RebeldeMule

El pozo
The Pit
Edward Abraham (Reino Unido, 1962) [27 min]



(filmaffinity)

Cortometraje experimental basado en el relato de Poe "El pozo y el péndulo".

Experimental film based on the classic Poe tale "The Pit and the Pendulum".

En BFI se escribió:Told with out recourse to dialogue (the only human voices are those of ominously chanting monks and the chief inquisitor pronouncing "morte!"), the film recounts the now familiar tale of a prisoner's torments in a darkened room with the titular devices of torture. He escapes the pendulum that descends inexorably towards him only find that the walls of the dreary cell in which he has been cast are glowing red hot, moving and pushing him closer to an apparently bottomless pit in the centre of the room.

Kevin Lyons, en Kev's Cupboard, en septiembre de 2008, escribió:During the 1950s and 60s, the British Film Institute, through its Experimental Film Fund, financed a number of unusual ventures under its remit to encourage new talent. One of those films was Edward Abraham's strange and eerie take on Edgar Allan Poe, "The Pit" (1962).

Told with out recourse to dialogue (the only human voices are those of ominously chanting monks and the chief inquisitor pronouncing "morte!"), the film recounts the now familiar tale of a prisoner's torments in a darkened room with the titular devices of torture. He escapes the pendulum that descends inexorably towards him only to find that the walls of the dreary cell in which he has been cast are glowing red hot, moving and pushing him closer to an apparently bottomless pit in the centre of the room.

For most of its brief 30 minute running time, The Pit remains commendably faithful to Poe's original (the prisoner discovers the pit by almost falling into it while blindly exploring his cell, the pendulum descends from a painting of Old Father Time) though the ending is considerably nastier. There's no last minute reprieve for Abraham's prisoner (played by Brian Peck), no French soldier to save him from his fateful fall into the pit.

Though Peck does well enough in a role that really has no meat to it whatsoever, the real stars of the show are Gregory Lawson's production design and the unsettling sound design of composer Leslie Harverson and sound men Cyril Vine and Bill Sutton. The cell is decorated with macabre images, primitive artwork of huge staring eyes, disorientating abstract patterns and menacing skeletal forms with hideous death masks and the soundtrack, all atonal instrumentation and unidentifiable electronic-sounding squawks and drones, fits this dank, revolting setting perfectly. At times it seems almost as much a torture for the audience as the constantly dripping water, descending pendulum and moving walls are for the prisoner.

Sadly, almost all of the Experimental Film Fund productions are now almost impossible to see (though a few of the animations and the early Ken Russell short Amelia and the Angel (1958) surface from time to time) and one can only hope that they match the professionalism with which Abraham assembled this, his only theatrical work as a director; he later directed On the Sixth Day (1974) for the ITV drama strand Late Night Drama and would eventually script the British horrors Dominique (1978) and The Monster Club (1980).

Guión: Edward Abraham; basado en la historia de Edgar Allan Poe.
Música: Leslie Haverson.
Fotografía: Gus Coma.

• Burt Letts.
• Dave Lloyd.
• Brian Peck.

Terror, Vanguardia/Experimental, Cortometraje / Inquisición, Adaptaciones literarias.

The.Pit.1962.720p.BluRay.x264-mfcorrea

Subtítulos: sin diálogos / incluidos en inglés para sordos (sonidos de ambiente)