Scanialara You won't be disappointed!

Suman Roberson It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

Mathilde the Guild Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

gridoon2018 This is the second "Inner Sanctum" film I have watched so far, after "The Frozen Ghost", and this one is the better of the two, mainly because it follows a traditional "whodunit" format where nearly every character is considered a suspect at one point or another. There seem to be two basic alternatives: either there is something truly supernatural going on, or someone is trying to make others believe that there is something supernatural going on. But in an effective and startling ending, a third option is revealed....Just don't read Leonard Maltin's comment before viewing the movie because he spoils everything! As in "The Frozen Ghost", the production is polished and the casting is good. **1/2 out of 4.

JLRMovieReviews Lon Chaney is suspected of murder when his wife is found dead. It doesn't help any, when it's discovered he's been out with his secretary. This is my first experience with The Inner Sanctum mysteries. In the beginning, I didn't quite know how to take it, seriously or campy. The dialogue and stiff acting by Lon made the film feel amateurish and unintentionally funny. But I have to admit, watching more, I seemed to forget myself and was totally into it. A lot of it was due in part to other actors, adept at what they're doing, like Brenda Joyce, as the secretary, J. Edward Bromberg as a supposed psychic, and Rosalind Ivan as the eccentric housekeeper. Oh, and George Cleveland was especially good as the old man. Even now knowing the twist ending, I would watch it over and enjoy its spirit! So join in the séance and talk to dead people! They help find the murderer in "Pillow of Death."

DLewis "Pillow of Death" is such a ridiculous title that one figures it must be good, and for the first two-thirds it more or less is so. Jerome Ash's cinematography is outstanding, Frank Skinner's music is appropriately dramatic; the sets -- left over from something else -- are fabulous and the performances are at least adequate in most cases to suit Babcock and Bricker's rather prosaic tale. However, a sense of routine starts to set in as the storyline advances -- each turn of the plot is accompanied by a shot of a screaming headline; characters begin to behave in a potted way and don't have very much dimension. Even given that, one can still have fun trying to figure out whodunit in this whodunit, but my crystal ball tells me very few will find the solution of this riddle particularly satisfactory. Ultimately, some may find the time spent watching "Pillow of Death" spent better in the company of one's own pillow, catching one hour's sleep rather than patiently enduring this title.

Scarecrow-88 The final film in the Inner Sanctum Mysteries series and wouldn't you know it, Chaney stars as a lawyer, under suspicion (and arrested) for the suffocation of his wife. Chaney's boozing Wayne Fletcher is hearing his dead wife's voice, communicating to him—is it his guilty conscience or the actual voice of a woman he might have killed? While always a suspect, Fletcher could be the victim of some elaborate trap, orchestrated by another who wants to implicate him for a crime he possibly didn't commit. That's the beauty of "Pillow of Death", you are unsure of Chaney's innocence or guilt, while other films in the Inner Sanctum Mysteries series had murderers that were not as difficult to figure out. Brenda Joyce (Chaney's wife in the previous series entry, "Strange Confession") is Fletcher's secretary, Donna Kincaid, an heiress to the Kincaid fortune, in line to receive the mansion and wealth her name provides. Belle (Clara Blandick) and Samuel (George Cleveland) are two of the remaining Kincaids still alive, soon to be victims themselves of a suffocation killer, maybe tied to the Vivian Fletcher murder. Donna could be a suspect since she benefits from their demises, as well as, a supposed psychic, Julian Julian (J Edward Bromberg), a soft-spoken, even-tempered charlatan who gains the trust of Belle (and had convinced Vivian that she was a medium, one of the main reasons the Fletchers' marriage disintegrated) and the kooky maid Amelia (Rosalind Ivan), holding séances in the Kincaid mansion. Wilton Graff is the investigator, Captain McCracken, in charge of finding the psychopath. "Pillow of Death" is closer to a Universal Studios chiller than previous entries, with an "old dark house" (that has secret passageways and eccentric characters who live within, along with a door that seems to open on its own, not to mention, a cemetery nearby) and series of murders with the same modus operandi, a list of suspects with motive and opportunity. The film raises the question of Chaney's innocence more than previous films—while he's shown downing shots of liquor, puffing away on cigarettes, the typical weary expression and nervy disposition we do see in many of the films where his characters are burdened by the idea of being behind murders they either don't remember or possibly contributed to unknowingly/mistakenly, "Pillow of Death" includes a dead wife's voice goading Fletcher to follow. What sets this apart from all of the films in the series (except maybe "Strange Confession" which leaves us in the dark about what his character had done until the very end) is a shocking conclusion where the killer's identity is unveiled, not following the mould where Chaney and Blandick catch the person responsible by trapping him or her, normally with the investigator awaiting in another room to make the arrest. Having now finished the series, I did find it interesting how Chaney, despite the star status of the films for which he starred and finding himself embroiled in murder plots, was often a "spoke in the wheel" with the supporting cast given just as much screen time as him. What I found amusing about "Pillow of Death" was the way Chaney is always considered the prime suspect, Belle absolutely convinced of his guilt, while others weren't so sure. Despite pouring on the pathos, Chaney isn't granted a reprieve. The film never guarantees that Fletcher is just an abused victim while another is out there *really* committing crimes he is being accused of. Fun cast really get into their roles. Bernard Thomas rounds out the cast as a neighbor, Bruce, in love with Donna, always creeping about, spying on the Kincaids out of fear that Fletcher will kill them. Bruce is another questionable character, mainly because of his peeping tom antics. Bruce wholly believes, like Belle, that Fletcher is, no question about it, Vivian's murderer. The plot also points out that Fletcher and Donna were in love despite his marriage to Vivian, earning Belle's ire, further raising suspicions about either one of them.