Watch Mr. Sardonicus For Free

Crappy film

Awesome Movie

A lot of fun.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Ronald Lewis stars as Sir Robert Cargrave, a highly esteemed doctor / surgeon sought out by the Baron Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe). The Baron had, once upon a time, given in to greed and robbed a grave, and he therefore met a nasty fate: his face froze into a hideous, toothy grin. Usually keeping his visage hidden under a mask, The Baron indulges in some cruel practices that upset the good doctor. He's prepared to follow through on various threats that he makes, should Cargrave refuse to come to his aid or not succeed in the attempt.The legendary schlockmeister William Castle was a man who truly understood the value of showmanship. Here he once again utilizes a gimmick, albeit one that he saves for the final few minutes of the picture. This one is called the "punishment poll", wherein audience members could vote on whether our villain had received enough payback for his misdeeds. As one can see, the gimmick is nothing more than a joke.Another good thing that could be said about Castle was his penchant for giving his fright flicks a respectable fun factor. "Mr. Sardonicus" is heavy on story (and back story) for a while, but it kicks into another gear whenever The Baron is at his cruelest and most sadistic. One unfortunate servant girl must endure leeches on her face for no good reason.Rolfe is delicious in the title role, and is a good sport considering that he must wear the mask most of the time. (The reveal of his affliction is a memorable one indeed.) Lewis is passable as our protagonist, as is the beautiful Audrey Dalton as Maude, the woman Cargrave loves who had married The Baron to appease her father. Oscar Homolka is great as the one eyed henchman Krull, who tries to be loyal to The Baron but is taken aback at one point by what he's being asked to do.Lovers of more contemporary horror may scoff at the makeup, but the effects do have an irresistible old fashioned, low budget charm to them.Seven out of 10.

It's 1880 London. The movie starts with director William Castle introducing this story of a ghoul or evil being who robs graves and feeds on corpses. Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis) is a teacher doctor at the Queens College Hospital. He's in love with Maude (Audrey Dalton) but she was forbidden to marry such a lowly man. She married Baron Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe) and Krull (Oskar Homolka) is the baron's man servant. He receives a pleading letter from the baroness, and immediately goes to Gorslava in central Europe. There he finds the mysterious creepy baron with a face mask experimenting on the maid Anna with leeches. There's a locked room which the servants call 'The Chamber of Horrors'.This is a black and white B-horror. For what it is, this is quite watchable. The section where Baron Sardonicus recounts his story as Marek goes relatively slowly. The face is cheesy but I kind of like it. The mask is weirdly compelling. This old fashion horror isn't scary in the modern sense but it does have a good creepy factor. The story is interesting and compelling all the way til the end. The gimmick of the audience voting is just that, a gimmick. It's really only an afterthought in a pretty good old fashion horror.

William Castle directed this gimmick thriller that stars Guy Rolfe as Baron Sardonicus, a wealthy but disfigured man who enlists the help of a surgeon(played by Ronald Lewis) to repair his damaged face. Audrey Dalton plays his beautiful wife, who hates and fears him, and falls for the doctor, and he for her. Oscar Homolka plays a loyal and hulking servant. It turns out that Sardonicus became disfigured after rifling the grave of his father, who was mistakenly buried with a winning lottery ticket, the one that made him rich. Will Sardonicus be punished by the audience vote, as instructed by director Castle? Good cast can't save misfired film that never amounts to much, though does have an effective ending, if you can make it that far!

Mr. Sardonicus is set during 1880 & starts in London where Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis) is a successful surgeon specialising in the field of paralysis, one morning Cargrave receives a letter written by his former lover Maude Randall (Audrey Dalton) who urges him to come to the European town of Gorslava in a matter of utmost importance. Cragrave leaves for Gorslava almost immediately & travels to the Castle of Maude's husband, the Baron Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe) who wears a mask that covers his entire face. Eventually Baron Sardonicus reveals his face to Cargrave who is shocked to see that he has a permanent horrifying grin because of paralysed facial muscles, Baron Sardonicus begs Cargrave to help cure him but when conventional massaging techniques fail to work Baron Sardonicus threatens the life of Maude if Cargrave does not use new experimental drugs on him & cure his horrible disfigurement...Also known simply as Sardonicus this atmospheric black and white Gothic horror film was produced & directed by William Castle & was based on the short story 'Sardonicus' by Ray Russell that originally appeared in a 1961 edition of Playboy who also wrote the screenplay here & despite the IMDb describing it as a novel Russell's original story was a mere thirty odd pages long, I know because I only read it last week (those in the UK it's one of the stories in the Pan Book of Horror Stories Volume 4) & it was that reading which made me want to find & watch this film & I am glad I did because Mr. Sardonicus is a fine film in it's own right & better than I expected. There are obvious differences like the addition of the maid & her torture, Sardonicus keeping a corpse in a locked room, the nature of Maude's punishment is different as in the film Sardonicus threatens to cut her face muscles leaving her with a horrible disfigurement while in the original written story he threatens to have forcible sex with her every night despite his hideous appearance, the lack of any mirrors is new to the film, the back-story about the lottery ticket is slightly different as Sardonicus was never previously married & he does not wear a mask at any point in the story but I suppose that works quite well in the film as his unmasking & the revealing of his true appearance is nicely built-up & pretty effective. The changes, however, are not massive & the main bulk of the story remains intact. Mr. Sardonicus is am atmospheric horror thriller that has a certain amount of originality about it, I can't remember seeing a film with a similar story that balances Gothic & psychological horror like it, at 90 minutes long Mr. Sardonicus feels shorter & the time I spent watching it flew by. The character's are good & well rounded, everything makes sense to a degree & the script just about manages to make it's audience both sympathise & despise Sardonicus.Filmed in black and white this works for Mr. Sardonicus really well with the dark dungeons, the isolated forest & it manages to hide some of the production's shortcomings. When revealed Sardonicus has a huge unnatural grin that isn't exactly scary but I don't think anyone would like to walk around permanently with it on their face so it has a certain effectiveness. The one aspect that Mr. Sardonicus could have done without is the William Castle introduction (he quotes some of the book, especially while trying to find Ghoul in the dictionary) & the silly Punishment Poll which was never a poll anyway as only one ending was ever filmed. The film would have worked fine without these unnecessary interruptions.The production values are good & Mr. Sardonicus is well made for the period, the acting is good & Guy Rolfe does a decent job considering he is stuck behind a mask for most of the film & I am sure he was cast because of his distinctive voice which sells the part.Mr. Sardonicus is a good film that was better than I was expecting, the short story is also pretty good & can recommend that. The William Castle bits are unnecessary but otherwise I was impressed.