Torture Garden starts with the opening credits running over various shots of a funfair where we finally settle on one of the attractions called the 'Torture Garden'. Inside Dr. Diabolo (Burgess Meredith) shows his paying customers various phony horrors like execution by decapitation & electric chair, for £5 (that's expensive even now!) he also allows anyone brave enough to witness 'real horror'. Five people take him up on his offer, Dr. Diabolo takes them backstage where a dummy named Atrobus is claimed to be the 'Goddess of destiny' & holds the 'shears of fate' in her hand which have the ability to cut people's life threads short or something like that. Dr. Diabolo invites everyone to look at Atrobus (Clytie Jessop sitting as still as she can) & retrieve a memory of the future. First up is Colin Williams (Micheal Bryant) in a story called Enoch...
Collin's uncle Roger (Maurice Denham) is dying. Collin's uncle Roger is rich & Collin wants the money. Collin's uncle dies before he can extract the required information about where the money is hidden out of him. Collin searches the cottage & discovers a coffin with a skeleton & black cat inside buried in the cellar. This particular black cat has certain tastes & uses a stash of gold as leverage to get what it wants...
Then it's Carla Hayes (Beverly Adams) turn in Terror Over Hollywood...
Carla is an ambitious would be actress in Hollywood. While on a date with a producer named Mike Charles (David Bauer) she is introduced to leading man Bruce Benton (Robert Hutton, why does the IMDb list his character name as Paul?) whom she falls in love with, especially after he gets her the leading role opposite him in his latest film. Carla quickly discovers that not everything is as it seems & Bruce has a dark secret connected with the mysterious Dr. Heim (Bernard Kay)...
Next up is Dorothy Endicott (Barbara Ewing) in a tale called Mr. Steinway...
Dorothy is a journalist who has just finished interviewing the world famous pianist Leo Winston (John Standing) whom both quickly fall in love with each other. However when she tries to separate him form his Grand Piano named Utopie the 'Goddess of music' it becomes jealous of Dorothy...
Finally it's Ronald Wyatt (Jack Palance) in The Man Who Collected Poe...
Ronald Wyatt visits fanatical Edgar Allan Poe collector Lancelot Canning (Peter Cushing) who when drunk shows Wyatt his collection of unpublished Poe. But the date 1966 on the paper makes Wyatt suspicious who ends up making a shocking discovery...
Then we're back to the funfair as the fifth person Gordon Roberts (Micheal Ripper) provides one last twist of his own, or does he...?
Directed by Freddie Francis I thought Torture Garden is easily the weakest of the Amicus horror anthologies out of Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1964), The House that Dripped Blood (1970), Tales From the Crypt (1972), Asylum (1972), From Beyond the Grave (1973) & The Vault of Horror (1973) all of which are far superior to Torture Garden. The script by Robert Bloch presents four very poor stories. None of them can be described as horror particularly, they are too slow & have little in the way of a pay-off at they're ends. Each story is far too predictable & provide little in the way of 'twist' endings which anthology stories need to make them work. The stories just aren't effective, I mean a story with a killer piano? Hardly scary is it? In fact I was trying hard not to laugh as director Francis tried to make a Grand piano seem frightening & menacing. Mr. Steinway is perhaps the poorest story I've seen in any Amicus horror anthology, I thought Enoch was the best of a bad bunch here as it had more in the way of horror than the rest although a policeman's reaction to a headless body is somewhat puzzling. On a positive note at least none of the stories last that long so it's not overly boring. There is no real blood or gore to speak of. The film was obviously shot in sets which vary from looking very fake to others which are quite nicely decorated. Director Francis doesn't do much with the limited material & Torture Garden is a bland & forgettable film which has little in the way of style even if some of the colour schemes are very late 60's, you may want to put on a pair of sunglasses at certain points. Torture Garden has not dated well at all, check the clothes out I mean Peter Cushing in a purple cardigan? The acting is OK but Meredith hams it up like you wouldn't believe & is quite fun to watch, a special mention goes to Cushing who really does deserve better than films such as this. Overall I was extremely disappointed with Torture Garden as I usually love anthologies especially the Amicus ones. Average at best & for Amicus anthology completest's (like myself) only.
Collin's uncle Roger (Maurice Denham) is dying. Collin's uncle Roger is rich & Collin wants the money. Collin's uncle dies before he can extract the required information about where the money is hidden out of him. Collin searches the cottage & discovers a coffin with a skeleton & black cat inside buried in the cellar. This particular black cat has certain tastes & uses a stash of gold as leverage to get what it wants...
Then it's Carla Hayes (Beverly Adams) turn in Terror Over Hollywood...
Carla is an ambitious would be actress in Hollywood. While on a date with a producer named Mike Charles (David Bauer) she is introduced to leading man Bruce Benton (Robert Hutton, why does the IMDb list his character name as Paul?) whom she falls in love with, especially after he gets her the leading role opposite him in his latest film. Carla quickly discovers that not everything is as it seems & Bruce has a dark secret connected with the mysterious Dr. Heim (Bernard Kay)...
Next up is Dorothy Endicott (Barbara Ewing) in a tale called Mr. Steinway...
Dorothy is a journalist who has just finished interviewing the world famous pianist Leo Winston (John Standing) whom both quickly fall in love with each other. However when she tries to separate him form his Grand Piano named Utopie the 'Goddess of music' it becomes jealous of Dorothy...
Finally it's Ronald Wyatt (Jack Palance) in The Man Who Collected Poe...
Ronald Wyatt visits fanatical Edgar Allan Poe collector Lancelot Canning (Peter Cushing) who when drunk shows Wyatt his collection of unpublished Poe. But the date 1966 on the paper makes Wyatt suspicious who ends up making a shocking discovery...
Then we're back to the funfair as the fifth person Gordon Roberts (Micheal Ripper) provides one last twist of his own, or does he...?
Directed by Freddie Francis I thought Torture Garden is easily the weakest of the Amicus horror anthologies out of Dr. Terror's House of Horrors (1964), The House that Dripped Blood (1970), Tales From the Crypt (1972), Asylum (1972), From Beyond the Grave (1973) & The Vault of Horror (1973) all of which are far superior to Torture Garden. The script by Robert Bloch presents four very poor stories. None of them can be described as horror particularly, they are too slow & have little in the way of a pay-off at they're ends. Each story is far too predictable & provide little in the way of 'twist' endings which anthology stories need to make them work. The stories just aren't effective, I mean a story with a killer piano? Hardly scary is it? In fact I was trying hard not to laugh as director Francis tried to make a Grand piano seem frightening & menacing. Mr. Steinway is perhaps the poorest story I've seen in any Amicus horror anthology, I thought Enoch was the best of a bad bunch here as it had more in the way of horror than the rest although a policeman's reaction to a headless body is somewhat puzzling. On a positive note at least none of the stories last that long so it's not overly boring. There is no real blood or gore to speak of. The film was obviously shot in sets which vary from looking very fake to others which are quite nicely decorated. Director Francis doesn't do much with the limited material & Torture Garden is a bland & forgettable film which has little in the way of style even if some of the colour schemes are very late 60's, you may want to put on a pair of sunglasses at certain points. Torture Garden has not dated well at all, check the clothes out I mean Peter Cushing in a purple cardigan? The acting is OK but Meredith hams it up like you wouldn't believe & is quite fun to watch, a special mention goes to Cushing who really does deserve better than films such as this. Overall I was extremely disappointed with Torture Garden as I usually love anthologies especially the Amicus ones. Average at best & for Amicus anthology completest's (like myself) only.