Original Film: I BURY THE LIVING (1958)
Remake: BLACK PINS OF DEATH
Tagline: Witness the bizarre coincidences that are happening at the Immortal Hills Cemetery.
Original Plot Synopsis:
Robert Kraft (Richard Boone) is the newly appointed chairman of a committee that oversees a colossal cemetery….the Immortal Hills cemetery; where prominent citizens have the opportunity to reserve their final resting places. The cemetery is so large that a map is kept in the cemetery office displaying the grounds and each grave site. Filled graves are marked by black pins and unoccupied but sold graves are marked with white pins. New to the position and unobservant, Kraft accidentally places a pair of black pins where they don't belong, only to discover later that the young couple who had bought the grave sites in question died in an automobile accident soon afterward. Under repeated tries, he finds that every time he places a black pin over an unoccupied grave, someone dies. This knowledge scares him, and yet some character is around to convince him to try it again to make sure. Thus he's caught up between his conscience and the fear he might be going insane. Kraft slips into deep guilt and depression and believes he is cursed, while the cemetery caretaker (Theodore Bikel in a heavy Scots accent) knows more than he's telling. Meanwhile, it then dawns on him that if he can kills people by sticking black pins into the map maybe he can bring them back by substituting white pins. In finale, Robert goes running through the cemetery and sees that all the recent graves have been opened and the bodies are gone. His plan worked! But is it too late?
Positive remarks of the original movie:
'I Bury the Living' is a good example of a 50s low budget genre movie. Though there was very limited budget for the film and few filming locations and no special effects whatsoever, but this was largely made up by the creepy atmosphere and well-written dialogues. The blackly humorous undertones are sublime and the monotonous camera-work adds a great deal to the tension. Overall, it was a uniquely dreamlike horror picture.
I Bury the Living is a psychological attack on the mind and the slow demise into despair and guilt.
Reasons behind the remake:
First of all, I need to clear that for a remake I didn’t like to go for a horror movie of those golden decades of cinema that already has a historical impact in the genre or has a strong fan base that even can’t bear the news like
“___ decides to remake ‘___’, one of the classic horror gems/all time great horror movies ever made!” and create a bad impression to the ardent horror fans in it’s very initial stage of filming.
So I was looking for a 50’s/60’s or 70’s horror film that has the following 2 qualities:
- An unusual but simple story which is also equally effective and interesting.
- An underrated (or not so infamous) horror gem that has the potential or opportunities to remake in a better way and finally can at least get a reasonable positive response from the original old school horror fans.
To me, I BURY THE LIVING is a that kind of film. Though you can argue that today this may suitable for a TV film or an episode of a horror TV series but the plot device of the movie was so unique and appealing that just for that reason alone this film deserves to be remade as a subtle intelligent horror film; where in these days we are getting fade up with the movies full of unnecessary violence and gore to create ‘Horror’ on the screen.
Alteration in the storyline for the remake (Contains SPOILER for the Original film):
We’ll try not to put any major changes till the end as the creepy atmosphere, compelling background score, strong characterization carries the original storyline quite nicely which was simple but very effective. Especially the nightmarish visions of Robert like how the plot map continually grows bigger and bigger and some of the weird montage/super-imposition sequences that happen. Another vital interesting thing was about the cemetery map, the more the camera focuses on the map, the more it starts to look like an abstract drawing of a face glaring out at the viewer…try to maintain the same quality in the remake.
But the scene where the police officer asks Robert to put a pin on the map to capture a fugitive criminal dead while he was hiding in another country...I think it’d better to delete this part as it sounds quite funny.
Now the most important part…the ending. Many viewers have expressed some disappointment with the ending of this film.
The ending has Robert trying to right his wrongs by "reversing the curse".
When he replaces the black pins with white, there are several close-ups on the graves of the deceased that clearly show the ground rising from underneath as if a corpse was rising.
Now from here the ‘remake’ will greatly differ from the ‘Original’.
According to an online source the “original script” of the of I BURY THE LIVING had an ending that shows Robert was to have locked himself in the caretakers shed which was suddenly surrounded by the walking corpses of all the people he had killed by sticking black pins into their grave markers. They do not attack but stand patiently outside calling for him to join them. Richard's grief is so great at having caused their deaths that he dies of a heart attack. But that ISN'T the way it ended, rather it shows the caretaker…Andy McKee was the main culprit who killed the dead ones actually.
So at the ending of the remake I like to go with that ‘original script’ but definitely with some alteration like after finding the graves opened and absence of his victim’s corpses Robert will return to the office and locked himself inside by shutting down the windows and the front door under a massive fear of confronting with ‘them’; as if the white pins are also proving to work reverse. Then he’ll first hear some footsteps outside as if they are coming towards the office and after a while it’ll be like ‘they’ are trying to coming inside by breaking through the windows and the door. Here will be some close up plus long shot scenes of Robert (with the map behind him in the wall) which will be shot in a way that can portray an attack on his mind and the slow his demise into despair and guilt that eventually result in death by a heart attack. I don’t like to show the corpses outside the room in a zombie style as I have no intention at all to turn this supernatural as well as psychological thrill ride into a zombie flick at the end.
After the death when Robert’s body is lying on the floor the camera will be focus from the up to his body and remain same there but after while the morning comes and more or less every other important characters will be shown in the room around Robert’s dead body and trying to figure out what was happened there last night? The Doctor declared it was a heart attack and the caretaker, Andy tells that he was knocked several times at the doors & windows to call Mr. Robert but he didn’t answer, Andy thought that perhaps he already left the office. But later when others (his girlfriend-Ann and the priest-Jess) came in the morning & looking for him as he didn’t returned home last night then they breakdown the door and find him dead and called Lt. Clayborne (the police).
The movie will end when Jess (the priest) see a black pin that has already pinned into the map just at the Robert’s preserved place of grave and when he showed that to the others then Andy McKee..the caretaker who is trying to put the map on the wall (it was lying on the floor as if somehow it felled down) will reply (something like this) “perhaps Mr. Robert… himself… put that there…to finally prove the things that he was saying about the pins and the map!”
Mainly the ending will be left for the viewers judgment, like whether the things that happened last night with Ribert were real or just a series of Robert’s mental breakdown or insanity that caused his death!?! This will remain mystery.
(continue...)