MovieChat Forums > Pit and the Pendulum (1961) Discussion > The only question I had about Elizabeth'...

The only question I had about Elizabeth's Reappearance (SPOILERS)


I undestand that this is just a movie, and that a suspension of belief is necessary, but I had one issue with Elizabeth's "rise from the tomb". Earlier in the movie when Nicolas is having a flashback to what he thought was Elizabeth's death, he finds her in the iron maiden. Now how could she have survived this if the very same iron maiden killed her later on? Maybe I missed something. Anyone know?

Pontoon boat? Whaddya going to do with a pontoon boat? Retake Omaha Beach?

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She didn't die, when he found her that time but, the doctor made him think that she did. The iron maiden didn't kill her the second time. She finally got 'buried alive'(so to speak).

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Of course the iron maiden didn't kill her the 2nd time, you can clearly see she's still alive when Catherine says "No one will ever enter this chamber!" - And that's the point, i.e. she got locked in there alive (similar to being buried alive).

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I couldn't understand why she was in the iron maiden in the flashback. The doctor said that she had died of fright. He said nothing about the torture device or how she could have gotten herself in there.


...Justin

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SPOILER AHEAD-------i've watched this movie any # of times, one of my all time favorites, but i have never been able to understand: who in the hell is the "screaming dead woman" in the coffin? she sure as heck ain't barbara steele.

ridiculous that i've watched this so many times and never got that plot point, but i always just get swept along in the deliciously morbid atmosphere and somehow ignore the plot...anyhow, who is the dead woman???

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When I was younger I always thought the body was Nicholas's mother and that Leon and Elizabeth had put her body in the coffin...knowing that Nicholas was going to open the coffin and be terrified at the thought of burying his wife alive. notice that the body was definitley screaming as she died judging from the corpse. now im not sure, maybe Leon abducted a patient or someone of the street, drugged them and put them into the coffin?

Nothing Is Trivial

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apparently, Evie, the corpse is nicolas's mother. i think she looks pretty good, to have been croaked and chained to a wall for 20 years.

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Ha ha i remember watching that scene as a kid....scared the life outta me


Nothing Is Trivial

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I always assumed it was just a dummy.

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The iron maiden itself didn't kill her (or wasn't meant to have), she died of shock/fright from being around and obsessed with the torture devices. She was just in the iron maiden when they found her.

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The question I have is that if she and the doctor had succeeded how were they going to explain her being alive?

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either his mother or the doctor provided a corpse or a living person to be entombed alive.

Swing away, Merrill....Merrill, swing away...

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