Maidgethma Wonderfully offbeat film!

KnotMissPriceless Why so much hype?

EssenceStory Well Deserved Praise

Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

udar55 Janet (Karen Witter) is the new biology teacher at Ravenscroft, a school for troubled young girls (including former porn star Ginger Lynn Allen and debuting Nia Long) run by Gary (Robert Vaughn). This odd, isolated place seems to bring out the worst in Janet as she keeps having hallucinations about hordes of ants, a pulsating brick wall, and a arm that keeps grabbing her. Staff quack Dr. Schaeffer (Donald Pleasence) tells her she just might be seeing different layers of reality (!?!). To make matters worse, the student population keeps dwindling as girls are offed by some guy in a mask. You know you are in for some true class when the opening credits misspell Poe's name (as "Edgar Allen Poe"). Another of Towers' South African lensed Poe "adaptations," this has about as much to do with his short story "Buried Alive" as Fred Olen Ray's THE HAUNTING FEAR does. I'd probably rate this one above USHER just because director Gerard Kikoine (EDGE OF SANITY) manages to pull off some interesting camera moves. He isn't concerned with such trickery in terms of plot though as the villain is exactly who you think it is. Oddly enough, the T&A factor is limited to one scene and former X-rated queen Ginger Lynn does not get nude. Arnold Vosloo and Bill Butler have small supporting roles. John Carradine has 30 seconds of screen time and this was to be his last film. The end credits dedicate it to his memory. Poor John.

djderka Come on folks, this is a really good B type thriller.If you don't like seeing the teacher Janet (Karen Witter, former playboy gal) in sexy professional outfits being chased by the evil doctor (Vaughn) through the dark basement, you need to pop a Viagra pill.I enjoyed seeing the girl school atmosphere and the hot, saucy, petulant chicks trying to get "reformed".Sure there are some faults, like the brick wall, undeveloped love interest with the cop. more mayhem, more nudity, etc.But as a fun movie with some popcorn and beer. it can't be beat. I will gladly buy this for a couple of bucks, if I could find it. It seems to be one of the later or last films of the director's career.Can't believe this genre isn't made again and again.Plot: hot chicks in various sexy outfits in a girls school are menaced by the evilcontrollers of the reform school. Ya' got the green light on this one.

Vomitron_G Pheeeew.... An Edgar Allan Poe story in some sort of slasher format...? A concept like this only could have been thought up during the late 80's...The movie does try but fails to convince because the script offers no surprises whatsoever. It's basically an average horror effort where angry women in a reform school meet their demise at the hands of a mad psychiatrist and his insane curing methods.It's not impossible to sit through, mainly because of the mildly entertaining death-scenes and it does have a certain style to it. In my opinion, you can tell this was directed by a Frenchman (Gérard Kikoïne), because his way of mise-en-scène at moments is just a bit more imaginative than your run-of-the-mill slasher/horror director from the 80's. At times he chooses quite original angles and camera movements to portray the events (unusual framing, profile close-ups of the actors with action going on in the background, inventive travels & crane-shots,...). But like I said, the story is extremely predictable and lacks suspense, and that's what basically kills the movie.The acting was overall acceptable (though the angry woman did get a bit on my nerves after a while - thankfully there was a group shower scene!), and Donald Pleasance, again, provides a very weird role. He's completely wasted on this movie, has almost nothing to do but it was fun seeing him play another out-of-place weirdo (who's also a notable member of the school's staff, by the way, wears a fake toupée and has some sort of German accent). For some reason you can often see him munching on stuff - I couldn't quite make out if it were peanuts or ants...An added value could come from Robert Vaughn, leading the cast as the mad psychiatrist, and John Carradine (in nothing more but a cameo). The climactic scene near the end (in which they're both featured) was somewhat amusing. But leading girl Karen Witter, although sweet eye-candy, wasn't really capable of carrying the film, as her performance came off as too generic to me. I did chuckle when I spotted a young Arnold Vosloo in a supporting role. All this made me enjoy the movie a bit more than I should have. And you can add a nonsensical frozen surprise-shot at the end to the mix.A rather weird film. Incompetent too. But as far as raping Edgar Allan Poe goes, they did a good job.

dbdumonteil They've got a lot of nerve to call that "Edgar Allan Poe's buried alive".It does not look like the writer's works to the slightest extent -unless the presence of a black cat counts-Located in a luxury reform school for girls (?) ,this piece of garbage casts Robert Vaughn as the director and D.PLeasance as a doctor(?)A young female teacher arrives:she is to teach here-but we never see her working or so little.In the basements ,a man with a Ronald Reagan mask(??) is burying alive the girls who try to escape.This is a completely failed horror film,borrowing now from"shining",now from Dario Argento's "suspiria" and "phenomena".This is a cock-and -bull story with the obligatory final trick:it's not over when you think it is,now roll on "Buried alive 2" :but the movie,proving that sometimes there's justice in the universe ,was a flop,preserving the spectators from it.It's the movie scenarists that should be buried alive.