Murders in the Rue Morgue

Chris Wicking's script takes the basic premise of a Grand Guignol theatre in Paris which is running an adaptation of Poe's story, and whose leading actress (Kaufman) is afflicted by weird nightmares involving elements of the play. The action slips back and forth bewilderingly from the play she is in to her dreams and then to her waking experience. It's a bold and complex structure for a horror film, and at times the thematic depth of the story doesn't hold up dramatically. But there's enough fascination and style in the dream sequences alone to hold the attention, and the action builds to a pleasingly obsessional - and genuinely Poe-like - climax, with the heroine completely isolated from reality.