I Bury the Living (1958)

Directed by Albert Band; produced by Albert Band and Louis Garfinkle

A businessman (Richard Boone), as part of his duties as chairman of a cemetery company, must put in a token few hours a month at the graveyard. The caretaker (Theodore Bikel), about to retire, finds that it is a peaceful place, and Boone, for his part, has little to do. Included in that little, however, is updating the cemetery map: replacing white pins, representing burial plots purchased but not yet filled, with black pins, symbolising someone’s imminent interment. Inadvertently, he finds that when he accidentally places a black pin instead of a white, someone dies. When it happens several times, Boone knows something is terribly amiss.

This is one of those very near misses that makes one hang one’s head at lost opportunities. The majority of the movie is very good. What I enjoyed particularly was the intelligence of Boone’s character. When he realises that he may have an influence on mortality, he tries to plumb the problem, telling his friends and associates about it, and even risking ridicule to talk to the police. This is something rarely seen in thrillers of this sort, in which stupidity is the usual quality in characters. The supporting characters are likewise smart. They try to dissuade Boone’s belief and, when confronted with growing evidence, all do not continue to reject possibilities.

Needless to write, if the acting were not competent, such characterisations would be for naught. Fortunately, the performances are uniformly good, mostly by unknown actors (it’s the horde of minor players in Hollywood that often makes a movie memorable.)

The direction is good, and the writing also more than capable. The atmosphere, building slowly, gives a feeling of growing dread to the situation.

It is the story’s resolution which causes the whole edifice to collapse. The tale was well on its way to becoming much more than a superior Twilight Zone episode (that series was, of course, almost always of high quality), and there is a point at which Boone has a realisation about the potential of his power that may have thrown the movie in a new and intriguing direction. Instead, that point is used as a break with everything good that came before, and drops it to the nature of the mundane. The explanation of the deaths, and Boone’s influence over them, is nonsensical. Indeed, the very nature of some of the deaths makes the explanation unreasonable.

Alas, I Bury the Living was only three quarters of an excellent film. It is a rarity, a film that would benefit from a re-make, and - something I usually detest - a little fiddling with the original script.