Halloween Classics X, Marauder's Map

It was a dark and stormy day ... wait I've done this joke before (I use the term loosely), never mind. Hello boils and ghouls I'm back for another Halloween Classic. So yeah I'm a day late, but real talk: I think we should just be pleasantly surprised I'm writing anything at all right? I mean I had a mountain of internet dust and digital cobwebs to clean off to even get into the editor ... all the more fitting to tell you about the latest classic scary movie I just watched. Coming at you from 1958 is Albert Band's "I Bury the Living."

Poster and movie nothing alike? Check.

"I Bury the Living" is basically a long episode of the Twilight Zone that wusses out on the ending. Stop me if you've heard this one, but this guy Robert Kraft, inventor of easy mac (Not really, he's like a department store owner or something), has been nominated to be the chairman over some cemetery. He isn't too thrilled about this, and I can't blame him, bullshit service is the worst part of my job too. But his boss/uncle insists, bullshit service is what makes the Krafts such grand businessmen he says (And here I thought it was the invention of fake powder cheese). So Robert begrudgingly accepts the position which basically involves signing paperwork and changing out the pins on a big ass map.

Let's talk about those pins, white pins are put into the map for people who have bought plots and are replaced with black pins when the person dies and the plot is literally filled. Seems simple enough, except our boy Robert accidentally puts black pins in for a young couple that just bought some plots. It was his first day, what else can be said. This being a horror movie, you can probably guess what happens next, the young couple dies and Robert gets this eerie feeling that he may have marked them for death with those pins. So on a lark, he switches out a white pin with a black one at random, just to see. Unfortunately, that person also dies, and from here Robert's friends try to convince him it's all in his head, all the while the body count rises and he falls deeper into depression and becomes obsessed with the power of the map ... or the power of himself, he isn't sure which it is.

This is all executed very well, aside from some corny dialogue, and at any moment I expected the camera to pan over to Rod Serling nonchalantly smoking his cigarette and talking about a "Little cemetery adjacent to ... the Twilight Zone." It's hard to think of a better compliment really, that it reminded me of the Twilight Zone, though that may also be it's biggest failing (In my head at least). Don't get me wrong, this is a nicely put together movie, it seemed to have zero budget and actually benefited from it. It used cinematography to accomplish what it couldn't with special effects. I found the lighting to be especially interesting, there are scenes where Robert succumbs to his madness and the whole room is dark except for his starkly lit face. I especially loved at the end when the map becomes this giant brightly lit monstrosity, taking up the whole room. Intriguing that such a dark force was lit so brightly ... but it worked, completely overpowering the room and Robert as well.

My biggest complaint comes from the ending, it built up to such an awesome conclusion, hinting at a twist I didn't think it could pull off ... and then it didn't. It took the intrigue it built up at the end and just let it simper off into a sad "let's wrap up everything in some neat way" that felt forced and completely unfun compared to what came before. I'm willing to admit that this could be all me though. The Twilight Zone is known for it's amazing twist endings, the ones that stick with you forever you know? Nothing beats the last man on Earth having his glasses break at the end, nothing. So perhaps I was dooming this little B-movie to not meet my expectations the second I thought "Oh man this feels like the Twilight Zone." But at the same time, once you go there, you might as well go all the way, you know?

I had an odd thought near the end of "I Bury the Living," as much as I'm opposed to remakes, I would love to see one of this starring Clive Owen and directed by one of those crazy auteur type directors named David (Y'know like Lynch or Cronenberg). Keep it in black and white and just go ape shit at the end, hear that? That's a remake I'd love to see, and the most expensive part would be Clive Owen, hear that Hollywood? Eh never mind, you'd just fuck it up anyway.

I think it could work.

So did I like "I Bury the Living?" Absolutely, even though I was let down by the ending, I still found a lot of the scenes near the end to be wonderfully shot, and as a whole it was just a fun movie to watch. It's certainly not something I'd say is a classic in the "Universal" sense of the world, but come on, it has an evil map that kills people, what more could you want in a movie? And seriously, if you're a student of film you should at least watch the ending to see how badass they made that map with just lighting, no fooling.

Cheers party people.