Roger Corman was an interesting and complex person. He was known primarily for his low-budget quickies, especially the early works made for American International where he often made two films almost simultaneously, using the same sets and actors. But he also kept abreast of what was happening with foreign films, and so would be familiar with The Seventh Seal.
His 1964 Poe adaptation The Masque of the Red Death uses the plague element of the Swedish film to expand a very short story to feature length. It also incorporates elements popular from ye olden dayes films of the time, like sword fighting and a castle with a torture dungeon.
One of the most interesting aspects of this production is it shows what Corman was capable of with the right resources. This clearly has a larger budget than most of his other films of the era. It was filmed at Shepperton Studios in the UK, and so he had access to their sets, costumes and props. A better quality of supporting cast than usual was also available, with Vincent Price supported by Hazel Court, Patrick Magee, Nigel Green and Jane Asher (the last of whom was almost Mrs. Paul McCartney).
The talent behind the camera is pretty ace as well. The script was co-authored by Charles Beaumont, scribe of many of the best episodes of The Twilight Zone. The cinematographer is Nicholas Roeg, soon to become a director with a unique aesthetic, helming such unusual works as Performance and The Man Who Fell to Earth.
Something that is odd, given the money and the technical experts used, is the way a widescreen lens is abused in some scenes. There are many kinds of such lenses, but this one has a pronounced fish-eye effect, with items in the middle of the frame proportioned correctly, while those of the left and right sides are compressed horizontally. This is normally not that distracting; that is, until it is used in a moving shot. One such moment is a clever full 180 degree circuit following Price as he walks in a wide circle. With him in the middle of the frame, he isn’t impacted, but the people and objects he passes cycle through what look like funhouse mirror distortions.
Such episodes briefly took me out of the film. My wife, on the other hand, liked how that added to the surreal vibe of the picture. Overall, the film has a deliberately staged appearance, giving it a truly operatic feel. Set design is also interesting, in particular a string of connected rooms, each of which has a singular color scheme. The only other time I have color employed so strongly is in the films of Mario Bava. One room is entirely yellow, and Price tells Asher his father once had a friend imprisoned in it for three years. Geez, I wonder what dad did to his enemies. According to Price, that victim could never again stand the sight of anything yellow.
We’re immersed in that strikingly artificial world starting with first frame after the opening credits, Visually similar to Death from Bergman’s film, a red cloaked figure stops an old woman who is passing by as she collects sticks, presumably in hopes of being on the cover of the fourth Led Zeppelin album. This figure turns a white rose to red and gives it to her to pass on to her people, and to tell them the day of deliverance is at hand. The gift he has given her to pass along is the red plague.
Price, as the local lord, will discover this when he stops by the village to engage in some cruelty towards them for his amusement. When Nigel Green and David Weston refuse to cower, he orders them garroted, comparing their insolence to a disobedient dog. Is he saying he has dogs which has strangled to death when they failed to do his bidding?
Asher pleads for the lives of the men, as Green is her father and Weston her fiancée. Price agrees to let them live, though they’ll be doing that in his dungeon. Actually, Price says they’re being “quartered”, and it doesn’t seem outside the realm of possibility to mentally precede what he said with “drawn and”. She will eventually rescue the men from their internment and, given this environment looks similar to the strange wing of a prison where Hannibal Lecter is kept in Silence of the Lambs, I wanted her to be really carefully when walking past Miggs’s cell.
She then is taken to the castle for a masked ball he will be throwing. I thought he would only be interested in corrupting her sexually, when he actually is far more intrigued by the potential for corrupting her spiritually. You see, he’s a Satanist, and he feels up to the challenge to convert this devout Christian. He has apparently tired of Court, his wife, though she still submits to the final process to become a bride of Satan.
As always, I’m amazed by the lengths people go to in this kind of thing to show their devotion to the dark one. I was raised Baptist, where the theology is you’re going to hell by default unless you go to ridiculous pains to make alternative arrangements. The idea of putting in any effort to get in good with Beelzebub to secure your place in Hell seems superfluous.
And yet, Court proceeds to brand her chest with an upside-down cross, so I guess Satan will only be able to look at her right-side-up. She also undergoes a weird, and deeply green-tinted, dream sequence which I believe is her consummating her marriage to Old Scratch. Different men take turns apparently stabbing her with various blades, or penetrating her with them, if you will. Something that scans as racist is each of these demonic figures are different caricatures of various ethnicities.
I mentioned the various actors earlier, and I especially want to single out Skip Martin. This dwarf actor plays Price’s court jester, and he conspires against Magee after the man slaps Martin’s beloved midget co-performer Verina Greenlaw (who is actually just a child and not, technically, a midget). There are only two significant scenes with Martin and both are stellar. I wanted to see more of his character in this film. For that matter, Martin did not have a long career in film, and it would have been interesting to have seen him in more pictures.
The Masque of the Red Dream is the pinnacle of Corman’s Poe cycle for American International. The extra money is definitely demonstrated on the screen through the rather beautiful sets and costumes. Good actors and a solid script, however, are something a film of any budget can have, and I love how all the elements came together to make this one of the best Poe adaptations by any director, of any means and from any era.
Dir: Roger Corman
Starring Vincent Price, Hazel Court, Jane Asher
Watched on Shout Factory’s blu-ray set The Vincent Price Collection