In 19th century England, a noted brain surgeon rescues a former student from being hanged on a false conviction for murder, and spirits him away to an ancient, repurposed abbey far in the countryside. There, he connives his pupil into assisting him in mapping the functions of the various parts of the human brain, using living subjects who are under a terrible animation-suspending drug called "black sleep". Subsequently, the student, along with the daughter of one of the subjects, discover that most of these subjects have survived but are being kept in a dungeon-like cellar, in various stages of physical and mental derangement...

Basil Rathbone
Sir Joel Cadman

Herbert Rudley
Dr. Gordon Ramsay

Patricia Blair
Laurie Munroe

Akim Tamiroff
Odo the Gypsy

Phyllis Stanley
Daphne

Lon Chaney Jr.
Dr. Munroe, aka Mungo

Bela Lugosi
Casimir

John Carradine
Bohemund
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Release Date
June 15, 1956
Runtime
1h 22m
Genres
Horror, Science Fiction
Director
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