In the death grip of the red mask

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Movie
German title In the death grip of the red mask
Original title The oblong box
Country of production Great Britain
original language English
Publishing year 1969
length 96 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Gordon Hessler
script Lawrence Huntington
production Gordon Hessler
Louis M. Heyward
Pat Green
music Harry Robinson
camera John Coquillon
occupation

In the death grip of the red mask (Original title: The Oblong Box ) is a British horror film from 1969.

During a stay in Africa, Sir Edward Markham's face is disfigured during a tribal ritual. Back in England, his brother, Sir Julian Markham, keeps him in chains to seal off his disfigured brother from the public. An attempt to escape fails, with the result that Edward is buried alive. Thanks to body thieves, Edward's coffin is recovered. Edward now, hiding his face behind a red mask, begins his campaign of retaliation to avenge the disgrace inflicted on him.

action

The background of the film plot is conveyed to the viewer in a sequence right at the beginning of the film, ultimately only in an explanatory manner at the end of the film. During a visit to Africa, Sir Edward Markham is accused by the natives of causing the death of a child. However, the responsibility for this fatal riding accident lay with his brother Sir Julian Markham. Since the natives could not distinguish the two brothers, the innocent Edward was brutally tortured during a tribal ritual, during which his face was also disfigured by a poison and magic.

Back in England, Edward is locked up in a room by his brother Julian and held captive in chains. For Julian, his brother Edward is considered unaccountable and suffering from a serious dangerous illness, so that he has to be completely isolated from the outside world. Besides Julian, only the house butler Ruddock and the lawyer Samuel Trench have access to Edward's room.

Trench, the lawyer, taken by Edward's fate, abuses Julian's trust and, with two helpers, the young Mark Norton and the African medicine man N'Galo, devises an escape plan for Edward. The plan provides that Edward falls into a deep sleep through an ingested poison, so that his brother Julian thinks he is dead. However, the exemption plan did not provide for Julian to arrange a proper burial for his brother Edward. So Trench has no way of getting to the "living corpse" resting in a nailed-up coffin and in a locked room. In order to preserve the family's reputation, Julian even extortionately pressures Trench to find a "well-preserved" substitute corpse for the wake (in the film, Tom Hacket has to die for this). Locked in his coffin, the "seemingly dead" Edward is buried alive after the funeral.

As luck would have it, the grave robber Weller and two assistants excavated the coffin with Edward's corpse the following night in order to present it to the doctor Dr. Newhartt for his medical experiments. After Dr. Newhartt has recovered from the initial shock of receiving a "living" corpse, he grants the "corpse" hospitality in his home.

Always keeping his disfigured face hidden under a red mask, Edward begins his vengeance campaign every night against all those who betrayed and left him. As the first victim, Mark Norton is intercepted and murdered by Edward during a carriage ride.

On his country estate, after the death of his brother Edward, Sir Julian Markham feels freed from the guilty conscience that weighed on him all the time due to the fate of his brother and his complicity. He pretends to be the host of a party again, and his relationship with his future wife Elisabeth, which has in the meantime been troubled, is turning into good again. None of the invited guests suspects that the phantom with the red mask outside the window, which terrified the hostess Elisabeth, was the living Edward.

Initially, Edward showed himself to be very empathetic and feels towards Sally, the maid of Dr. Newhartt, drawn, a flirt, which she has to pay for with the dismissal without notice. In search of Sally, Edward ends up in a brothel , which ended fatally after the love service for both the prostitute Heidi and her pimp, after she tried in vain from her "wealthy" client to get something more than usual for love service. However, since Edward was wearing the borrowed coat from Dr. Newhartt, the detective Hathorne manages to track down the owner of the coat.

Julian Markham discovers a sketch from his friend, the painter Joshua Kemp, in which Kemp portrayed the image of a corpse washed ashore in the river. Markham immediately realizes that the unidentified body is the person who was passed off as his deceased brother at the wake. Julian Markham then goes to the lawyer Trench to complain about the inadequate disposal of the body. Much worse for Markham is Trench's admission that his brother was buried "alive body" as a result of the unsuccessful rescue attempt.

The following night, Edward also goes to Trench's apartment and surprises him while making love with his wife. Trench tries in vain, completely surprised by the sight of Edward who is still alive, to convincingly explain to him that it was not intended to leave him locked in the coffin to his fate; hidden behind his red mask, Edward cuts the throat of his former escape helper. Before that, however, Edward learns about N'Galo from Trench, who, according to the agreement, can restore his "face" to him with magic. However, the treatment at N'Galo shows no success, which Edward reveals accordingly to N'Galo and throws a hot liquid on his face in a duel.

By the maid Sally, who after her release from Dr. Newhartt found a new job at the Markham house, Julian Markham learns that the "man in the red mask" wanted in the newspaper is with Dr. Newhartt had stopped. Julian immediately goes to Dr. Newhartt, with the faint suspicion that the “phantom” could be his brother.

After Edward injured his chest while fighting N'Galo, he asked Dr. Newhartt medical care. When the doctor asks him to drink a “drug”, he suspects that it is a deadly poison; he simply cuts the doctor's throat with a knife. When Julian Markham worked for Dr. Newhartt arrives, he is dying, but his last words give Julian Markham the certainty that his brother is still alive.

Both Edward and Julian make their way to the family mansion in turn. When Edward arrives, he takes Sally the maid hostage and takes her out to the park. Led by their screams, Julian follows them armed with a rifle. The two brothers meet and Edward falls to the ground after two shots fired by Julian. Fatally injured, he wants to shake hands with his brother. What he sees as a reconciliation becomes Edward's last act of revenge, as he bites Julian in the hand, thus passing on the poison in his body.

In the final scene, Elisabeth finds her husband Julian in Edward's former room. Julian tells her that this is now his room, and when he turns to his wife, she recognizes his disfigured face.

Others

  • Michael Reeves , who was originally intended to be the director, was replaced by Gordon Hessler while the filming was being prepared . The reason given was "mental problems" by Reeves, who died a few weeks later, on February 11, 1969, from a drug overdose.
  • The screenwriter Lawrence Huntington died on November 29, 1968, a few days after filming began.
  • In the opening credits , reference is made to the short story The Oblong Box, written by Edgar Allan Poe in 1846 , as a novel . In terms of content, however, the film plot has no relation to the aforementioned novel.
  • The spelling of the Dr. Newhartt is spelled differently in external film descriptions, e.g. B. with Dr. J. Neuhart on Internet Movie Database .
  • The German theatrical release took place on February 6, 1970 through Constantin Film Verleih in a version shortened by six minutes compared to the original version.
  • The German video first release (1986) appeared under the alternative film title Der Fluch des Demon ; later video publications were also made under the title Die Todesmake .

DVD version

The German-language film DVD was released on October 16, 2003 by ems new media AG . Since the originally dubbed German theatrical version was shortened compared to the English original version, the missing scenes were inserted in the original (English) sound with German subtitles on the DVD.

As bonus material, the DVD contains the German (3:11) and English (1:52) cinema trailer, the German video opening credits (3:31), a slideshow (6:00), an interview with Uta Levka (16:35), and biographies or filmographies (text panels) for Vincent Price (13 panels), Christopher Lee (4) and Uta Levka (2) as well as three advertising trailers for other films.

Movie review

  • “A confused story with numerous corpses, creaking doors, screeching owls, no tension.”, Judges Ronald M. Hahn , and the lexicon of international films classifies: “One of the numerous horror films from the 60s that have their motifs at EA Poe searched; richly confused and more bloodthirsty than atmospheric. "Even the Evangelical Film Watcher doesn't think much of the film, but is still able to gain a few positive aspects from it:" No sensational horror box with excess images, but at least a logically structured, dignified and played one, sometimes almost too lame ready-made horror kitchen for immediate use. Suitable for lovers without special requests. "
  • The internet platform Sense of View refers to earlier Poe films by Roger Corman and criticizes the fact that the typical and cherished elements of these films are sorely missed, the film lacks the atmospheric density.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Interview with Gordon Hessler
  2. ↑ Edgar Allan Poe: Eerie Tales . Weltbild, Augsburg 2009, ISBN 978-3-86800-138-9
  3. ↑ Information according to the film credits
  4. ^ In the death grip of the red mask on Filmdienst.de - film database
  5. ↑ version View on OFDb.de - Film Database
  6. ↑ DVD information on wicked-vision.com
  7. ^ In Hahn / Jansen: Lexicon of the horror film. Bergisch Gladbach 1989, p. 242
  8. ↑ In the death grip of the red mask. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used 
  9. ↑ Evangelical Press Association Munich, Review No. 65/1970
  10. ↑ Film review on senseofview.de