There have been uncountable more or less faithful adaptations of the works of the author of The Fall of the House of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum or The Black Cat. Deceased at the age of 40, he is still referential in fantasy and horror. No wonder his macabre pen and his dark romanticism have influence filmmakers like Jean Epstein (The Fall of the House of Usher), Lucio Fulci (Seven Notes in Black, The Black Cat), Jan Svankmajer (The Pendulum, the Pit and Hope, The Fall of the House of Usher) or obviously Roger Corman who adapted several of Poe's stories. Since 1908 (the surprising two-headed Sherlock Holmes in the Great Murder Mystery), up until the recent Extraordinary Tales by Raul Garcia (shown at L'Etrange) there have been over 350 film adaptations of Poe's writings. This year Retour de Flamme has selected three of them, presented by the irreplaceable Serge Bromberg. We'll start the evening with the very rare The Tell Tale Heart, a silent expressionist adaptation, followed by The Crime of Dr. Crespi, a film that relies mostly on Erich von Stroheim's (The Grand Illusion) remarkable acting. For dessert you will taste the very bizarre Rachmaninoff’s Prelude, an independent British film entirely conceived, produced and acted by Castleton Knight. An extraordinary cinema tale.
