Poe Film Poster #2

The most famous Poe movies are undoubtedly the series created for American Pictures International (API), primarily by Roger Corman. Corman, famous for his low-budget horror flicks, splurged on the 1960 version of The Fall of the House of Usher and found himself with a box office hit. This was the first of what would eventually be thirteen films loosely, usually very loosely, based on one or more of Poe’s works. (Sometimes the Poe association was little more than a title and the recitation of the relevant poem at the beginning and end of the movie.) The center of this cycle was actor Vincent Price, although other horror greats in the twilight of their acting careers would also appear, including Boris Karloff, Basil Rathbone, Peter Lorre and even Lon Channey, Jr. (best known as the wolfman).

Shown here is a poster from the movie version of The Masque of the Red Death from 1964, with Price as Prince Prospero. Only in The Premature Burial of 1962 did Corman change his star, using Ray Milland. The other films, all with Price, are: The Pit and the Pendulum (1961), Tales of Terror (1962), The Raven (1963), The Haunted Palace (1964), The Tomb of Ligeia (1965), The City Under the Sea (1965, also known as War Gods of the Deep), The Conqueror Worm (1968, also known as The Witchfinder General), The Oblong Box(1969) and Cry of the Banshee (1970). API also release, without Roger Corman or Vincent Price, The Murders of the Rue Morgue (1971), with Jason Robards and Spirits of the Dead (1969), another anthology of Poe tales, including a very young Jane Fonda among its stars.