Here is a baker’s dozen, a witch’s coven, if you will, of the thirteen best films inspired by Edgar Allan Poe.
The list is heavily weighted with the works of the late auteur Roger Corman, who created a horror sub-genre of Poe adaptations. He not only dramatized the narratives and obsessions of Poe, but expressed his own profound musing on the inevitability of death and the premonitions of Freudian psychology by the author. Two Universal classics from the first decade of sound horror, The Black Cat and The Raven, also have places on the list. The Black Cat, inspired by Poe’s morbid vision, actually portrays the evils of post World War I trauma on two disturbed veterans. The Raven is a lurid and sadistic study of a brilliant man’s devotion to and obsession with the writer’s madness. And two later filmmakers, Michael Reeves and Gordon Hessler, metaphorically portray the revolutionary anger toward the authoritarian patriarchy of the late 1960s in the guise of Poe adaptations in The Conqueror Worm and The Oblong Box. Vincent Price took the opportunity to present Poe word for word in his brilliant one-man show, the television special An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe. And three great directors adapt Poe stories in contrasting and personal style in Spirits of the Dead.
Dr. Steve Haberman is a screenwriter, author and film historian. He received his PhD in Film Studies from De Montfort University in Leicester, England, and earned his BA in Cinema from the University of Southern California.
See other ‘best of’ lists by Dr. Steve Haberman: Best Dracula Films, Best Frankenstein Films, Best Hitchcock Films
- *** indicates available on Blu-ray
- ** indicates available on DVD
- * indicates No disc
Title | Year | IMDb Rating |
---|---|---|
*** The Masque of the Red Death | 1964 | |
*** The Fall of the House of Usher | 1960 | |
*** The Black Cat | 1934 | |
*** Pit and the Pendulum | 1961 | |
**** Witchfinder General | 1968 | |
*** The Tomb of Ligeia | 1964 | |
*** An Evening of Edgar Allan Poe | 1970 | |
*** The Raven | 1963 | |
*** The Premature Burial | 1962 | |
*** The Raven | 1935 | |
*** The Oblong Box | 1969 | |
*** Tales of Terror | 1962 | |
*** Spirits of the Dead | 1968 | |
13 titles |