The Masque of the Red DeathYear: 1964 Director: Roger Corman Written by: Charles Beaumont, R. Wright Campbell Threat: The Red Death Weapon of Choice: Plague Based upon: short story -- "The Masque of the Red Death" -- Edgar Alan Poe Color/B&W/3D: Colour Language: English Country of Origin: UK IMDb page: |
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Other movies in this series:
None
Rish's Reviews
I love Vincent Price. It seems that I always have.
Back in my childhood, our cheapie independent television Channel 20 used to show the
same movies on "Thriller Theater" over and over again. Among them were the Roger
Corman Edgar Allan Poe movies. I remember enjoying House of Usher and
Pit and the Pendulum (and to a lesser extent, The Raven), but never
being able to get through Masque of the Red Death. Even playing with action
figures or putting a puzzle together, I couldn't stand two hours of that film.
But it has been touted as one of Vincent Price's best, so I was very happy when tyranist
invited me over to check it out. Unfortunately, the movie was as dull and hard to get
through now as it was twenty-something years ago.
Basically, Vincent Price plays an evil dude lording over the countryside. When the
plague hits in a nearby village (sparing a semi-present few, for some reason), Price
barracades himself and his sycophantic noble subjects in his castle for a lot of debauchery,
musical numbers, and Satan worship. Oh, and for a reason I still can't figure out, he
half-kidnaps an attractive commoner and shows her around the castle, trying to indoctrinate
her in his devilish ways, but at the same time admiring her innocent faith.
Wow, this movie was so slow, so rambling, and so darn pointless. Sad, really.
I could cite several problems here. For example, the dream sequence that shows a lot
of disjointed, pseudopoetic imagery to create . . . well, padding for the film's runtime.
Or the dialogue that went on and on, yet going nowhere (it reminded me of what children's
theatre actors would do when they were onstage and someone had missed their cue).
You could almost see the characters watching the clock through the corner of their
eye as they spoke, waiting for the script supervisor to announce they'd reached their
runtime. Hoorah!
And what about the two musical interludes? The dancing? The artsy-fartsy (though
more fartsy than artsy) choice of the colour scheme and the silly sub-third season "Star
Trek"-level makeup effects for the plague victims (basically they looked sunburned)?
This was not a very good film. It's not the kind of awful tripe Roger Corman would later
be known for, knocking off successful films and making sleazy exploitative flicks on a
shoestring budget. No, it was much much worse.
Best Scare: Come now, there were no scares. Perhaps the revelation of the face behind
the titular "masque" was the closest it came.
I'd Recommend It To: I'm sure there are those who love this film, and I'll make no attempt
to dissuade them. Everybody else I invite to stay away.
Posted: December 28, 2006
The tyranist's thoughts
This movie is just plain bad. I've seen worse, but I've rarely seen any quite as dull. I suppose
it would be a serious challenge to stretch the original story to half an hour, let alone an hour
and a half, but they could've done something better.
The decadence, while not new to the story, seems oddly portrayed. The satan worship, which
is definitely new to the story could have provided some really interesting moments, but it mostly
just distracted from the other dullness for a bit before becoming dull in and of itself.
I just can't get over how bad this movie is. But people talk about it like it was quite probably
the crowning achievement of Vincent Price's career. I suddenly feel like I've stumbled into
a modern art gallery and I'm looking random colors on canvasses and wishing that I was
looking at a realist.
At any rate, there's no need to see this. It's just crap and you'd probably be happier to not
have seen it than to have finally seen the great Vincent Price reduced to a bad pantomime.
Posted: December 28, 2006
Total Skulls: 19
| Sequel | ||
| Sequel setup | ||
| Rips off earlier film | ||
| Horror film showing on TV/in theater in movie | ||
| Future celebrity appears | ||
| Former celebrity appears | ||
| Bad title | ||
| Bad premise | ||
| Bad acting | ||
| Bad dialogue | ||
| Bad execution |  |
|
| MTV Editing | ||
| OTS | ||
| Girl unnecessarily gets naked | ||
| Wanton sex | ||
| Death associated with sex | ||
| Unfulfilled promise of nudity | |
|
| Characters forget about threat | ||
| Secluded location | |
|
| Power is cut | ||
| Phone lines are cut | ||
| Someone investigates a strange noise | |
|
| Someone runs up stairs instead of going out front door | ||
| Camera is the killer | ||
| Victims cower in front of a window/door | ||
| Victim locks self in with killer | |
|
| Victim running from killer inexplicably falls | ||
| Toilet stall scene | ||
| Shower/bath scene | |
|
| Car stalls or won't start | ||
| Cat jumps out | ||
| Fake scare | ||
| Laughable scare | ||
| Stupid discovery of corpse | ||
| Dream sequence | |
|
| Hallucination/Vision | |
|
| No one believes only witness | ||
| Crazy, drunk, old man knows the truth | ||
| Warning goes unheeded | ||
| Music detracts from scene | |
|
| Death in first five minutes | ||
| x years before/later | ||
| Flashback sequence | ||
| Dark and stormy night | ||
| Killer doesn't stay dead | ||
| Killer wears a mask | |
|
| Killer is in closet | ||
| Killer is in car with victim | ||
| Villain is more sympathetic than heroes | ||
| Unscary villain/monster | |
|
| Beheading | ||
| Blood fountain | ||
| Blood spatters - camera, wall, etc. | ||
| Poor death effect | |
|
| Excessive gore | ||
| No one dies at all | ||
| Virgin survives | |
|
| Geek/Nerd survives | ||
| Little kid lamely survives | |
|
| Dog/Pet miraculously survives | ||
| Unresolved subplots | |
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| "It was all a dream" ending | ||
| Unbelievably happy ending | |
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| Unbelievably crappy ending | |
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| What the hell? | |
