Pit of Darkness

1961 British film by Lance Comfort

October 1961 (1961-10)

Running time

80 minutesCountryUnited KingdomLanguageEnglish

Pit of Darkness is a 1961 British thriller film, directed by Lance Comfort and starring William Franklyn and Moira Redmond. It is based on the 1960 novel To Dusty Death by Hugh McCutcheon.The film is an amnesia thriller dealing with a man's attempts to piece together a sequence of strange events in which he seems to have been involved during the time of which he has no memory,

Plot

Safe-designer Richard Logan awakens late one evening on a patch of suburban waste ground. He has no idea how he got there. He returns home to wife Julie to apologise for being late from work. He is astonished to learn that he has been missing not for a few hours, but for three weeks. Furthermore, a troubling series of events has occurred during his absence. A supposedly foolproof safe which he installed in a customer's home has been cracked open with apparent ease. Items taken include cash and a world-famous diamond from East Africa. Alarmed by Richard's disappearance, Julie had hired a private detective to find him, but the detective was later found dead. Richard must now find a way to penetrate the amnesia that prevents him from recalling recent events.

After investigating, he becomes aware that he is trailed by a group of mysterious men who patronize a local nightclub called the Blue Baboon, which he and Julie decide to visit one evening. While there, in his confused mental state, Richard is plagued by random and trivial occurrences – a snatch of a popular song or a conversational nuance – which inexplicably strike a chord within him. He experiences mental flashbacks so fleeting they are over as quickly as they begin. These and other events lead him to wonder if he may have been involved in criminal activity with some of the nightclub's regulars. Later, Richard is lured to a cottage in the countryside. He enters and hears the tick-tick-ticking of a bomb about to go off. He runs from the house, a split-second ahead of the shock waves that result from the explosion. It is this episode that appears finally to jolt his memory, and he believes he has discovered what has transpired during the past three weeks.

Cast

William Franklyn as Richard Logan
Moira Redmond as Julie Logan
Leonard Sachs as Clifton Conrad
Bruno Barnabe as Bruno
Nigel Green as Jonathan
Bruce Beeby as Peter Mayhew
Anthony Booth as Ted Melis
Nanette Newman as Mary
Humphrey Lestocq as Bill Underwood
Jacqueline Jones as Mavis
Michael Balfour as Fisher
Ronnie Hall as the singer

Critical reception

The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Complex, fanciful plot made plausible by effective writing and direction. The pace is brisk, there are some spirited fisticuffs, and there is the personality of William Franklyn – unbeatable in suggesting solid virtues behind a rakish, smooth exterior. Sets, editing, sound, all competent."^[1]