Sir Richard returns to his family home after a short stay in London, with him is his new bride, Elizabeth, who will be meeting his family for the first time. Upon arriving in his homested the reception isn’t as pleasant as he was expecting. It appears that in Richard’s absence a young woman was murdered, and the townspeople suspect Richard although he hasn’t been in town for over three months.
Once Richard and his new bride arrive at the house things continue to take a turn towards to the strange. While at dinner a letter addressed to Elizabeth is delivered revealing the family’s moto. Richard is distraut, and confesses the true reason behind his previous wife sudden death. She was unable to bare Richard any children, and thus a heir. She quickly fell into a depression believing Richard and his father hated her for it, and ultimately threw herself out of a window. She died gripping the family moto in hand, as a suicide note.
During the first night, Richard and Elizabeth are awoken by a banging window, when Richard goes to investigate he sees that the window that is open is that which his previous wife, Anne, threw herself from. When he sees an apparition of his ex-wife in the garden his new wife is very understanding and quickly dismisses the incident. But when Richard goes to close the window he is informed by a servant that the window opens itself every night, and has done so since he left the house for London.
As with all films of this nature, the towns people are very superstitious, the devil and supernatural misadventures are to blame for anything bad, and the townspeople are beginning to believe Richard is a devil. Although the townspeople never pick up their pitchforks and go out for blood, it gets pretty close at times. But are these fears unjustified? Several eyewitness’s claim to have seen Richard in the town, while he claimed to be in London, on horseback being chased by his ex-wife who is yelling, “Murderer”, in his direction.
These strange occurances keep happening. The following morning Richard’s horse is not ready, after it is revealed some woman keeps riding it during the night. And then a man from Tiverton arrives with a brand new saddle which he claims Sir Richard came and ordered, although Richard has been in London the whole time. So who is this strange character that people keep believing is Richard, or is Richard involved in some funny business?
The longer Richard and Elizabeth are at the house the stranger the misadventures are, and the deeper the suspicions directed at Sir Richard become. When Richard becomes entangled in the re-enactment of the scene of the horse back riders previously witness by the townspeople, Richard is stopped and questioned by soldiers, and it looks like Richard is going to have a hard time getting out of this one. Richard becomes distraut and seems to be losing his grip on reality, but will we get to the bottom of this mess before he’s totally out of his mind?
The Black Torment is very run of the mill for this kind of period piece. Being produced at a time when the British horror film, and particularly those produced by Hammer, were in a very healthy state. Hammer Films, who reinvented the period horror film in England, has an undeniable influence on Black Torment. But where a Hammer film might get a little boring here or there, Black Torment is actually a very enjoyable film. There is absolutely no rest in this film for us, Richard, or his wife. The whole film probably spans but a few days, and just about everything imaginable happens as the mystery unfolds! This does create a problem though, there is no real build up of atmosphere, things just happen too fast and so the build up of tension for the finale is a little dampened.
Unfortunately little care is taken in keep the films conclusion a secret. It becomes fairly easy to guess who is involved by the way certain characters are interacting, but there is still a surprise or two in store once you have the culprits under close observation. Not by any means a classic of British horror cinema, but good none the less and definitely worth the time.
