- The Strange Door
Infobox Film | name = The Strange Door
caption = The theatrical release poster
director =Joseph Pevney
producer = Ted Richmond
writer =Robert Louis Stevenson (short story)
Jerry Sackheim
starring =Charles Laughton Boris Karloff Sally Forrest
music =
cinematography = Irving Glassberg
editing = Edward Curtiss
distributor =Universal Pictures
released =December 8 ,1951
country = USA
runtime = 81 min.
language = English
budget =
amg_id = 1:111923
imdb_id = 0044078"The Strange Door" (1951) is a
horror film , released byUniversal Pictures . The film starredCharles Laughton ,Boris Karloff , andSally Forrest . It was directed byJoseph Pevney and was based on the short story, "The Sire de Maletroit's Door " byRobert Louis Stevenson . Its alternative title was "Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Door".Plot
Alain, the Sire de Maletroit (Laughton), plots
revenge on his younger brother Edmund (Cavanagh) for stealing Alain's childhood sweetheart, now deceased. Alain imprisons Edmund in a dungeon for 20 years. He then convinces Edmund's grown daughter Blanche (Forrest) that her father is dead. As Blanche's mother (Alain's lost love) died in childbirth, Maletroit intends to further antagonize Blanche by reducing her life to a miserable hell. As the film begins, he tricks a high-born drunken cad, Denis de Beaulieu (Richard Wyler , credited as "Richard Stapley"), to pass through the sole, exterior door of the Maletroit chateau, which has no latch handle on the inside, making him a captive, with the intent of forcing the delicate Blanche into marriage with him. However, Denis has unanticipated redemptive qualities, and he and Blanche fall in love. Their attempt to escape is initially foiled by Alain, who seals Edmund, Blanche and Denis in a stone deathtrap designed to crush the lot of them. Maletroit's disloyal manservant Voltan (Karloff) comes to their aid and dies effecting the escape of Denis, Blanche and her father from a dungeon cell, the walls of which are crushing in on them under pressure of river water churned against them by a water wheel on the chateau.Alain dies when he falls into the river and is caught up in the water wheel, his fat body jamming it to a halt.Cast
*
Charles Laughton as Alain de Maletroit
*Boris Karloff as Voltan
*Sally Forrest as Blanche de Maletroit
*Richard Wyler (credited as Richard Stapley) as Denis de Beaulieu
*William Cottrell as Corbeau
*Alan Napier as Count Grassin
*Morgan Farley as Renville
*Paul Cavanagh as Edmond de Maletroit
*Michael Pate as Talon
*Charles Horvath as TurecExternal links
*imdb title|0044078
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.