The Pit and the Pendulum (1991 film) The Pit and the Pendulum (1991 film) The Pit and the Pendulum (released on DVD in the United States as The Inquisitor) is a 1991 American horror film directed by Stuart Gordon and based on the eponymous short story by Edgar Allan Poe. The film is an amalgamation of the aforementioned story with other Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado", and it also appropriates the anecdote of "The Sword of Damocles", reassigning it to the character of Torquemada. In 1492 Spain, Grand Inquisitor Torquemada leads a bloody reign of terror. Opposed to the use of torture by the Church, Maria speaks
The Pit and the Pendulum (1961 film) fixed to it." Corman felt Poe's two strongest stories after "Usher" were "The Masque of the Red Death", and '"Pit and the Pendulum". He considered making the former but was worried about similarities between the story and "The Seventh Seal" (1957), so he decided on adapting the latter. However Samuel Z. Arkoff said it was his and James H. Nicholson's decision to make "Pit" as the second Poe film "because it was a lot more graphic and in the second place, "Masque of the Red Death" would have needed a dancing troupe that would have been quite expensive. In all