Blu B
Yeah it's not that good. Acting is alright and the music isn't bad. No one is really given that much to work with. the main bad dude you never see him ever and his face is covered but he doesn't have the same strong voice as like a Claude Rains to really command things. Price and Lee never really interact much and aren't given that much to work with. Everyone else is super forgettable. The pacing is terrible and everything else is subpar. It's terribly jumpy and while the main idea of his brother being left for dead and seeking revenge on those that wronged him. It never does it in a very cohesive way. It feels like stuff just happens on his quest for vengence, it gets suprisngly boring at certain points, and the direction can be very weird with very obnoxious camera angles that come out of nowhere every so often and is distracting. It truly feels like there are chunks missing from this in terms of character intereactions. We never get to really see Price develop a relationship with his brother beyond a 30 second scene, Lee and Price never get to really interact together and Lee's character really never get's much explanation, and same goes for the deformed brother. It just feels rushed and unfocused. This needed probably a good 15-30 minutes extra to make this work more cohesively. It's never scary and it gets borderline convuluted at certain points because of how choppy it can get. I really can't recommend this to anyone except super hardcore Price fans. Most should skip it.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
10/30/24
Full Review
Elvis D
Basándose vagamente en un relato de Edgar Allan Poe, The Oblong Box es un thriller que combina algunos elementos de las obras de Poe en una sola historia. Es una película del cine gótico de la época que ofrece una buena elegancia en aspectos de producción y narrativa. Se tuvo el honor de ver a Vincent Price y Christopher Lee juntos en esta película por la fama que ellos ganaron como iconos del terror gótico. La película tiene un par de elementos que pudieron haber servido para el subgénero slasher. La película no es exactamente un slasher, pero tiene algunas características que se pueden ver en Edward. Él es un hombre que usa una capucha para cubrir su rostro deformado y usa un cuchillo como arma. Su parentesco con el arquetipo de asesino enmascarado que se ve en los slashers significa algo. La única falla en esta película son las muertes provocadas por Edward. Más allá de que la sangre se ve obviamente falsa, los degollamientos tampoco se ven reales. Ese sería el único punto en contra de esta película. The Oblong Box es una película que se puede admirar por la colaboración entre Price y Lee y eso significa bastante para los fanáticos del terror británico clásico. Mi calificación final para esta película es un 8/10.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
08/09/24
Full Review
Audience Member
ased on the Edgar Allan Poe short story "The Oblong Box," the script for this movie by Lawrence Huntington and Christopher Wicking also brings in plenty of other Poe themes like masked men, premature burial and, well, voodoo. Which has nothing to do with Poe, but hey — this is the first time Christopher Lee and Vincent Price were in a movie together, so let's just ignore that.
While in Africa, Sir Edward Markham (Alister Williamson, who usually is in a supporting role) has his face ruined in a voodoo ceremony — shades of how The Great Kabuki (Japanese version) got his facepaint — and is kept locked up by his brother Julian (Vincent Price). The secret is that the crime that he was punished for — killing a child — was really the fault of his brother. Now, he wears the scars for the crime he did not commit.
He soon gets the family lawyer and a witchdoctor (Harry Baird, Cool It Carol) to help him fake his death, but his brother buries him — but first, a proxy as nobody wants to see what Sir Edward has become — before going off to marry his true love Elizabeth (Hilary Dwyer, which means that Matthew Hopkins finally got to have his way with Sara).
Meanwhile, Sir Edward is dug up — still alive — and given to Dr. Newhartt (Lee) to use as an experimental autopsy. The facially deformed madman blackmails the doctor and starts murdering nearly everyone he meets. By the end of this movie, numerous people have been horribly killed and both brothers are sentenced for their crimes, if not by the law, then by karma.
Sadly, this movie was to reteam Witchfinder General director Michael Reeves with Price. That film led to a renaissance of Poe films from AIP. However, Reeves fell ill while working on the film — he was also going to make an adaption of H.G. Welles' When the Sleeper Wakes with AIP. He'd die a few months later of an accidental drug overdose. Instead, this was directed by Gordon Hessler, who also made Pray for Death and Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park.
The pro-black scene of the slaves rising up against Sir Edward was enough to get this movie banned in Texas, which happened within several of our lifetimes. The world changes eventually, right?
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/06/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Tubby Custard blood throughout; they certainly got a lot out of the knives. Entertaining.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/13/23
Full Review
ashley h
The Oblong Box is a decent film. It is about aristocrat Julian Markham who keeps his disfigured brother, Sir Edward, locked in a tower of his house. Vincent Price and Alister Williamson give good performances. The screenplay is a little slow in places. Gordon Hessler did an alright job directing this movie. I liked this motion picture because of the horror.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
This was going to be the fourth film directed by Michael Reeves ("Witchfinder General," "The Sorcerers," "She Beast"), who's a filmmaker I'm fascinated by, mostly because of the three intriguing horror films he directed before his untimely death. None of these films were horror classics, but they were unique stories and were more of an edge than most horror films of this era. I was particularly taken with "Witchfinder General" where Vincent Price gave a rare non-hammy performance and was terrific. "The Oblong Box" would have again paired Price and Reeves, but sadly Reeves died due to an accidental overdose during pre-production. Veteran horror director Gordon Hessler took over and made the film more in line with the previous AIP Poe film adaptations, which isn't a bad thing, but it's disappointing to not see what Reeves would have brought to this cycle of films. In this Poe tale, Vincent Price's brother, Alister Williamson, is buried alive, and then reappears wearing a red mask, exacting his bloody revenge. Overall, this film is not as classy or smart as the Roger Corman Poe films, but it's entertaining none-the-less.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/31/23
Full Review
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