Bloody Pit of Horror

Bloody Pit of Horror (Italian: Il boia scarlatto, The Crimson Executioner) is a 1965 Italian Gothic horror film directed by Domenico Massimo Pupillo and starring Mickey Hargitay as a deranged former actor who believes himself the reincarnation of a 17th-century executioner. When a group of photographers and models arrives at his castle to shoot covers for horror novels, he traps them in his dungeon of elaborate torture devices and sets about purging them of their sins. The film is loosely inspired by the writings of the Marquis de Sade and is a prime example of mid-1960s Italian exploitation horror, full of campy grandeur, garish color, and baroque death traps. It is in the public domain.