Watch The Premature Burial For Free

the audience applauded

Excellent but underrated film

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

'The Premature Burial' was the third film in Roger Corman's series of eight Edgar Allan Poe themed movies. Unlike 'House of Usher' and 'The Pit and the Pendulum' this one stars Ray Milland instead of Vincent Price because Corman went to produce that film without AIP who had exclusive contract with Price. Compared to Price, Milland's performance is less manically intense, but rather subtle with playing around with character's inner demons and sufferings. The film occasionally seems little campy and outdated, but these misty graveyards still work when watching alone after midnight. Although the film's story is little different from Poe's original by the same title, the film is quite well put together and surprises us with a little (perhaps, over dramatic) twist at the end. Nonetheless, 'The Premature Burial' is nicely creepy tale about paranoid obsession and living on the verge of madness.Recommended for Gothic horror/mystery fans.

I am a big fan of Roger Corman's work, even some of the schlock you find in those bargain bin collections that are, now, public domain. I think that the man was exceptional at doing a lot with nothing. That fact that his low-rent films are still remembered, while so many others are lost to the sands of time, show that he was doing something right. That something was that he really understands story and how to make a riveting movie.I had, until now, seen all of Corman's "Poe Cycle" with the exception of this film, the anomaly in the group. Corman was in a dispute with AIP, who had produced his previous two Poe films and tried to create one without them. Since AIP owned the rights to Corman's muse, Vincent Price, he went with Ray Milland in the main role. Milland is best known to horror fans for THE UNINVITED and another Corman classic, X: THE MAN WITH THE X-RAY EYES, though his most famous role may be in Hitchcock's DIAL M FOR MURDER.As with most of the movies in this cycle, the Poe short story is not enough material to fill out a 90 minute movie, so Corman has to pad the proceedings with other material. Most of this movie is a "parlor film" much like the classic Gothic movies (a la Dracula), meaning that a great deal of the action takes place in the same few rooms, with minimal camera work and movement, but focusing on our actors and their lines, sort of a play on film. That can be disastrous in the wrong hands, but the acting here is what makes it work so well. Milland is fantastic, as usual. He plays a man whose father may (or may not) have been buried alive. His fear of repeating his father's fate is propelled by an incident at the beginning of the movie, where Milland's doctor robs a grave, only to witness a clear example of another man buried alive. As the movie goes on, the viewer is never sure if Milland is just plain crazy, or if anything has real grounding in reality. He builds an elaborate vault with a dozen escape routes to prevent his burial and his obsession begins to tear apart his marriage to AIP beauty Hazel Court. Milland is the main reason all of this works. He never feels "hokey" even in the most bizarre circumstances and evinces a clear sense of investment from the audience as they share his fear.In the end, we find that what Milland really had to fear was much more mundane, as we get more of a "whodunit" plot in the final act that is, also, played out with tight film making until our exciting finale. Corman's eye for Gothic detail is on full display here. Even though most of the movie takes place in a few rooms, they add to the sense of constriction. The dungeon laboratory is a great scene, full of cobwebs and vaults. There is so much fog in this movie, you feel the dampness coming through the screen. The most feels far more "epic" than the limited scenery would warrant.It's not the best of the Corman/ Poe Cycle, for that check out MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH or PIT AND THE PENDULUM, but it is certainly a great example of Gothic 60s horror and well worth a watch.

Solid, well crafted entry in producer / director Roger Corman's cycle of Edgar Allan Poe adaptations that's an effective exercise in psychological horror as well as more traditional kinds of horror (such as we see in the nightmare sequence, for example). It shows just how badly one's life can be affected by an unhealthy obsession.Corman initially tried to get Vincent Price for the lead, needing to switch to Ray Milland instead. While the casting of Milland may have seemed odd at the time, the esteemed, Oscar winning actor would go on to make appearances in other genre and schlock movies in the future. Milland offers a mostly understated performance as the tormented Guy Carrell, medical student and painter who can't get his supposed legacy and phobia of being entombed alive out of his mind. Meanwhile, good friend Miles (Richard Ney), new wife Emily (beautiful genre vixen Hazel Court), and sister Kate (Heather Angel) grow increasingly concerned over his behaviour.Working with his consistently reliable production design / cinematography team of Daniel Haller and Floyd Crosby, Corman is able to create very effective atmosphere for the production, and the 2.35:1 aspect ratio allows him to pack the frame with detail, and he also continues the practise of creating depth to the images. The music by the great Ronald Stein would be enjoyable enough on its own, but it's supplemented by the repeated refrain of the "Molly Malone" melody, whether it's whistled or played on the piano.Milland does some delicious work here, particularly in the sequence where Guy is showing Emily and Miles all the safeguards he's put in place in case of his being "buried alive". The excellent cast also includes Alan Napier as Emily's doctor father (who utters one of the best lines, "I never enjoy myself, I merely experience greater and lesser amounts of tedium."), and John Dierkes & Corman regular Dick Miller as the unsavoury grave diggers.The script by Charles Beaumont and Ray Russell has a very literate quality, and Milland gives his dialogue all of the gravitas that he can muster.While this wouldn't rank among the best of Corman's Poe series (that honour would have to go to "House of Usher" and "The Masque of the Red Death"), it's still very respectable and fun viewing for classic horror fans.Seven out of 10.

"The Premature Burial" is not a bad movie. It's got a very sumptuous look, good performances from Ray Milland and Hazel Court, solid cinematography by Floyd Crosby, and strong, atmospheric direction by Roger Corman. But it still may not satisfy and I think I know why. It's because, by the time this movie came out, Corman's Poe adaptations had fallen into a predictable rut. The combination of morbid insanity, betrayal, and psychological trauma that was innovative and daring in "House of Usher" and "Pit and the Pendulum" had gotten clichéd. Ray Milland's Guy Carrell is a very close twin to Vincent Price's Don Nicholas Medina - even their childhood trauma is the same. No matter how much atmosphere, fog, set direction, musical stings and acting juice that Corman injects into this movie, it has a hard time overcoming that almost-fatal flaw. Having said that, I still like this movie. Some have said that Ray Milland is miscast - he is, if you think of his age, but if you insist on viewing it in those terms, so would Vincent Price have been. He does bring great acting talent to the table, and carries the role well. Hazel Court, as his paramour, never looked lovelier or behaved more despicably. The dream sequence is actually quite unsettling and disturbing, with the swirling mist and gel lighting. It's still nice to see such a pristine presentation of this movie. The DVD is just gorgeous, with absolutely no wear visible. There's no commentary from Corman (shame, MGM!) - instead, all we get is a very short interview with him. Not the best of the Poe movies, but still a good example of old school, American-made Gothic horror.