Backdrop fallback

River Queen

River Queen

Share

River Queen

"With darkness all around, only the heart can see where the forest meets the river."

2005

1h 54m

5.7(37 votes)

Adventure

War

Overview

In 1860s New Zealand, a young Irish woman desperately trying to find her son finds herself caught on both sides of the lines during the wars between Māori tribes and the British colonial army.

Links & Resources

Social & External

Production Companies

The Film Consortium

Endgame Entertainment

New Zealand Film Commission

UK Film Council

Capitol Films

Wayward Films

Australian Film Commission

The people behind it

Cast & crew

10 featured cast members

Starring

Samantha Morton

Samantha Morton

Sarah O'Brien

Kiefer Sutherland

Kiefer Sutherland

Doyle

Cliff Curtis

Cliff Curtis

Wiremu

Stephen Rea

Stephen Rea

Francis

Temuera Morrison

Temuera Morrison

Te Kai Po

Wi Kuki Kaa

Wi Kuki Kaa

Old Rangi

Anton Lesser

Anton Lesser

Baine

Mark Ruka

Mark Ruka

Hone

Barry Te Hira

Barry Te Hira

Te Kai Po Lead Warrior

Rawiri Pene

Boy

Creative team

Directed by: Vincent Ward
Written by: Vincent Ward
Shane Connaughton
Produced by: Chris Auty
Don Reynolds

Similar Movies

Missing Link

Missing Link

The charismatic Sir Lionel Frost considers himself to be the world's foremost investigator of myths and monsters. Trouble is, none of his small-minded, high-society peers seems to recognize this. Hoping to finally gain acceptance from these fellow adventurers, Sir Lionel travels to the Pacific Northwest to prove the existence of a legendary creature known as the missing link.

Project A

Project A

In late 19th century Hong Kong, the British may rule the land, but the pirates rule the waters. Coast Guard officer Dragon Ma is determined that his beloved Coast Guard will not be made a fool of.

Old Yeller

Old Yeller

Young Travis Coates is left to take care of the family ranch with his mother and younger brother while his father goes off on a cattle drive in the 1860s. When a yellow mongrel comes for an uninvited stay with the family, Travis reluctantly adopts the dog.

Gunga Din

Gunga Din

British army sergeants Ballantine, Cutter and MacChesney serve in India during the 1880s, along with their native water-bearer, Gunga Din. While completing a dangerous telegraph-repair mission, they unearth evidence of the suppressed Thuggee cult. When Gunga Din tells the sergeants about a secret temple made of gold, the fortune-hunting Cutter is captured by the Thuggees, and it's up to his friends to rescue him.

The Brothers Grimm

The Brothers Grimm

Folklore collectors and con artists, Jake and Will Grimm, travel from village to village pretending to protect townsfolk from enchanted creatures and performing exorcisms. However, they are put to the test when they encounter a real magical curse in a haunted forest with real magical beings, requiring genuine courage.

Lord Jim

Lord Jim

After being discredited as a coward, a 19th century seaman lives for only one purpose: to redeem himself. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with Sony Pictures Entertainment in 2000.

The Count of Monte Cristo

The Count of Monte Cristo

Young sailor Edmond Dantès is wrongfully imprisoned, escapes, finds treasure, and reinvents himself as the wealthy Count of Monte Cristo to exact revenge on those who betrayed him.

Dances with Wolves

Dances with Wolves

Wounded Civil War soldier John Dunbar tries to commit suicide—and becomes a hero instead. As a reward, he's assigned to his dream post, a remote junction on the Western frontier, and soon makes unlikely friends with the local Sioux tribe.

Fair Wind to Java

Fair Wind to Java

The Dutch East Indies, at the end of the nineteenth century. An adventurous captain of an American merchant vessel is looking for a sunken Dutch vessel containing 10,000 precious diamonds. Unfortunately, he's not the only one and then there's also that volcano on the nearby island of Krakatau, waiting to explode in its historical, disastrous eruption...

The Last Samurai

The Last Samurai

Nathan Algren is an American hired to instruct the Japanese army in the ways of modern warfare, which finds him learning to respect the samurai and the honorable principles that rule them. Pressed to destroy the samurai's way of life in the name of modernization and open trade, Algren decides to become an ultimate warrior himself and to fight for their right to exist.

Shanghai Noon

Shanghai Noon

Chon Wang, a clumsy imperial guard, trails Princess Pei Pei when she's kidnapped from the Forbidden City and transported to America. Wang follows her captors to Nevada, where he teams up with an unlikely partner, outcast outlaw Roy O'Bannon, and tries to spring the princess from her imprisonment.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

After an abrupt and violent encounter with a French warship inflicts severe damage upon his ship, a captain of the British Royal Navy begins a chase over two oceans to capture or destroy the enemy, though he must weigh his commitment to duty and ferocious pursuit of glory against the safety of his devoted crew, including the ship's thoughtful surgeon, his best friend.

The Steppe

The Steppe

Based on a Anton Chekhov short story, this slight tale has some good moments as the drama of a young boy's journey unfolds. The lad comes from peasant stock, and one day his family decides it would be best for him to go live with his uncle in the city. The only problem is that the city is all the way across the Russian steppes, and at this time in history, that arduous journey could only be undertaken by horse and carriage. Reminiscent of the American pioneer wagon trains heading West, the tale lacks any attacks from hostile forces but is filled with charming vignettes. In one part of the journey, the boy comes across some fishermen along a river, harpooning their catch for the day. In another segment, he is entertained when some folk dancers do a lively show. But in general, it is too long and unmomentous a journey to hold attention well for nearly two hours.

Glory

Glory

Robert Gould Shaw leads the US Civil War's first all-black volunteer company, fighting prejudices of both his own Union army and the Confederates.

Battletruck

Battletruck

It's the 21st century, the Oil Wars have made a mess of the planet and the land outside major cities is lawless. After Hunter comes to the aid of Corlie, who has run away from the villainous Straker, he takes her to the peaceful community of Clearwater. Unfortunately for the citizens of Clearwater, Straker fully intends to get Corlie back.

Sunshine

Sunshine

The fate of a Hungarian Jewish family throughout the 20th century.

Rooster Cogburn

Rooster Cogburn

After a band of drunken thugs overruns a small Indian Nation town, killing Reverend Goodnight and raping the women folk, Eula Goodnight enlists the aid of US Marshal Cogburn to hunt them down and bring her father's killers to justice.

Hundreds of Beavers

Hundreds of Beavers

In the 19th century, a drunken applejack salesman must go from zero to hero and become North America's greatest fur trapper by defeating hundreds of beavers.

Ghostkiller

Ghostkiller

Accused murderer Kyle Ghostkiller, heir to a mystical medicine bundle, escapes the FBI and time jumps to 1862 where he must save his thirty-eight ancestors from hanging and prevent a supernatural dark force from destroying the future.

The Man from Snowy River

The Man from Snowy River

Jim Craig has lived his first 18 years in the mountains of Australia on his father's farm. The death of his father forces him to go to the lowlands to earn enough money to get the farm back on its feet.

Recommended Movies

Boudica

Boudica

Inspired by events in A.D. 60, Boudica follows the eponymous Celtic warrior who rules the Iceni people alongside her husband Prasutagus. When he dies at the hands of Roman soldiers, Boudica’s kingdom is left without a male heir and the Romans seize her land and property. Driven to the edge of madness and determined to avenge her husband’s death, Boudica rallies the various tribes from the region and wages an epic war against the mighty Roman empire.

Interceptor

Interceptor

A U.S. Army Captain uses her years of tactical training to save humanity from sixteen nuclear missiles launched at the U.S. as a violent attack threatens her remote missile interceptor station.

Falcon Rising

Falcon Rising

Chapman is an ex-marine in Brazil's slums, battling the yakuza outfit who attacked his sister and left her for dead.

Wolf Hound

Wolf Hound

Inspired by the real-life German special operations unit KG 200 that shot down, repaired, and flew Allied aircraft as Trojan horses, "Wolf Hound" takes place in 1944 German-occupied France and follows the daring exploits of Jewish-American fighter pilot Captain David Holden. Ambushed behind enemy lines, Holden must rescue a captured B-17 Flying Fortress crew, evade a ruthless enemy stalking him at every turn, and foil a plot that could completely alter the outcome of World War II.

Shout at the Devil

Shout at the Devil

During World War One an English adventurer, an American elephant poacher and the latter's attractive young daughter, set out to destroy a German battle-cruiser which is awaiting repairs in an inlet just off Zanzibar. The story is based on a novel by Wilbur Smith, which in turn is very loosely based on events involving the light cruiser SMS Königsberg, which was sunk after taking refuge in Rufigi delta in 1915.

Hell Hath No Fury

Hell Hath No Fury

Branded a traitor by her countrymen, French national Marie DuJardin is rescued by American soldiers on one condition: to survive, she must lead them to a cache of gold - before the Nazis return to claim it for themselves.

Black Gold

Black Gold

On the Arabian Peninsula in the 1930s, two warring leaders come face to face. The victorious Nesib, Emir of Hobeika, lays down his peace terms to rival Amar, Sultan of Salmaah. The two men agree that neither can lay claim to the area of no man’s land between them called The Yellow Belt. In return, Nesib adopts Amar’s two boys Saleeh and Auda as a guarantee against invasion. Twelve years later, Saleeh and Auda have grown into young men. Saleeh, the warrior, itches to escape his gilded cage and return to his father’s land. Auda cares only for books and the pursuit of knowledge. One day, their adopted father Nesib is visited by an American from Texas. He tells the Emir that his land is blessed with oil and promises him riches beyond his wildest imagination. Nesib imagines a realm of infinite possibility, a kingdom with roads, schools and hospitals all paid for by the black gold beneath the barren sand. There is only one problem. The precious oil is located in the Yellow Belt.

Operation Blood Hunt

Operation Blood Hunt

Prolific expert of the occult and whiskey, Reverend Conte, accompanies a ragtag group of military rejects to a remote South Pacific Island to investigate the disappearance of Marines units stationed there in 1944, said to be at the hands of the Japanese Imperial Army. Upon speaking with the island’s inhabitants, they soon discover the Marines had actually been massacred by a group of Lycanthropes, known to most as WEREWOLVES.

Force 10 from Navarone

Force 10 from Navarone

World War II, 1943. Mallory and Miller, the heroes who destroyed the guns of Navarone, are sent to Yugoslavia in search of a ghost from the past.

Mutiny on the Bounty

Mutiny on the Bounty

Fletcher Christian successfully leads a revolt against the ruthless Captain Bligh on the HMS Bounty. However, Bligh returns one year later, hell bent on revenge.

The Lost City of Z

The Lost City of Z

A true-life drama in the 1920s, centering on British explorer Col. Percy Fawcett, who discovered evidence of a previously unknown, advanced civilization in the Amazon and disappeared whilst searching for it.

Swiss Family Robinson

Swiss Family Robinson

After being shipwrecked, the Robinson family is marooned on an island inhabited only by an impressive array of wildlife. In true pioneer spirit, they quickly make themselves at home but soon face a danger even greater than nature: dastardly pirates.

The Woman King

The Woman King

The story of the Agojie, the all-female unit of warriors who protected the African Kingdom of Dahomey in the 1800s with skills and a fierceness unlike anything the world has ever seen, and General Nanisca as she trains the next generation of recruits and readies them for battle against an enemy determined to destroy their way of life.

Sahara

Sahara

After the fall of Tobruk in June 1942, U.S. Army sergeant Joe Gunn leads his tank into the Sahara desert, in order to evade advancing Rommel's forces and reach Allied lines. Along the way he picks up few Allied soldiers, but soon they are running out of water. They find water at the ancient well, but the well is a goal of an entire German battalion. Despite the impossible odds, Sergeant Gunn decides to defend the well.

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome

Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome

Mad Max becomes a pawn in a decadent oasis of a technological society, and when exiled, becomes the deliverer of a colony of children.

Accident Man

Accident Man

Mike Fallon, the Accident Man, is a stone cold killer. When a loved one is murdered by his own crew, Fallon is forced to avenge the one person who actually meant something to him.

Unconquered

Unconquered

England, 1763. After being convicted of a crime, the young and beautiful Abigail Hale agrees, to escape the gallows, to serve fourteen years as a slave in the colony of Virginia, whose inhabitants begin to hear and fear the sinister song of the threatening drums of war that resound in the wild Ohio valley.

Trash

Trash

Set in Brazil, three kids who make a discovery in a garbage dump soon find themselves running from the cops and trying to right a terrible wrong.

The Water Diviner

The Water Diviner

In 1919, Australian farmer Joshua Connor travels to Turkey to discover the fate of his three sons, reported missing in action. Holding on to hope, Joshua must travel across the war-torn landscape to find the truth and his own peace.

The Losers

The Losers

On a mission deep in the Bolivian jungle, a team of elite commandos finds itself on the receiving end of a lethal betrayal. Now presumed dead, the men join forces with a mysterious operative named Aisha to hunt down their enemy and even the score.