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In the Summer of 1998, I bought a fuzzy VHS copy of an Italian zombie movie from an obscure video shop in Manhattan for $30.00. I had read a lot about this movie.....that it was proposed as the unofficial sequel to Lucio Fulci’s Zombie and that the same effects man, Gianetto de Rossi, created the zombie makeup. I also read that there were several key elements to this Italian zombie movie – there was a crude mastectomy at the hands of a zombie, several disembowelments and that the dead are awakened because the living characters tread on the wrong ground.
The movie that I’m writing about is Burial Ground (aka Nights of Terror; Zombie 3). This movie was made amidst the Italian zombie/cannibal cycle that began in the 1970’s and wrapped up around 1983. Lots of sauce and bad acting went into the making of this film.....
The story begins with Doctor Ehrs, an archeologist, who stumbles across an ancient Etruscan secret to life beyond death. He is staying at a wealthy friend’s mansion near the burial site. On the eve of a get-together at the estate, the Doctor enters the tomb of the evil Etruscan monks and begins to snoop around. He is greeted by a pair of hideously decayed zombies who proceed to take some bites out of him (one of these zombies' makeup design resembles Kane Hodder's makeup design in the seventh Friday the 13th film).
After the main credits, the rest of the bunch arrive, ready to indulge in some drinking and wild sex. The zombies leave their tomb, searching for the flesh of the unsuspecting partiers.
After lots of running around by the cast, the zombies get fed. Some of the characters do get to kill off some zombies, classic-style (destroying the heads/brains via shotguns and machetes). However, it seems that the zombies are far more intelligent. I’ve never before seen a movie where zombies fashion a battering-ram to gain entrance to the front doors of a mansion. Some zombies even decide to take to the outer-walls of the mansion, climbing to the windows on the second floor. But when all is said and done, the beginning and end of this movie are merely held together with a bunch of gore sequences (most of them decently pulled off).
The most interesting part of this film is the fact that one of the characters has a 13-year-old son who is sexually obsessed with his mother. Throughout the movie, the boy (who is played by an eerie, short, bug-eyed 35-year-old) spies on his mother having sex and actually, at one point, tries to make out with his mother, putting his hands in places other than where they should be! After being slapped, he runs away yelling “what’s wrong!?! I’m your son!” Other bits of ridiculous dialogue include when one of the guests puts on some lingerie for her husband. He puts his arms around her and says “you look just like a little whore……but I like that!”
The makeup effects are exactly what you’d expect of an Italian zombie production. However, it seems that the budget was lower than Fulci’s Zombie (for the makeup effects, that is), because you can see the facial features of the actors under the zombie makeup.
This film was available in the U.S. from Vestron Video under the title Burial Ground. It was a full-frame print and can still be found on video store rental shelves. I had gotten a hold of a dub of the widescreen Japanese release, which features distracting Japanese subtitles. As with most Japanese prints of films of these types, the picture is very dark with washed-out colors. With this new DVD release by Media Blasters through their Shriek Show series, the image is bright and colorful. The reds stand out in a way that the viewer is assaulted by the scenes of disembowelment and gut-munching. However, the image is a bit TOO bright, causing the blacks to appear a dark gray. It also seems that the anamorphic enhancement is underscanned because there is a thin strip of gray at the top and bottom of the image (where the anamorphic bars end and the image begins).
The Dolby Digital 2.0 mono sound is fine, although it seems that the treble levels in the dialogue track are a bit low. This is probably due to the source material and the low budget and not the mastering done by Media Blasters.
The extras include interviews with Gabriele Cristanti and Mariangela Giordano. These interviews are pretty dull and could have been combined, including some clips from the movie interspersed between the interview clips in the same fashion as an Anchor Bay or Blue Underground featurette. The International trailer is included, and pretty much tells the story. It would have been nice for Media Blasters to include the domestic trailer for this release, however. It seems to be a trend amongst domestic DVD releases of films of this type that the International trailers are used and the U.S. trailers are absent (ex. Phenomena (as Creepers), Demons, Hell of the Living Dead (as Night of the Zombies), City of the Living Dead (as Gates of Hell), etc.). I feel that these trailers are important for the viewer to understand the way these films were handled and advertised in this country. The contrast between the International trailers (with the absence of narration) and the exploitative, U.S. trailers (with narration by either Adolf Caesar or Roskko; with catchy or even tasteless taglines, etc.) would be interesting to find on a DVD. There is a three-minute still and art gallery, displaying mostly theatrical posters, publicity stills and video/DVD box cover art (where did they get that Vestron release that included a mini-shovel?!?!). Trailers for other Media Blasters releases are also included (House by the Edge of the Park, Eaten Alive, Spasmo and Zombi Holocaust).
This was a long-awaited release and is a very welcome disc in my collection. I find myself more often than not reaching for this title. Although the extras could have included more material, the transfer and title of this release is well worth the money. Eat up, kiddies…..