The Pit and the Pendulum 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 based on Edgar Allan Poe's short story of the same name. Set in 16th century Spain, the story is about a young Englishman who visits a forbidding 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-based movies released by American International Pictures, the first having been Corman's House of Usher released the previous year. A critical and box office hit, Pit's commercial success convinced AIP and Corman to continue adapting Poe stories for another six films, five of them starring Price. Film critic Tim Lucas and writer Ernesto Gastaldi have both noted the film's strong influence on numerous subsequent Italian thrillers. Stephen King has described one of Pit's major shock sequences as being among the most important moments in the post-1960 horror film.

Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pit_and_the_Pendulum_%281961_film%29

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

217:

Roman Emperor Caracalla was assassinated at a roadside near Harran and succeeded by his Praetorian Guard prefect Macrinus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracalla

1904:

British occultist and writer Aleister Crowley began transcribing The Book of the Law, a Holy Book in Thelema. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_the_Law

1968:

BOAC Flight 712 suffered an engine fire shortly after take off from London Heathrow Airport, leading to deaths of five people on board, including flight attendant Barbara Jane Harrison, who was later awarded a posthumous George Cross for her heroism during the accident. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BOAC_Flight_712

1992:

American tennis player Arthur Ashe announced that he had contracted HIV from blood transfusions; he would spend the remainder of his life as an AIDS activist. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Ashe

2008:

On board Soyuz TMA-12, Yi So-Yeon became the first Korean, and second Asian woman to go into space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yi_So-Yeon

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

vindictive (adj): Having or showing a strong or unreasoning desire for revenge http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vindictive

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

You can do a lot with diplomacy, but with diplomacy backed up by force you can get a lot more done. --Kofi Annan http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Kofi_Annan