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Out of all of Poe’s works, few have had as big of an impact on me as “The Pit and the Pendulum.” Like many youngsters with an interest in the macabre, it was the first to immediately grab my attention, its title conjuring images of a massive, swinging blade cutting a poor sap wide open. Of course, there’s more to the poem than that—it’s focused less on the titular blade and more on the paranoia it creates, as well as painting a portrait of the horrors of the Spanish Inquisition. It also has, quite infamously, one of the most frustrating deus ex machinas of all time, where the French army stops the swinging pendulum mere seconds before it can bisect our bound protagonist, much to the disappointment of English students the world over. While it’s hardly Poe’s best work, it’s certainly among his most iconic,...

During its brief theatrical release in Los Angeles and New York in May, Full Moon Entertainment's ''The Pit & the Pendulum'' will benefit from director Stuart Gordon's ''Re-Animator'' reputation. But that reputation will not be enhanced by this pitiful film.

The film goes to video in June, where even the dreariest horror film stands a chance.

Little of Edgar Allan Poe's tale, one of the singular most terrifying accounts of mental torture ever composed, remains in Dennis Paoli's unimaginative script.

Paoli's story concerns grand inquisitor Torquemada's (Lance Henriksen) erotic obsession with a young woman Rona De Ricci), whom he has imprisoned, and the valiant efforts of her husband (Jonathan Fuller) to spring her from the dungeons.

The story line serves merely to show off the machinery of pain in Torquemada's chamber of horrors. Humor -- if that's the right word -- stems from the interpolation of mundane and anachronistic phrases -- ''OK, so I'm late for work'' -- into this medieval exotica.

Gordon lets Henriksen mug his way through a cliche-ridden portrayal of villainy. Fuller is rather bland as the damsel's rescuer, whose fighting skills belong more to a martial arts movie.

Though fetching, De Ricci is allowed to do little more than run through the usual catalog of terrified expressions. Frances Bay's elderly witch, unfortunately, sounds at times like the late Ruth Gordon.

Oliver Reed turns up for what appears to be two days' work for a sequence lifted from another Poe tale, ''The Cask of Amontillado.''

The effects and stunts are fine, as is the conventional though atmos-

The effects and stunts are fine, as is the conventional though atmos-pheric set.

The film's use of Pieter Bruegel's ''The Triumph of Death'' in the opening credits suggests a mingling of morbidity and perverse sexuality that the film strives to achieve but doesn't.

THE PIT & THE PENDULUM

JGM Entertainment

Director Stuart Gordon

Producer Albert Band

Executive producer Charles Band

WriterDennis Paoli

Adapted from story by Edgar Allan Poe

Director of photography Adolfo Bartoli

Art director Giovanni Natalucci

Music Richard Band

Editor Andy Horvitch

Costume designer Michela Gisotti

Color/Stereo

Cast:

Torquemada Lance Henriksen

Maria Rona De Ricci

Antonio Jonathan Fuller

Esmeralda Frances Bay

Gomez Stephen Lee

Cardinal Oliver Reed

Dr. Heusos William J. Norris

Mandoza Mark Margolis

Running time -- 97 minutes

MPAA rating: R

(c) The Hollywood Reporter...