Director: Roger Corman
Screenplay: Charles Beaumont & Ray Russell, from the story by Edgar Allan Poe
Starring: Ray Milland, Hazel Court, Richard Ney, Heather Angel, Alan Napier
Release Date: March 7th, 1962
PREMATURE BURIAL is another in the Roger Corman stable of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, this one starring Ray Milland instead of Corman’s usual collaborator, Vincent Price. Change in leads aside, this film shares the same gothic atmosphere, ornate production design, vivid Technicolor cinematography and dryly dark sense of humor that has made this particular cycle of movies some of my top picks for annual Halloween viewing.
The flick gets off to a great start with Guy Carrell (Milland) observing as two grave robbers exhume a recently-buried corpse for the purposes of medical examination. This scene takes place in the kind of moodily lit and fog-enshrouded graveyard that only exists in old movies, so I knew immediately that I was going to dig this flick, especially once the grave robbers (one of whom is played by Corman and Joe Dante regular Dick Miller) pulled back the lid of the coffin to reveal the twisted visage of the man inside, his face a rictus of agonized terror and his fingers bloodied from attempting to claw his way out of the coffin. After a colorful credits sequence, the story picks up several months later as Emily (Court), Guy’s fiancée, arrives at the Carrell mansion hpping to rekindle their waning romance. This proves difficult, as ever since the incident in the graveyard Guy has been overcome with a crippling, irrational fear of being buried alive. He claims his father suffered from catalepsy, a condition which renders the victim unresponsive to any external stimuli, and as a boy he heard his father screaming from within his tomb on the night of his funeral. Fearing that the condition could be hereditary, Guy is convinced that the same fate will befall him. Guy is able to overcome his fear temporarily on his and Emily’s wedding night, but soon becomes obsessed with building a crypt with dozens of built-in escape aids, including a collapsible coffin, several sticks of dynamite, a hidden escape hatch, several days supply of food and lastly, should all other plans fail, a vial of poison. Emily convinces Miles Archer (Ney), a psychiatrist and old friend, to stay at the mansion to help her cure Guy of his increasingly unhealthy behavior. But someone may be plotting to turn Guy’s unfounded fear into a self-fulfilling prophecy.
PREMATURE BURIAL is a fun, atmospheric little gem that fits perfectly alongside Roger Corman’s Vincent Price-starring Poe films in style and tone. Setting the storyline and performances aside, this film is a treat just to look at, with perfect shot composition that takes full advantage of the widescreen frame and lushly vivacious colors that pop off of the screen, in particular the red candles of a candelabra that resides in Guy’s manor. From the moonlit mists of the moors and the trees that seem to reach out like gnarled hands, every single location is obviously stage-bound, but this blatant artificiality lends the film a sense of heightened unreality that serves to enhance the gothic melodrama of it all.
As far as the performances, there isn’t a weak one in the bunch, though I will admit that I sorely missed the presence of Vincent Price. That’s not to say that Ray Milland is in any way lacking in screen presence. In fact, his portrayal of Guy is appropriately tense and bi-polar, as he swings back and forth between overcoming his fears and embracing them. But Price always brought a certain intensity and subtly knowing sense of humor to these films, a quality which could have greatly served this story.
As it is, though, PREMATURE BURIAL is perfectly serviceable, following just about every beat I’ve come to expect from these flicks, right down to, you guessed it, the “Technicolor Psychedelic Nightmare Freakout” scene, in this instance a lengthy sequence in which Guy imagines that he has awakened inside his fool-proof tomb, only to discover that each and every one of his plans for escape has failed him. None of this is particularly scary, but it wasn’t really meant to be. Like the work of Poe, these films are all about shining a light on man’s fears, both logical and irrational, and obsessions through the creation of a particular mood. I especially appreciated the eerie use of the song “Molly Malone”, whistled by one of the grave robbers during the opening scene and which recurs throughout the picture, sometimes in Guy’s fevered imagination, and sometimes when a mysterious other is trying to drive him mad. The revelation of just who is messing with Guy’s fragile psyche, by the way, actually threw me for a loop. In retrospect it seems pretty obvious, but Corman and his screenwriters set several reasonable antagonists, only to finally settle on one whom I not only never suspected, but who made perfect sense.
Like the all of the flicks, PREMATURE BURIAL will not be everyone’s cup of tea, particularly those more accustomed to horror films with quicker pacing and gorier grue. These folks will probably find most of the film corny, and they would be absolutely correct in thinking so. I just happen to dig this particular brand of corn a great deal, and strongly suggest that if you’re looking to watch something that is more light in tone, but will still evoke that particular Halloween mood, you can’t go wrong with PREMATURE BURIAL, or any of the Poe films for that matter.
My Rating: 7.5/10
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