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The Pit and the Pendulum Movie Review

The Pit and the Pendulum is a 1961 horror film directed by Roger Corman and starring Vincent Price, John Kerr and Barbara Steele. It’s a flawed, but atmospheric genre flick.

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“No one shall ever enter this room again“

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When Francis’s sister Elizabeth dies owing to mysterious circumstances, he visits the castle of his brother-in-law Nicholas Medina. Nicholas and his sister, Catherine, offer a vague explanation. This movie was based on a short story by the famed Edgar Allan Poe, and it has that typical Poe atmosphere and old-fashioned thrills.

The plot is very good I would say, but with some caveats. It is more than reasonable to expect that Price would play a villain in most of his movies, so the end twist did seem obvious, at least to me. It worked and it made sense, but unpredictable it was simply not. Still though, I liked the overall premise, the mystery behind it all and the inclusion of Spain, the inquisition and the torture devices made for a really grotesque imagery. The movie is restrained, but in terms of imagination, it’s quite brutal indeed.

The acting is a total mixed bag unfortunately. While Vincent Price excelled with his expectedly suave presence, an iconic voice and great emotiveness, others were immensely inferior to put it mildly. Yes, these actors were the worst aspect of the film as their acting was borderline stagey and ridiculously over-the-top.

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I did like the characters and the overall dynamic worked for me with the familial relationships and the cheating, but the actors ruined it as Barbara Steele was way too theatrical and the less said about John Kerr, the better as his performance is ridiculous honestly. Most of his delivery was as wooden as a tree, and he definitely ruined an otherwise excellent, believable dialogue.

Another problem that The Pit and the Pendulum has is that it is way too short. Clocking in at around 85 minutes, it is a brief, fun viewing experience, but more could have been done with its excellent premise nonetheless. Still, that short runtime led to a particularly well paced, brisk and enjoyable movie that flies by for sure.

Technically speaking, the movie works, though again I have some negative remarks as well. Having in mind that it had a very low budget, the film’s location and especially time period were left underutilized in certain areas. I will get to the positive aspects in just a moment, but first let’s just say that the actors not wearing wigs and proper clothing ruined the illusion of the sixteenth century, plus the British accents ruined the illusion of all this happening in Spain. These are just small tidbits that, had they been done right, would have made for a much more authentic experience.

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However, the movie still looks excellent, which is commendable given its again very small budget standing at around 300.000 dollars. The cinematography is fantastic and particularly impressive in a couple of amazing moving takes and some superb creepy imagery. The sets are excellent and the torture devices are very well depicted. I liked the score as well and the direction from Corman is very strong. The movie isn’t scary by today’s standards, but it’s eerie and atmospheric in that pleasantly old-fashioned Victorian period way.