The Pit and the Pendulum is one of the 7,000 movies Roger Corman directed that was "adapted" from an Edgar Allen Poe story and starred Vincent Price.  I use the word "adapted" loosely because all Roger Corman did was use the title of an Edgar Allen Poe story to help promote the film (we call this exploitation, boys and girls).  The only thing the Pit and the Pendulum shares with the original Poe story is the title, and a pit, that just happens to have a pendulum, but believe me, it's completely different than the story.

Now, just because The Pit and the Pendulum ignores the source material, that doesn't mean it's a bad movie.  All the Corman/Price/Poe collaborations are good.  Roger Corman was the king of churning out quality, low budget films in a few days that really turned a profit.  Plus, I love the way he directs; all his films have this real colorful, Gothic style to them (imagine a Hammer Horror film on LSD).  And when you add the late, great, Vincent Price, then you've got horror gold.  Picking one Vincent Price movie is tough, but this one always stayed with me.  Price, as always, is spectacular, plus the movie stars the gorgeous Barbara Steele.  Without spoiling the film, my favorite part is the last scene.  Chilling!  Trust me, the film is worth watching for the last scene alone.

Seriously, when it comes to Vincent Price, you could write down every movie he ever starred in, put those names in a hat, draw one and whatever you picked would be a winner.  Other notable Vincent Price movies worth seeing are House on Haunted Hill (which I almost wrote about, but I wanted to include a Roger Corman/Vincent Price movie in my blog), The Haunted Palace, Witchfinder General, Abominable Dr. Phibes, and Masque of the Red Death, to name a few.

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