Buried Alive is a gruesome film. I can't understand how an executioner is put in the role as hero. Some one who makes their living as the person who pulls the switch and elecutes men is someone who generates serious karma. yet, we have this person looking like an Everyday Joe who is seen as sympathetic. I assume the film is an indictment of the death penalty, but did the producers have to make evil seem so relative?
Live Long and Prosper!
i don't know. he was far from sympathetic to me. i thought he was the most grating character in the film. every other line he was spouting self pity, which got johnny into the whole mess. i don't think it was a matter of evil being relative. prison and capital punishment was a fact. someone had to pull the switch, and i really doubt that it would have been a sadist who got off on it. the executioner suffered his healthy share of ghosts and doubt, unlike the reporter who played with men's life as if it was a game.
share"i don't know. he was far from sympathetic to me. i thought he was the most grating character in the film. every other line he was spouting self pity, which got johnny into the whole mess. i don't think it was a matter of evil being relative. prison and capital punishment was a fact. someone had to pull the switch, and i really doubt that it would have been a sadist who got off on it. the executioner suffered his healthy share of ghosts and doubt, unlike the reporter who played with men's life as if it was a game."
Perhaps. But I think the writers could have gotten the point across that the death penalty is wrong with out humanizing the executioners. I just did not want to know these executioners were emotionally conflicted. Why cchoose that line of work?
Live Long and Prosper!
Even the nurse admitted she didn't know why she was working in the prison. Why should the executioner? It's existential... Oooohooooohooo.
shareAlso, I think it's important to, above all else, humanize humans. Otherwise they're just humus.
share"Even the nurse admitted she didn't know why she was working in the prison. Why should the executioner? It's existential... Oooohooooohooo. Also, I think it's important to, above all else, humanize humans. Otherwise they're just humus. "--Jabbapop
I see this movie has deeply affected you. That's a good thing. Older films should not be discarded as outdated, but enjoyed and studied by new generations of audiences.
Yes, of course we're all humans with human flaws. I just find any kind of vocation where one is confronted with death and dying gruesome.
Live Long and Prosper!
Haha this movie has deeply infected me. I should see a doctor before I have to amputate.
There were a lot of things in this movie that were goofy. Like when the barfight breaks out and the camera goes to closeup of the bartender as he complains "Hey you guys can't do that in here!" and stands back and does nothing, tacitly approving the violence. Or when the executioner character, after downing six plus shots of liquor in rapid fire, takes the wheel from Johnny and drives off plastered drunk to the hospital. Or how all these smart men treat the nurse as a trophy of sexual conquest simply because she's the female they come in contact with at the workplace, and we're supposed to accept this as a melodramatic plot point and stand on our toes in giddy anticipation of who wins out. Even the resolution of Johnny's fate was malarky: he manages to evade death because his pals pull a prank on one of the prisoners. The whole movie was cheezy and ludicrous, but certainly entertaining; totally a B+ movie. The scene where the big dumb brute character straight out of Of Mice and Men makes his macho show and is subsequently deflated as the pathetic phrase about squeezing the life out of the guard's neck had me in stitches. If this movie were made today, the socio-political and media "awareness/commentary" would give it the frillings of pastiche, which makes me wonder about its reception upon release: did moviegoers of the time actually view this as "serious" prison critcism?
"If this movie were made today, the socio-political and media "awareness/commentary" would give it the frillings of pastiche, which makes me wonder about its reception upon release: did moviegoers of the time actually view this as "serious" prison criticism?"---Jabbapop
Many good points. Yes, I think movie goers did. They were a lot less sophisticated than later generations of movie goers. Films made today will be campy and laughable to later generations as acting and writing techniques evolve and change. It's just a matter of time.
Live Long and Prosper!