Sent to the Devil's Island penal colony, Dr. Karloff runs afoul of
sadistic commandant James Stephenson, who seems obsessed by the guillotine (an execution sequence is one of the film's longest scenes).
His chief nemesis in the camps is a
sadistic camp
commandant, Watanabe, nicknamed «the Bird» (Miyavi), who inflicts all manner of gruesome punishments, including, in one protracted scene, forcing a long line of inmates, one after the other, to punch Zamperini in the face.