by Sam Juliano
While the 1950’s are rightly known as the decade where the term “art house” really came into being, and a period that produced some of the greatest musicals and strong sociological statements from Hollywood, it is also a time when science fiction and low-budget horror made its mark. Films like Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Robert Wise’s The Day the Earth Stood Still, Howard Hawks’s The Thing, and Fred M. Willcox’s Forbidden Planet were seminal and influential works in their genre, while horror films like Jacques Tourneur’s Night of the Demon, Hammer studio’s Dracula, and camp cheapies like William Castle’s House on Haunted Hill, were all the popular rage. Films like Roger Corman’s Attack of the Crab Monsters seemed to blend characteristic elements of both genres, adding to the mix an unmistakable strain of tongue-in-cheek humor.
Humor, however, is nowhere present though, in an atmospheric chiller from 1958 called I Bury the Living, which along with a British witchcraft film starring Christopher Lee from 1960 called City of the Dead, and the eerie Carnival of Souls (1962) were the three films that obsessed me as a young child during mid-1960’s re-runs. While the witchcraft film may well be the one that had entranced me the most in those impressionable years when horror was my medicine, the other two are as vivid in my mind as when the first times I saw these decades ago. I can’t even count the times I’ve seen them since, as they initially were television staples, until the advent of home video. I Bury the Living, directed by Albert Band, and starring Richard Boone and Theodore Bickel, is an atmospheric horror piece with a central premise that is as terrifying as anything conjured up before or since. Stephen King himself made reference to the 75 minute film in his famous volume Danse Macabre:
Once upon a time there was a cemetery caretaker who discovered that if he put black pins into the vacant plots on his cemetery map, the people who owned those plots would die. But when he took out the black pins and put in the white pins, do you know what happened? The movie turned into a big pile of shit! Wasn’t that funny?
King’s summary judgement in retrospect though was inordinately harsh and the rushed and somewhat ludicrous denouement of I Bury the Living almost seems like an inconsequential matter, since for its first 65 minutes, this is one of the most claustrophobic and terrifying films out there. I remember once watching this alone when I was twelve late at night, and I was frantic with fear, imagining that someone was trying to prying open a basement door to the outside. Band’s crisp and imaginative direction makes excellent use of the kinetic visual possibilities of a rectangular wall map that documents who is alive in the town where the rural cemetery is located, as well as those who are dead an buried there. Boone plays Robert Kraft, the cemetery’s paperwork caretaker, who spends a number of nights in a small cottage located within the grounds. This structure, which serves as Kraft’s office when he’s performing his duties as caretaker is dominated by the gigantic map, which uses black and white pins next to the names of the living and the dead. As the Scottish sounding caretaker of the place, Andy McGee explains, the pins enable the caretaker to see at a glance what the status of any individual plot in the graveyard is. Black pins indicate where someone is already buried; white pins signify that a plot has been purchased, but is currently empty.
When Kraft replaces some white pins with black ones, out of morbid curiosity, a string of deaths ensue, culminating with a trio of men who are all serving as members of the cemetery’s board of directors, including Kraft’s uncle, George. This leads to the film’s most effective set piece, an arresting and horrifying sequence where the map begins to warp Kraft’s mental state to the point of implied dementia. During this bravura sequence the map undergoes a series of visual transformations that are actually part of Kraft’s mental breakdown. Band and cinematographer Frederick Gately use renowned horror veteran Gerald Fried’s discordant music to spine tingling effect in conveying unease and discombobulating uncertainty. Outdoor stock shots of surface dirt moving on graves takes on added terror, and even when the final events reached the level of absurdity, one has been taken through the ringer of supreme cinematic fear.
With the use of montage and some experimental camera angles, Band did much with a tiny budget, and over 50 years later this modest throwaway looks better than it ever did.
Richard Boone gives a compelling performance as Kraft, but as the lumbering caretaker, Bikel is rather bland and fraudulent. Part of the problem of course is the pedestrian script by Louis Garfinkle, which certainly breaks no new ground in horror film writing, or for any writing for that matter. But wisely, the screenplay in in full service of the film’s elaborate visual scheme, which uses small spaces and shapes to electrifying effect.
I Bury the Living is nightmare-inducing.
This has always been one of my own favorites as well. The director uses close-ups quite effectively with the pin-pushing and the story was very much Twilight Zonish, suggesting mind over matter. I agree that Boone was excellent.
I agree that this film is terrifying. I expected some hoky fun when I rented it (judging from the cover), but then recalled that Stephen King had listed it (in “Danse Macabre” as you mentioned here) as one of the ten most frightening films he’d ever seen. All the same, I figured his memory must have been faulty.
I was wrong. The plot, when laid out bare, sounds ridiculous. A rather ordinary, boring caretaker of a cemetery (accompanied by a hilarious ‘Scottsman’) happens to gain power over the fundamentals of life and death with a board that lays out the structure of the cemetery–where people are buried, have been buried, and will be buried. All this sounds absurd and very 1950’s, yes, but it turns out well. You actually start believing it yourself and can feel the protagonist’s anguish. The end is disappointing, but the buildup is more than worth it. Black pin, white pin, black pin, white pin…..
Very nice choice here Sam. I saw this years back, but reading your fine recap has brought it into focus once again. I happen to concur with the prevailing thinking here on the faulty conclusion (which makes no sense) but until that point it is as you say “hair-raising.” I’m sure the studio preobably interferred on the artistic decision about how to wind it up. Too bad.
………….it’s interesting that Stephen King even remembers this. I think I once read somewhere that he thinks it’s one of the ten scariest films ever. Sorry to say I don’t remember ever watching it. I’ll have to get hold of the DVD………..
Tell me I didn’t know you would eventually write something about this film. I remember your great excitement when it was announced in the mid-90’s for laserdisc release. Great review!
Thanks for plugging Danse Macabre, which may have been, as I think it over, the first book of criticism I read. I still think its one of King’s best books, non-fiction or fiction. I haven’t seen I Bury the Living in years, I will have to revisit.
Frank G: Thanks very much for that fantastic comment. Yes, King has actually warmed up more with this film in the later years. This also is relayed to Frank A.
Bobby: It definitely is Twilight Zonish (it’s 75 minutes after all, for one)
Bill: I heard the studio did interfere, so that’s an excellent point there you make.
Yes, Joe you did know it! LOL!!!
Thanks very much one and all.
And thank you very much Chuck for that. I completely agree with you on what you say about “Danse Macabre” as it’s surely one of the best of all King’s writings, fiction or non-fiction. King also hit paydirt methinks with his effusive praise for Boris Karloff’s Thriller, calling it rightly the scariest network television show ever aired. I do think though that I BURY THE LIVING holds up beautifully decades later.
Wonderful review Sam.. you’ve inspired me to revisit this!
Thanks Kaleem! I do think you’ll find what made it so effective all those years ago, will be amazingly ‘fresh’ on re-viewing.
Sam, I really love your lead-in, mentioning all those films we grew up with. What an elegantly written piece. Bravo.
Sam, I remember seeing this on TV as a child (I knew Boone from “Have Gun” and his early 60’s repertory anthology series–does anyone remember this?) and finding it very scary and atmospheric. I still can visualize that map and those pins. I also agree that “Thriller” was a great TV series. I saw it at a very impressionable age during its first run and years later in reruns, and it aged very well. The episodes somehow managed to maintain an atmosphere of sustained dread for nearly an hour.
Sam and Allan, on a separate note, I have just had the Dardos Award passed to me, and I have chosen “Wonders in the Dark” as one of the five blogs I get to pass the award along to. I don’t know if you’re interested in this kind of thing, but details will appear in my regular Monday post at movieprojector.blogspot.com along with a link to your site.
I am not familiar with this show. But I do recall watching the Outer Limits and The Hitchcock TV series in my pre-teens, and now wonder what our parents were doing letting us watch this scary stuff – and at night!
R. D. Finch: Thank You very much for that comprehensive and terrific remembrance of I BURY THE LIVING and subsequently of Boris Karloff’s Thriller, which I reviewed here at the site:
https://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com/2008/10/31/boris-karloffs-thriller-television-horror-anthology-series-extraordinaire/
We have been tagged once for the Dardos Award, R.D., by Screen savour’s T.S., but your overwhelming gesture here is exceedingly generous and deeply appreciated. We will look forward to your Monday blog announcement.
Later today, I will be going over to your own blog to see what enriching things you are doing. Allan and I can say how much we are gratified to you for all you have done here this week and for the Dardos!
Ha Tony! I think our parents just wanted these shows to serve as baby sitters!!
I think quite highly of this film as well (I believe Sam knows that) and I love Richard Boone. So it is an enrapturing feast for the eyes to visit Wonders in the Dark and read this tremendous review of I Bury the Living by Sam.
This is indeed a fantastic psychological study. Horror may come grislier and more visceral, but rarely so disturbingly phrenic. Just a very special film, and, to reiterate, I love seeing Sam give it its due here! Bravo.
I don’t deserve all that for my modest treatment here Alexander, but it’s a fantastic and much appreciated comment. I have indeed known of your great love for this underappreciated low-budget gem. Again, thank you so much my friend!
Sam, thanks for directing me to your post on “Thriller.” Really enjoyed it, and the list of notable episodes evoked some vivid memories for me, especially “The Grim Reaper,” “The Hungry Glass,” and “Pigeons from Hell” (“Eulalie! Eulalie!”).
Ah yes, R.D. “Eulalie” indeed! One of teh greatest individual episodes in the history of network television.
Thanks so much for checking out the piece and in providing your vivid response here!
Sam: Indeed! I did revisit this and loved every minute. It’s so unfortunate that Hollywood isn’t capable of such ‘classic’ horror anymore..
I am thrilled to hear this Kaleem! I thought you would come in with a strong appraisal.