Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Exoticalot People are voting emotionally.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

hrkepler '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 The film occasionally seems little campy and outdated, but these misty graveyards still work when watching alone after midnight.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.

mamalv I am not a big fan of horror movies, but watched this one because of the great Ray Milland. Since others have reviewed that Vincent Price would have been a better choice, I disagree completely. Milland gives a wonderful portrayal of a man living a nightmarish preoccupation with death. His father, he believes was buried alive, and he is afraid he will follow the same terrible fate. Milland still has the looks to be believable as the newly married man, with a younger woman so so in love with him, or is she? The movie may be somewhat like GASLIGHT, where Charles Boyer is slowly driving Ingrid Bergman insane. The dimly lit home the caverns beneath, and the foggy woods where the bodies are buried, are a cinematic wonder. They almost look dreamlike as I would suppose that Corman had in mind. This is certainly one of Corman's best, mostly because of Milland's performance.

Bill Slocum While most of Roger Corman's Edgar Allan Poe film adaptations employ little actual Poe, "Premature Burial" is more notable for something else that is missing: Vincent Price.Price's mordant wit and oddly effective plays for sympathy amid otherwise sinister turns made him essential in all the other Corman-Poe films. Here, the less sinister Ray Milland is cast against type but does even better, at least with one key scene, one he played before in a more famous movie.In "Dial M For Murder," Milland plays a man who plots out his wife's murder beforehand, explaining how cleverly he planned it all out to a shocked associate (as well as us the audience). In "Premature Burial," he lays out similar plans, this time for preventing a death - his own. Here, as rich layabout Guy Carrell, he explains to shocked wife Emily (Hazel Court) all the various ways he has mapped out for breaking free of his crypt should he be buried before he is actually dead, which happens to be his greatest fear.A rope ladder, a hidden panel, a bell, even "a recent invention by a Swedish chemist named Nobel" are among the accouterments Carrell places at his disposal to effect his escape. He even has amontillado (nice Poe touch) and some reading material to rest up with before busting out.Watching Milland explain all this, you relish as with "Dial M" the effective foresight his character has brought to bear. You also see, because of the tight way Milland controls his voice and the subtle way he works his eyes, that his character is teetering on the brink of madness. In at least this scene, "Premature Burial" makes a case for being a superior Corman-Poe vehicle, Price or no.The rest of the time, Price is missed.While an effectively moody thriller in the main, "Premature Burial" does suffer from some serious faults. For a Corman film, it's unusually slow-paced, with a morbid air that can't be helped due to the dark subject matter but begs for the kind of humor Price could have brought with a twitch of an eyebrow. I doubt even Vincent could have done much with some of Guy's groaner lines ("From the beginning, death has come to the Carrells like an assassin"), but they would have sound less awkward coming from him rather than the more stolid-seeming Milland.There are an excess of inartful "boo" moments used in place of real chills, employing a gravedigger, a corpse, even a hobby horse. A lot of scenes don't make much sense, especially when viewed again. Questions linger, like: Why is Guy looking on at the beginning upon what is later said to be a grave robbery? Why is Guy's sister so openly hostile to Emily? What happened to Guy's dog and cat after their scare scenes were over?It's not that "Premature Burial" doesn't try to answer at least some of the above queries, but the answers provided are convoluted.What's good about the movie outweighs the bad, though. I'd enjoy Hazel Court in anything, or nothing at all for that matter, and here you get all of that and a clever part besides. The moody EC-horror-comic-book vibe keeps the story involving even as the fog threatens to overtake the entire cast. Even a rather silly, sudden ending produces real chills, even if Milland by then appears more than a bit lost. At its best, "Premature Burial" connects with basic human fears while delivering a deliciously overwrought tale of Gothic suspense and revenge. But it is not always at its best.Just for delivering Milland's one scene in his magic crypt, "Premature Burial" is worth a viewing. You wish Price was there for the rest of the film, but for those 10 minutes Milland is as effective as Price ever was on a Corman-Poe project, and his hollow smile and sickly twinkle leave you with the kind of creepy feeling that lingers long after.

amosduncan_2000 "The Premature Burial" was Poe's only story with a happy ending, as the tormented narrator decides to write off "bugaboo tales, like this one," and stay on the sunny side. Might he have also said "no more mediocre movies?" Ray Milland made his great contribution to shlock movie culture with this hilariously grouchy performance in "Frogs," he does what he can here but it does tend to underline how important the presence of Vincent Price was to these Poe films. Poe's interesting tale ( the title phobia was already a horror cliché by the time he got to it) is turned into a rather overwrought revenge saga with too much phony smoke. Though Floyd "David's dad" Crosby does his usual excellent work. All in all it's an O.K. time if you like this sort of thing.