The Oblong Box (film)

The Oblong Box
Directed byGordon Hessler
Screenplay by
Based on"The Oblong Box"
by Edgar Allan Poe
Produced byGordon Hessler
Starring
CinematographyJohn Coquillon
Edited byMax Benedick
Music byHarry Robinson
Production
company
Distributed by
Release date
  • 11 June 1969 (1969-06-11)
Running time
91 minutes
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
Budget£70,000[1] or $175,000[2]
Box office$1.02 million (US/ Canada rentals)[3]

The Oblong Box is a 1969 British gothic horror film directed by Gordon Hessler, starring Vincent Price, Christopher Lee and Alister Williamson. This was the first film to star both Price and Lee.

Taking its title from the 1844 short story "The Oblong Box", it explores and combines several themes typical to the work of Edgar Allan Poe, such as premature burial and masked figures, with the non-Poe theme of voodoo ritual killings.

  1. ^ "AIP Memories: An Interview with Gordon Hessler", DVD Drive In accessed 11 March 2014
  2. ^ Tom Weaver, "Gordon Hessler", Return of the B Science Fiction and Horror Heroes: The Mutant Melding of Two Volumes of Classic Interviews 2000 McFarland, p 145
  3. ^ "Big Rental Films of 1969", Variety, 7 January 1970 p 15