BURIED ALIVE

(A.k.a. UNTITLED MONTERASTELLI PROJECT)

Rene (Leah Rachel) is enjoying an afternoon soak in the bath when she's interrupted by the unexpected arrival of her cousin Zane (Terence Jay, LIVING HELL). Their flirtatious dialogue divulges an undeniable attraction - and possible history - shared between the two. She closes her eyes and moves in for a kiss from Zane, but the mood is killed when he pushes her away and attempts to drown her in the tub.

Fortunately for Rene, the above was nothing more than a bad dream. When she wakes, her boyfriend Danny (Steve Sandvoss, KISS THE BRIDE) is there ready to roger her in the bath.

Meanwhile Zane is busy with computer nerd Phil (Germaine De Leon, RICHARD III). Zane's great-grandfather is said to have buried his wife alive along with a horde of gold many years ago, and Zane's befriended Phil in the hope that the geek will use his online searching skills to drum up enough clues as to the whereabouts of said treasure.

Great-grandfather's old house in the sticks seems like a good place to start looking. Especially as it still stands empty, overseen by cranky caretaker Lester (Tobin Bell, SAW) and used as a summer getaway by surviving family members. Zane and Phil set off on their journey to the house, picking up Rene and Danny along the way. Danny is quick to notice an unsettling connection between his girlfriend and her cousin …

Rene believes they are spending the weekend at the house as part of an initiation process she wants to inflict on a couple of brain-dead newbie co-eds they also pick up on the way - Julie (Lindsey Scott) and Laura (Erin Lokitz, CIRCLE) - who desperately want to be part of her sorority.

Once at the remote house, creepy Lester reluctantly agrees to let the pill-popping sextet stay - as long as they keep away from the family goldmine as "there's some critters down there".

As the kids settle in to the crusty old building (smoking pot, bickering, a bit of rumpy pumpy), we learn that there are no landlines for miles, they can't get signals on their mobile telephones and the generator is extremely temperamental - yes, I'm also amazed how so many places in America seem to suffer from these problems!

As Phil chats to joker Zane throughout the evening, Rene - in-between concocting humiliating chores for her co-eds to endure, most of which involve stripping to some degree - becomes increasingly aware that he appears to know an awful lot about her family's history. Phil confesses that Zane has had him researching their ancestors' lives in a bid to track down the gold. Phil reveals how his investigations have uncovered a family curse where descendants of the great-grandfather have met violent deaths, ever since his first wife was buried alive.

The drunken youths scoff at this revelation, choosing to continue their bawdy games undeterred. But then the axe murders commence … Could the killer really be the mistreated wife, returned from beyond the grave to wreak vengeance upon the relatives of her murderer, while protecting her gold in the process?

BURIED ALIVE is an attractive looking but terminally clichéd hatchet job from Robert Kurtzman (WISHMASTER) that makes it difficult to care what the answer to the above question may be.

The colourful photography is reasonably fetching, offering a polished sheen to the cheap visuals that suggests the film has been shot on HD Video. With professional editing also evident, the look is slick and completely anodyne - eschewing any sense of rawness that once made such low budget horror films feel "unsafe".

The script is lifeless while the plot itself, as you can no doubt see, is cripplingly derivative. There are no surprises here; save for the fact that Zane's drug-guzzling, unscrupulous and manipulative character ultimately emerges as the most likeable. Rene, I feel, is meant to be the one the audience can empathise with - but in truth she's such a cunt that it's impossible not to wish her dead. Julie and Laura are simply irritating eye candy who share a penchant for saying "Eww" a lot in thick American accents. Phil's sole gimmick is that he repeats the last word of each sentence he mumbles, while Danny is duller than a weekend in Whitby. Bell meanwhile is underused as Lester, although he overacts wildly (like, ridiculously) whenever he is on screen.

Which leaves the film's content to hopefully elevate it above its lack of originality, irksome characters and adequate yet sedate aesthetics.

Well, there's a fair amount of gore and nudity on offer. We get the usual bunch of annoying teens all keen to show off their curiously unappealing toned, tanned torsos. And there's a reasonable selection of decently executed but harmless quick-edit gore scenes peppered throughout the film's second half (the first forty minutes are devoid of anything approaching horror).

Some may be interested in the soundtrack, which comprises of commercial rock songs (including a track by Mushroomhead). It adds to the feeling that you're watching a pretty but hollow MTV production. An hour into the film, one of the songs contains the lyric "Has anybody here had enough?".

My answer to the above was "yes", but in fairness it was (almost) worth sticking this out for an admittedly eerie finale.

The screener disc viewed offered no extras or menus (I noticed though that the film did have remote access via 16 chapters).

The film was presented in a very nice looking 1.78:1 transfer that was enhanced for 16x9 TV sets. The English 2.0 audio was equally reliable, with optional English subtitles for the hard of hearing.

The only additional material on the screener disc were forced trailers at the start for CATACOMBS, SAW 4 and THE HAMILTONS.

BURIED ALIVE is not scary. It's not remotely inventive, nor is it particularly bloody. But if you think a couple of pert young women occasionally getting their bunnies out, and the sight of Tobin Bell pretty much confirming that outside of the SAW franchise this man does not merit employment in the film industry, is enough to recommend a film … then this is the film for you.

Review by Stuart Willis