mental illness and the marriage becomes dangerous, all the while the chief advisor Kefren and his scheming mistress plot to destroy the unstable pair.

Reviews
Konterr Brilliant and touching
Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible
Humbersi The first must-see film of the year.
Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.
Leofwine_draca By all rights I wasn't expecting to enjoy this stodgy historical drama at all: devoid of much action, it seemed talky and dull, like HEROD THE GREAT or HEAD OF A TYRANT. The obvious paucity of the budget meant that, aside from a dodgy superimposed building in the background of a scene at the beginning of the film, we aren't in for any real Egyptian locations: even though pyramids are present in the plot, we never get to see any of them. In addition, the acting is nothing to write home about: Debra Paget (THE HAUNTED PALACE) is nothing more than wooden in the titular role, and the various plotters at the court are never evil enough to make much of an impact (where's Edmund Purdom when you need him?). In fact, aside from reliable character actor Ettore Manni in a good turn as the heroic court physician and the chap playing the beleaguered architect – who I think is Robert Alda, Alan's dad, nobody in the cast really stands out. I was looking out for Rosalba Neri in a minor part but couldn't spot her.However, about halfway through the film, things pick up and start getting interesting. There's a poisoning plot straight out of Shakespeare and some murky goings-on in sinister tombs replete with bodies and sarcophagi, and a brilliant fight scene in which Manni fends off a crazed knife-wielding embalmer. Then Paget gets buried alive (shades of THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER here) and suddenly the film gets quite good. We join a band of grave-robbers as they break into the tomb, only to encounter all manner of deadly traps and double-crosses in the sweaty confines. We get a decently-done cave-in and then a classic (and surprisingly bloody) death for the villain, who's shot to death with about a dozen arrows. Sure, this film can never be watched more than once, even by history buffs, but it's short and, for once, has more adventure than stodge. And that is a definite plus.
artpf Cleopatra, after the civil war that followed the assassination of Caesar, met with Marc Antony in Assyria where they planned the defense of Egypt against the Romans. Before leaving, Cleopatra entrusted her young daughter, Shila, to the rulers of Assyria to be brought up as their own. After Marc Antony's defeat and Cleopatra's death, Egypt, for the next twenty years, was torn apart and ruled by a youthful Pharaoh, Nemorat, with his despot Queen Mother, Tegi, who desired to unite both kingdoms and strengthen her son's rule by conquering Assyria and making Shila, now a beautiful woman, his queen.Sounds intriguing, right?Not sure what the budget was for this period piece, but it's tedious
mark.waltz Looking much as she did in "The Ten Commandments", Debra Paget points out here that movie costume designers didn't think that fashion had changed between the days of Moses and post Cleopatra days a thousand years apart. The ridiculous story has Cleopatra with an alleged daughter Shila given up to the Assyrians to raise who becomes against her will the new Pharaoh's wife and is accused of his poisoning after refusing to make love to him. The fact that not only is this Pharaoh (Corrado Pani) totally insane but possibly gay makes the film even more ridiculous with his overly possessive mother (Yvette Lebon) standing over everything he does while it is obvious all the time who was responsible. Throw in the doctor (Ettore Manni) who must save Shila from being buried alive with the dead Pharaoh's rotting corpse and you have one laughably macabre plot.Poorly photographed and dubbed into English, this film does at least try to make itself look like it attempted to give a true ancient Egyptian feel to the proceedings. While historically speaking the film is utter tripe, at least the film doesn't utilize phony British accents as Hollywood did to dub the performers, and some of the props momentarily had me convinced that there was a slight semblance of authenticity to what they were trying to dramatize.
clearwoodlouis I remember this film being on TV as a movie, which my mother didn't like, so I never got a chance to see it for over 40 years until now. I notice that this Italian movie is probably not about Cleopatra's Daughter at all. Debra Paget somewhat fresh from "The Ten Commandments" again revisits ancient Egpyt in this classic. The title of the Italian original is "Sepolchro dei re," "Sepulchre of the King" shows that this film could be about a New Kingdom pharaoh (16th to the 11th centuries B.C.) rather than about a Ptolemaic one (4th to the 1st centuries B.C.). I liked the film, and I was glad to be finally able to see it. A famous reviewer says that the film is sadistic.