Smile, though your heart is aching. Smile, even though it’s breaking.
In 1880, in Gorslava, Baroness Maude Sardonicus (Audrey Dalton), the wife of Baron Sardonicus (Guy Rolfe), sends an urgent message to a well known London physician Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis). At one time Maude and Robert had been in love but she was forced, by her father, to marry a “man of substance”. The Baroness asks him to come at once.
When Robert arrives at Sardonicus’ castle he immediately feels that things are not what they should be. He hears screams and finds a young servant being tortured with leeches. Sardonicus' servant Krull (Oskar Homolka) says she is a guinea pig. When Sardonicus appears at dinner he is wearing a mask. Sardonicus is a vile and sadistic Baron. He tortures young women from the village. Krull is blind in one eye because of him. He psychologically tortures his wife Maude. And Krull himself passes on the torture to servants.
Eventually, Sardonicus tells Sir Robert the story of why he wears the mask. He was born Marke Toleslawski. He was a farmer like his father Henryk (Vladimir Sokoloff). His wife Elenka (Erika Peters) was not happy with their lot in life. Henryk had purchased a lottery ticket as a present for Marke and Elenka.
When his father died before the drawing he was buried with the lottery ticket in his coat pocket. Months later they find out that the ticket is a winning ticket. Elenka forces Marke to dig up his father’s grave and get the ticket. The sight of his father’s grinning skull traumatizes Marke. Ever since that night his face has been frozen in a death’s grin. Elenka commits suicide and Sardonicus buys a castle, a title, and marries Maude. From Maude he learns of Robert’s treatments.
Sardonicus now hopes that Robert can restore him to normal. Robert tries but with no success. Sardonicus wants him to try untested methods but Robert refuses. Sardonicus tells him that if he doesn’t he will have Krull turn Maude into a grinning monster just like him.
“Mr. Sardonicus” was released in 1961 and was produced and directed by William Castle. The film was based on a short story called "Sardonicus" that was originally published in Playboy. The film was praised as one of Castle’s best by both critics and regular folk alike. I must have missed something along the way. I thought it was OK, even good but not the best thing that Castle did. Yes, Sardonicus’ face was wack-o weird, and the torture aspects were a good touch of horror, but it wasn’t enough to grab me. Maybe because I never saw it as a child so I didn’t get to have nightmares about all those teeth. My loss.
During its initial theatrical release Castle used a gimmick he called the “punishment poll”. Theater goers were given a glow-in-the-dark card that featured a hand with a thumb sticking out. Toward the end of the movie Castle addressed the audience and said the audience was to determine the ending of the movie. Patrons were urged to vote on if Sardonicus was to be shown mercy or not by showing their cards with the thumb either pointing up or down.
In his autobiography Castle claimed the idea for two different endings came from the Columbia Pictures' dissatisfaction with the downbeat ending of the original script. He said "I would have two endings, Columbia's and mine, and let the audience decide for themselves the fate of Mr. Sardonicus." The alternate "merciful" ending supposedly showed Sardonicus cured and surviving. Co-star Audrey Dalton claims no such ending was ever shot. This is probably true since no other ending has ever been found.