Dr. Leon, believing him to be Bartolome, and Leon falls to his death in the pit while trying to escape. Francis, having heard Elizabeth's screams, enters the dungeon. Nicholas also confuses Francis for Bartolome and knocks him unconscious. He straps him to a stone slab located directly beneath a huge razor-sharp pendulum. The pendulum is attached to a clockwork apparatus that causes it to descend fractions of an inch after each swing, closer to Francis' torso. Catherine arrives just in time with Maximillian, one of the servants. After a brief struggle with Maximillian, Nicholas falls to his death. Francis is removed from the torture device, bleeding but still alive. As they leave the torture dungeon, Catherine vows that no one shall enter that room again. They slam and lock the door shut; the last scene shows that a terrified Elizabeth is still alive, gagged and trapped in the iron maiden. Cast Vincent Price as Nicholas/Sebastian Medina John Kerr as Francis Barnard Barbara Steele as Elizabeth Luana Anders as Catherine Medina Antony Carbone as Doctor Leon Patrick Westwood as Maximillian Lynette Bernay as Maria Larry Turner as Nicholas as child Mary Menzies as Isabella Charles Victor as Bartolome Production Development 20th Century Fox had announced plans to film the story in the late '50s, along with versions of "The Tell-Tale Heart" and "The Murders in the Rue Morgue", but the films were never made. When Roger Corman's House of Usher was released in June 1960, its box office success took AIP's James H. Nicholson and Samuel Z. Arkoff by surprise. Corman admitted, "We anticipated that the movie would do well... but not half as well as it did." According to Richard Matheson, "When the first film was a hit, they still didn't consider doing a Poe series. They just wanted another movie with a Poe title fixed to it." Corman felt Poe's two strongest stories after "Usher" were "The Masque of the Red Death", and '"Pit and the Pendulum". He considered making the former but was worried about similarities between the story and The Seventh Seal (1957), so he decided on adapting the latter. However Samuel Z. Arkoff said it was his and James H. Nicholson's decision to make Pit as the second Poe film "because it was a lot more graphic and in the second place, The Masque of the Red Death would have needed a dancing troupe that would