Cebalord Very best movie i ever watch

TinsHeadline Touches You

Wordiezett So much average

Adeel Hail Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

udar55 Janet (Karen Witter) is the new biology teacher at Ravenscroft, a school for troubled young girls (including former porn star Ginger Lynn Allen and debuting Nia Long) run by Gary (Robert Vaughn). This odd, isolated place seems to bring out the worst in Janet as she keeps having hallucinations about hordes of ants, a pulsating brick wall, and a arm that keeps grabbing her. Staff quack Dr. Schaeffer (Donald Pleasence) tells her she just might be seeing different layers of reality (!?!). To make matters worse, the student population keeps dwindling as girls are offed by some guy in a mask. You know you are in for some true class when the opening credits misspell Poe's name (as "Edgar Allen Poe"). Another of Towers' South African lensed Poe "adaptations," this has about as much to do with his short story "Buried Alive" as Fred Olen Ray's THE HAUNTING FEAR does. I'd probably rate this one above USHER just because director Gerard Kikoine (EDGE OF SANITY) manages to pull off some interesting camera moves. He isn't concerned with such trickery in terms of plot though as the villain is exactly who you think it is. Oddly enough, the T&A factor is limited to one scene and former X-rated queen Ginger Lynn does not get nude. Arnold Vosloo and Bill Butler have small supporting roles. John Carradine has 30 seconds of screen time and this was to be his last film. The end credits dedicate it to his memory. Poor John.

Vomitron_G Pheeeew.... An Edgar Allan Poe story in some sort of slasher format...? A concept like this only could have been thought up during the late 80's...The movie does try but fails to convince because the script offers no surprises whatsoever. It's basically an average horror effort where angry women in a reform school meet their demise at the hands of a mad psychiatrist and his insane curing methods.It's not impossible to sit through, mainly because of the mildly entertaining death-scenes and it does have a certain style to it. In my opinion, you can tell this was directed by a Frenchman (Gérard Kikoïne), because his way of mise-en-scène at moments is just a bit more imaginative than your run-of-the-mill slasher/horror director from the 80's. At times he chooses quite original angles and camera movements to portray the events (unusual framing, profile close-ups of the actors with action going on in the background, inventive travels & crane-shots,...). But like I said, the story is extremely predictable and lacks suspense, and that's what basically kills the movie.The acting was overall acceptable (though the angry woman did get a bit on my nerves after a while - thankfully there was a group shower scene!), and Donald Pleasance, again, provides a very weird role. He's completely wasted on this movie, has almost nothing to do but it was fun seeing him play another out-of-place weirdo (who's also a notable member of the school's staff, by the way, wears a fake toupée and has some sort of German accent). For some reason you can often see him munching on stuff - I couldn't quite make out if it were peanuts or ants...An added value could come from Robert Vaughn, leading the cast as the mad psychiatrist, and John Carradine (in nothing more but a cameo). The climactic scene near the end (in which they're both featured) was somewhat amusing. But leading girl Karen Witter, although sweet eye-candy, wasn't really capable of carrying the film, as her performance came off as too generic to me. I did chuckle when I spotted a young Arnold Vosloo in a supporting role. All this made me enjoy the movie a bit more than I should have. And you can add a nonsensical frozen surprise-shot at the end to the mix.A rather weird film. Incompetent too. But as far as raping Edgar Allan Poe goes, they did a good job.

FieCrier A woman leaves the Raven Croft Mental Facility, which for some reason is filled with only women who do not seem insane, but more like juvenile delinquents (played by women in their 20s and 30s, to be sure). Outside, she's attacked by a short person in a Ronald Reagan mask and pushed through a trapdoor down a very long chute. Mr. Reagan shows up at the bottom of the chute seconds later, suggesting he has his own chute nearby or an express elevator. It was lucky for him her escape route passed by his trapdoor anyway.The late Reagan is infamous for (among many other things!) being responsible for the closing of federally funded mental institutions, essentially kicking many patients out onto the streets. I wonder if this movie was trying to comment on that, in its own stupid way. The "Ronald Reagan Home for the Mentally Ill" in Airplane II may have been making a jab at the same thing. Anyway, a Reagan mask isn't really scary-looking. Even though it seems to be painted a solid color, suggesting the William Shatner mask in Halloween, it still looks like a caricature of Reagan, and thus, silly.The next day a young woman shows up at the facility to be a teacher. On the way she has a Psycho moment when a sunglasses-wearing cop (Vosloo, years before the Mummy!) finds her asleep in her car. At the institution, she has some odd hallucinations relating to people falling down the chute (which she's never seen) or being walled up behind bricks.And about those bricks - the killer walls people up behind a single row of red bricks which he does not appear to cement together. Even though he puts his prisoners in straitjackets, they could still simply push against the wall and have it fall down.Donald Pleasance has a character that is ridiculous and serves practically no purpose except to be weird. John Carradine shows up for all of about ten seconds. I understand in his later years people would film him doing something, before even having an idea of what to do with it, just so they could put him in their movie. Perhaps this fits in with that.Robert Vaughn looks, sounds, and dresses the same in this as in everything else I've seen him in. C'mon, an accent, some facial hair, and different haircut, do something to make your character superficially different! Or is it the director's fault?The movie is definitely not adapted directly from Poe. It suggests The Black Cat, The Premature Burial, The Fall of the House of Usher, The System of Doctor Tarr and Professor Fether among others, without really having much to do with any of them except superficially.

Fritz Langlois BURIED ALIVE was to be the last film made by John Carradine during his lifetime (the old actor would later come back from the grave to appear in a few more movies). Edgar Allan Poe's name is mentioned in the title, but don't believe the hype. For this is just another cheap horror exploitation flick (what more can you expect from producer Harry alan Towers, who churned out some of the worse movies ever?) Nevertheless, it's enjoyable enough if only for the performances. Robert Vaughn (TEENAGE CAVEMAN) plays the director of a school/madhouse. Donald Pleasance is once again typecast as one of its loony inhabitants. His French voice is not the same as in the HALLOWEEN series, but it's as much fun. And John Carradine appears shortly, wheelchair-bound, in what constitutes a fitting, if not flamboyant, last blast of weirdness. That's about all you get from an otherwise poor-looking film...