Back El pou i el pèndol (pel·lícula) Catalan The Pit and the Pendulum (ffilm 1961) Welsh Das Pendel des Todes German Il pozzo e il pendolo (film 1961) EML Pit and the Pendulum Spanish The Pit and the Pendulum (1961eko filma) Basque مغاک و آونگ (فیلم ۱۹۶۱) Persian Kuilu ja heiluri (vuoden 1961 elokuva) Finnish La Chambre des tortures French O pozo e o péndulo (filme) Galician

The Pit and the Pendulum (1961 film)

The Pit and the Pendulum
Original 1961 theatrical release poster by Reynold Brown
Directed byRoger Corman
Screenplay byRichard Matheson
Based onThe Pit and the Pendulum
1842 story
by Edgar Allan Poe
Produced byRoger Corman
Starring
CinematographyFloyd Crosby
Edited byAnthony Carras
Music byLes Baxter
Color processPathécolor
Production
company
Alta Vista Productions
Distributed byAmerican International Pictures
Release date
  • August 12, 1961 (1961-08-12)
Running time
80 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
BudgetUS$300,000
Box officeUS$2 million[1][2][3] or $1.5 million[4]
204,570 admissions (France)[5]
Vincent Price and Barbara Steele

The Pit and the Pendulum[6] is a 1961 horror film directed by Roger Corman, starring Vincent Price, Barbara Steele, John Kerr, and Luana Anders. The screenplay by Richard Matheson was loosely inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's 1842 short story of the same name. Set in sixteenth-century Spain, the story is about a young Englishman who visits a foreboding castle to investigate his sister's mysterious death. After a series of horrific revelations, apparently ghostly appearances and violent deaths, the young man becomes strapped to the titular torture device by his lunatic brother-in-law during the film's climactic sequence.

The film was the second title in the popular series of Poe adaptations released by American International Pictures, the first having been Corman's House of Usher released the previous year. Like House, the film features widescreen cinematography by Floyd Crosby, sets designed by art director Daniel Haller, and a film score composed by Les Baxter. A critical and box-office hit, Pit's success convinced AIP and Corman to continue adapting Poe stories for another six films, five of them starring Price. The series ended in 1964 with the release of The Tomb of Ligeia.

Film critic Tim Lucas and writer Ernesto Gastaldi have both noted the film's strong influence on numerous subsequent Italian thrillers, from Mario Bava's The Whip and the Body (1963) to Dario Argento's Deep Red (1975).[7][8] Stephen King has described one of Pit's major shock sequences as being among the most important moments in post-1960 horror film.[9]

  1. ^ "1961 Rentals and Potential". Variety. 10 Jan 1961. p. 58.
  2. ^ Corman, Roger and Jerome, Jim. How I Made a Hundred Movies in Hollywood and Never Lost a Dime, DeCapo Press, 1990, p. 83, ISBN 978-0306808746
  3. ^ "TMe: Box Office Tops from 1960-1969". Archived from the original on 2016-03-05. Retrieved 2016-01-04.
  4. ^ "Poe & Bikinis". Variety. 9 October 1963. p. 17.
  5. ^ Box office information for Roger Corman films in France at Box Office Story
  6. ^ Williams, Lucy Chase. The Complete Films of Vincent Price, Citadel Press, 1995. ISBN 0-8065-1600-3. As Williams notes, the actual onscreen title was "Pit and the Pendulum".
  7. ^ Lucas, Tim. Video Watchdog Magazine, issue #74 (August 2001), p. 55. Review of The Pit and the Pendulum DVD
  8. ^ Gastaldi, Ernesto. Interviewed by Tim Lucas in Video Watchdog Magazine, issue #39 (May–June 1997), p. 28–53, "What Are Those Strange Drops of Blood in the Scripts of Ernesto Gastaldi?"
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference King was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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