Now available on DVD
Cast:
Lorielle New as JB
Danielle Demski as Alicia
Amy Paffrath as Gemma
Tom Sandoval as Vinnie
Michael King as Trevor
Stephen Hansen as Jason
Bart Voitila as Kyle
Directed by David DeCoteau
Review:
Poor Edgar Allan Poe. He must be turning in his dusty grave right about now. I can’t imagine the classic horror author would ever had imagined that his work would be turned into such a twisted and boring erotic horror thriller.
Let’s get this out of the way. The Pit and the Pendulum won’t appeal to everyone. It is a homoerotic horror movie targeted at the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender (LGBT) community. Yep, that means you have more guys with their shirts off than a Twilight movie. Actually, I don’t believe any of the men actually own shirts in this movie and they may only own one pair of pants each.
So expect plenty of man love as well as plenty of men in their skivvies lounging around on a bed, laying out on a blanket in the sun, a way too long wrestling match, lots of random men touching each other as friends and all sorts of other stuff that probably won’t appeal to straight men. And as a straight man, I speak from experience.
To be fair, there are some lesbian hookups with two of the hotter chicks actually making out a few times. And the main chick in the movie, JB (Lorielle New) does take off her top for an extended period of time but it isn’t anything special.
But the problem with The Pit and the Pendulum isn’t that it is geared for the LGBT community, it’s that it sucks ass. Far too much time is spent on developing homoerotic situations and the horror is an afterthought. Any tension that’s built is destroyed by the sheer stupidity of the script and JB running around hypnotizing people for far too long only to choke them out a minute later. Oh and a pendulum happens to be swinging back and forth occasionally as well because they had to tie it into the original somehow.
There’s some greater storyline about how JB was trying to help her brother with some condition and her desire for immortality but it’s so glossed over by the homoeroticism and lameness of the characters creeping around a house quietly over and over again that it is never fully explained. Plus, you don’t really care because if you’re straight you’ve turned it off by this point and if you a member of the LGBT community you are bored shitless.
Now a positive to The Pit and the Pendulum is that the production values are very strong. The digital picture is crystal clear and the colors in the film are vibrant. But with a wafer thin script, very suspect acting, a lack of any discernable scares (you really can’t even call this a genuine horror flick) and a sexual theme that just ain’t my cup of tea, it is hard to find anything else to like here.
