The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		4.0
Overall		4.0

The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie Review

No one expects the Spanish Inquisition. Well, almost no one, anyway.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 20, 2013

Shout! Factory’s Scream Factory imprint is giving horror fans a little early Halloween present this year, bringing six classic Vincent Price – American International films to high definition for the first time. Though horror tends to be a genre that, to paraphrase one Rodney Dangerfield, “gets no respect”, and indeed probably all of these films were thought of as B-movie drive in fodder back in the day, most if not all of them hold up surprisingly well today, with several of them offering a quasi- hallucinatory quality which Roger Corman, the supposedly low rent auteur who is responsible for the majority of the offerings in this set, states was a deliberate choice (not one necessitated by relatively paltry budgets) in an attempt to viscerally recreate the inner life of the (perhaps troubled) mind. Though Price had made at least a couple of forays into horror in the fifties with such fare as House of Wax 3D and The Fly, it was really the American International pictures that established Price’s “second act” in the film business, offering him more or less steady employment when many of his contemporaries had either resigned themselves to the ostensibly less glamorous world of television or who had outright retired from show business.

While The Fall of the House of Usher was the first so-called Corman-Poe “collaboration”, The Pit and the Pendulum is probably the best remembered of this particular batch of films, so much so that, as described in the insert booklet essay by David Del Valle, virtually all coverage of star Vincent Price’ death included the seminal “pendulum scene” from the climax of the film as the one example from the actor’s incredibly long and varied career. The Pit and the Pendulum also firmly established the Poe-Price connection in people’s minds and proved beyond a doubt that the success of The Fall of the House of Usher hadn’t been a fluke.

There’s little doubt that Corman probably felt he had stumbled—perhaps unwittingly—upon a winning formula, and it’s therefore not that surprising that The Pit and the Pendulum follows somewhat the same formula as The Fall of the House of the Usher. In both films, a handsome stranger arrives at a gigantic fortress like structure only to be met by the rather peculiar owner, played in both instances of course by Vincent Price. Poe’s original short story really only provides the climax of this film, as Corman discusses in the commentary accompanying the film as one of many supplements. Otherwise, the screenplay is largely the fanciful work of Richard Matheson, who had done similar duty on The Fall of the House of Usher.

John Kerr portrays Francis Barnard, who arrives at the mansion of his brother-in-law Nicholas Medina (Vincent Price) in order to find out what caused the death of his sister (Nicholas’ late wife), Elizabeth (Barbara Steele). When he’s given varying stories of what led to Elizabeth’s demise by Nicholas, Nicholas’ sister Catherine (Luana Anders) and finally the family doctor Leon (Antony Carbone), he grows increasingly suspicious, especially after he’s taken to the Medina’s handy dandy torture chamber, a relic of the then recent Spanish Inquisition, where Elizabeth supposedly met he fate in an “iron maiden”.

Francis begins to suspect that Nicholas is in fact becoming increasingly unhinged, something that Nicholas has already posited happened to Catherine. Once again, the unhealthy influence of the residence plays a central role, though in this film, long repressed memories ultimately enter the fray when a flashback reveals the horrifying history of the Medina family. The Pit and the Pendulum ultimately opts for a fairly mundane denouement to all the increasingly hysterical goings on, with Nicholas’ insistence that his wife is in fact not dead leading to a pretty pedestrian revelation. However, that soon gives way to the film’s hyperbolic but still legendary climax, when Francis finds himself on the receiving end of a very sharp pendulum blade.

The Pit and the Pendulum simply needs to be accepted on its own decidedly over the top terms in order to be fully enjoyed. This is one of Price’s more florid performances, fully of mad giggles and facial tics galore, but as silly as it undeniably is at times, it’s also weirdly fascinating at the same time. Kerr is very tamped down here, as he tended to be in his film roles, but he at least doesn’t have the same overly modern ambience that hobbled Mark Damon’s work in The Fall of the House of Usher. The two women are impeccably beautiful even if they don’t ultimately have a lot to do other than scream occasionally. Corman once again weaves a very dreamlike atmosphere, including what would become a trope in all of these films—an actual dream sequence, where the raging Id of various characters is put on display for all the world to see.

The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Pit and the Pendulum is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Scream Factory, an imprint of Shout! Factory, with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.34:1. This is generally a very commendable high definition presentation, though the color here is just slightly less pleasing than in The Fall of the House of Usher, with a marginally faded, brownish appearance. Fine detail is very good, revealing nice touches like the heavy brocade on some of the costumes. There are occasional density issues including some minor flicker. The elements have the requisite amount of quite minor age related damage, limited almost entirely to small flecks. Grain is quite natural looking and aside from some very minor haloing in the matte shots (which are not a result of edge enhancement) there are no artifacting issues to report.

The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Pit and the Pendulum features a lossless DTS-HD Master Audio Mono track presented via DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. This track isn't quite as full bodied as some of the others included on this set, and while the difference is marginal, I downgraded the score to the only available next tier, in order to provide some reference to the fact that there's an unnatural boxy sound to some of dialogue and Les Baxter's nice score. This is not a major issue by any stretch, and in fact a lot of this track sounds great, including that wonderful "whump, whump" in the climax as the pendulum does its dirty work.

The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Pit and the Pendulum: Rare Prologue (1080p; 5:06) is a framing device featuring Luana Anders.


• Vincent Price's Introduction and Final Words for The Pit and the Pendulum (1080i; 4:08) and (1080i; 1:51) are culled from Vincent Price's Gothic Horrors, an Iowa public television broadcast of the film.


• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 2:28)


• Photo Gallery (1080p; 3:57)


• Audio Commentary by Producer and Director Roger Corman. This is another very entertaining and informative commentary, which finds Corman discussing everything from the film's really cool title sequence to how they decided to approach adapting Poe's very short story.

The Pit and the Pendulum Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Pit and the Pendulum holds a special place in the hearts of many a baby boomer (including this one), who either saw the film in its theatrical run or grew up with its regular television broadcasts. Corman once again weaves a really impressive mood throughout this piece, helped by the inimitable Price and a good supporting cast. This Blu-ray offers nice looking video and very good (if occasionally just slightly problematic) audio, and it comes with a great assortment of supplements. Highly recommended.