This movie has been getting good press in mags like "Fangoria" and "Rue Morgue." It can be rented at Blockbuster as one of their exclusives and is scheduled for a street release at the end of March. It is a low budget project, but one that's produced with a lot of class, wit, energy and a respect for the genre.It involves a couple of low-life, but likable Burke and Hare-type grave robbers named Grimes and Blake, and their misadventures supplying fresh corpses for a local doctor/mortician (Angus Scrimm). They unearth the usual rotten and not-so-rotten corpses, vampires, zombies and even an extraterrestrial (!), but their most dangerous adventure comes in the form of a sick, violent family of grave robbers who don't appreciate the competition: The House of Murphy. The daughter, who was burned beyond recognition, wears a mask identical to the burned daughter in the classic French film "Les Yeux sans Visage" ("Eyes Without a Face")-great touch! The son grinds up his victims' bones and uses the bone dust for snuff.
Overall, a fun, tongue-in-cheek movie with laughs and thrills that belies its low budget with a great script, excellent actors and above-average production values. Special features include several IFC trailers, including "I Sell the Dead." I would suggest using the subtitle feature as the accents are thick in some places. Highly recommended.
This is a film that's been getting a decent amount of buzz since a while before it came out. Needless to say, it never showed up on screens in the heartland, so I had to wait for it to appear on DVD before getting a chance to see it. Depressing, that, because I Sell the Dead delivers all the promise one expects from its stellar cast and then some. (Impressively, this is the third horror comedy to come down the pike in the past twelve months that's well worth your time, along with Pontypool and Dead Snow.)
I Sell the Dead opens with Arthur Blake (The Lord of the Rings' Dominic Monaghan) about to be hanged for the crimes of murder and grave-robbing. He spends the night before giving his confession to a priest (Hellboy's Ron Perlman), maintaining that he is entirely innocent of the murder, but that he and his longtime partner Willie Grimes (Session 9's Larry Fessenden) were the best in the grave-robbing business. We see Blake starting off as Grimes' apprentice, with the two of them working for the brutal Dr. Quint (Phantasm's Angus Scrimm), then striking out on their own, only to run afoul of the area's most notorious grave-robbers, the gang known as the House of Murphy. Things only get worse when they decide to take on another apprentice, the beautiful and willful Fanny Bryers (Exorcism: Driving Out the Devil's Brenda Cooney).
The script is fast-paced and witty, but it's the sight gags that really make this work. And I'm not talking about over-the-top Airplane-style sight gags, either; while McQuaid goes over the top a few times, it's the subtlety of the thing that makes this film as charming as it is. Well-written, genuinely funny, with excellent acting and a couple of twists at the end that actually work (as predictable as they are), I Sell the Dead is one of those horror movies you should show to your friends who don't think they like horror movies. They'll get a kick out of it, and so will you. ****
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I noticed this at my local Blockbuster. Brought it home without any real expectations, and was really very pleasantly surprised.The movie revolves around Arthur Blake, a graverobber who is about to be executed, and Ron Perlman, the monk who is interviewing Blake before his execution. Perlman wants to know how Blake got started in graverobbing, what his career was like, and what happened to Blake's worst rival. Blakes' tale involves the dead, vampires, zombies, and aliens. It is somewhat bloody, but laced with humor. Worth watching!
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Great cast, great idea and stylish.... but it was missing something. It was neat to look at, but I never really connected to it.There were a whole lot of good ideas, but not enough was done with them. The movie would have been better if it were longer to expand on the ideas or more focused. Most of Arthur's apprenticeship could have been cut for instance.
The horror wasn't particularly scary and the humor snicker worthy at best. Combined with the slow pacing, it's just too many strikes against the movie. It's a shame, because this movie has the cast and ingredients to be a genuine cult classic.
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A pair of grave robbers strike gold when they discover a wealth of undead corpses (including zombies, vampires, and other ghouls) buried in the local cemetery, bodies that earn them a fine reward from the seedy local doctors working under the guise of science. Their framed story is retold by Arthur Blake, the younger of the two thieves, who relays their adventures to a priest while awaiting the guillotine. Glenn McQuaid similarly strikes gold with this off-beat but highly original Horror Comedy, offering the same stunning cinematography and art design as the Hammer productions with a classic Gothic aesthetic. Fessenden and Monaghan make for a charmingly clever pair of down on their luck grave robbers, and they are joined by an equally talented and enjoyable cast of miscreants including the great Ron Perlman as the wayward priest. The production and design of the film could not have been improved, but I SELL THE DEAD falls just short of becoming a modern classic due to the uneven pacing brought on by its structure and format. As Blake begins each new tale, a great amount of time is spent setting up each new scenario and introducing new characters, which inevitably undermines the action, suspense, and horror. The fleshed out characters and plot are both appreciated, but not at the cost of a rushed payoff for each of the vignettes. McQuaid displays a tremendous amount of potential in this, his second film, and hopefully the open ending will allow for an even stronger sequel with the same sharp scripting and humor.-Carl Manes
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