The Asphyx

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The Asphyx
Directed by	Peter Newbrook
Produced by	John Brittany
Written by	Christina Beers (story), Laurence Beers (story), Brian Comport
Starring	Robert Stephens, Robert Powell, Jane Lapotaire, Alex Scott
Music by	Bill McGuffie
Cinematography	Freddie Young
Editing by	Maxine Julius
Distributed by	Cinema Epoch United Entertainment
Release date(s)	1973
Running time	99 min
Country	UK
Language	English
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

The Asphyx is a 1973 British horror film directed by Peter Newbrook. It was also known as Spirit of the Dead and The Horror of Death. It stars Robert Stephens and Robert Powell.

It tells the exploits of rich Scientist-Philanthropist Sir Hugo Cunningham, who discovers an unimaginable blur being recorded while he searches the negatives of dying men whom he had recorded. Later on, at a party, he is making a motion picture of his wife and son, who are playing in a pool and ends up filming their accidental deaths as well. At first, Cunningham doesn't realize that he's captured that same misshapen blur on the camera, but once he does, he comes to a conclusion: that the blur is a person's soul leaving the body. It isn't until he re-examines the pictures and film however, that he makes the startling discovery that the blur was not moving away from the bodies of those who were dying, it was moving TOWARDS them. After doing some research, the good Doctor finds that he has found a ticket to immortality through the blur, an ancient Greek spirit known as an "Asphyx". According to legends, the spirit will appear only at the moment of a person's death to take them away to the Underworld. Cunningham, in his brilliant madness soon deduces that if he can only stop this process from happening at all, it would make any person immortal and unable to die- unless their particular Asphyx is released.

The Doctor soon goes to his task and makes a deal with his adopted son for help in perfecting and utilizing the procedures, and from there- his laboratory becomes filled with torturous devices and instruments of death. He soon comes to understand however, that immortality comes at a high price, not easily fulfilled by mortal man.