The film Red Sonja (Theatrical release: 3 July 1985) was shot in Italy, on location in Celano and Abruzzi, near Rome, and at the Stabilimenti Cinematagrafici Pontini studios. In Conan the Barbarian, Sandahl Bergman played Valeria, the queen of thieves and the love of Conan’s life. Initially she was offered the role of Red Sonja, but turned it down, choosing instead to play the villainous Queen Gedren. After Bergman turned down the lead role, it took Dino De Laurentiis almost a year to find an actress Amazonian enough to play the title character in Red Sonja. He was still looking eight weeks before the production was due to start, when he saw Brigitte Nielsen on the cover of a fashion magazine. The 21-year-old native of Helsingør, Denmark, who was in Milan on a modeling job, soon found hers