INFAMOUS DUNGEON

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22100, 4 May 1935, Page 12 (Supplement)

INFAMOUS DUNGEON

NEW HISTORICAL FILM The " Black" Hole of Calcutta" is brought to the screen for the first time in " Clive of India," Darryl Zanuck's 20th Century production, starring Ronald Colman, which United Artists will release. Not even, the Bastille of France or the Tower of London housed greater horror than that infamous cell, some 18ft square, into which, on June 20, 1756, in the city of Calcutta, India, one hundred and forty-five men and women were crammed by the soldiers of a cruel potentate and left to die in a night of hideous suffering. Not until six o'clock the next morning was the door of the prison opened. So crushed were all the bodies that it took twenty minutes to sort the living from the dead. Twenty-threo survivors managed to crawl out of the death chamber, among them a young bride, who was placed in Suraj Ed Dowlah's harem.

In the screen play the scene and events of that night have been reproduced exactly as described by the few survivors. In the title role of this Joseph M. Schenck presentation, Colman leads the small army which avenged the outrage.