In tandem with publisher Midnight Media Paul Brown, Nigel Burrell has been delivering Euro cult movie thesis and zines to the hungry masses for over a decade. As the editor of Midnight Media's IS IT UNCUT? Burrell and his team go to every length to find the most complete versions of European genre cinema on dvd and other formats. Always insightful, but never forgetting his fan roots, I recently spoke to Mr. Burrell twice in as many months. The first portion of this interview is about, you guessed it, LET SLEEPING CORPSES LIE, while the latter half is the largely unpublished portion of a conversion I had with Nigel for my article on Eurocult cinema and the International DVD market. More of this particular interview can be found at my blog, Gli Attore.
For more information about Mr. Burrell's work please see the Midnight Media links at the bottom of the page. I'd like to say thanks again to Nigel for fitting me into his busy schedule and I can't wait to get my mitts on the Giallo Scrapbook #2.
Besides seeing a beautifully bewhiskered Ray Lovelock, my need to see Let Sleeping Corpses Lie was fuelled by Nigel's Midnight Media treastise. Nigel offers his opinion of the film a decade after writing his ode to Grau's undead fest. "Well, my gut level responses have remained the same," he says, "but the plot holes have rankled a bit more on a recent viewing! I still love it, but perhaps some of my affection is born from nostalgia for the 'Video Nasty' days and the legend that had sprung up about the film's uncut version."
Talk turns to the scariest moment in the film, for me, it's Gutherie's entrance but Burrell's choice, is definitely as creepy. "Oh, definitely the scene in the church crypt where the bodies reanimate in their coffins... There's something really bone-chilling in that imagery, it's scarier than any gore scene could ever be!"
One of the things I loved in Nigel's look at the film was his spot on point about the youth vs. elder subplot. I see it as something that still exists. Nigel agrees. "It's a perennial theme, right? Though of course the protagonists are not 'teens' as they would have been in the 50s schlock horror drive-in flicks, or in today's teen-orientated Hollywood Horror offerings, but rather in their late 20s," Burrell explains. "They are also very much of their times, with a hang-over of late Sixties anti-establishment attitudes seen particularly strongly in the character of George (Edna is the opposite to him really, an 'innocent' or 'normal' person). It's natural for any audience - even nowadays - to side with George and Edna against the offensive figure of Kennedy's dictatorial copper."
For someone as well versed in this film as Nigel, I asked what different versions there are and if they added anything to the film. "I like the pre-credits sequence best in the version that appeared on UK VHS. I've seen French and Italian videos, I guess that in the Italian version the (native) cast dubbed their own Italian lines. Of course in the foreign versions you lose the regional accents that make the UK print so distinctive. However, some of the accents are ludicrously out of place for the area of the British Isles where the film's action is located!" He notes of the infamously overdone brit accents. "The Spanish print cut out the streaker crossing the road at the beginning! Franco's fascist regime wouldn't tolerate such 'shocking' and immoral imagery."
Speaking of the UK, as a Briton how does Nigel feel the film represents the UK, if at all. "Actually, it represents very little of what UK life was like in 1974, but a good deal more of what life was like in Franco's Spain!" Nigel says noting the movie's undercurrent of fascism. "By setting the action and anti-police attitudes in England Grau could escape accusations of being anti-government (he was/is of course a Leftist director by nature as an examination of some of his other films will underline). If he'd set the film in Spain he would have been in real trouble."
As we talked about the youth and elders subplot, George is the key to this. I asked Nigel what he liked about the character. "His accent can be a bit grating in the UK print, but of course that's not his fault! I like his anti-establishment comments throughout. He just seems perfect in his role. An everyday young man caught up in terrifying situations which he struggles to make sense of and survive."
As Nigel mentioned earlier, he's less forgiving of some of the film's gut busting plot holes these days. Since we both were in agreement on the blood sub-plot, I asked what he would do to fix that. "The whole of that blood sub-plot should have been jettisoned really. It clashes with the other reanimation scenes elsewhere," Burrell notes. "And why didn't the dead caretaker rise also? I have problems with that angle, and the murderous baby stuff seems a little tacked-on too."
So in the cannon of zombie films where does Grau's Sleeping Corpses stand. "Oh, in the top five of any list of Zombie films, it's a seminal work despite the obvious flaws," Nigel asserts, a fan to this day. "It brought the world graphic technicolor cannibalism four years before DAWN OF THE DEAD for a start! And Grau's living dead are still scary, even today."
As a long time fan of European genre cinema, Nigel has experienced the ups and downs of living among censors. He became aware of many films before the infamous video nasty crackdown, but now it's a boom time. Burrell describes it, "As a fan of Horror Cinema, in particular 1960s/1970s Euro-Horror, and maybe a little of the 'buzz' once experienced by the necessarily 'underground' activity of collecting rare International videos during the Dark Ages of the 1980s UK'Video Nasty' crackdown has gone, but it has to be seen as a positive turn of events to have so many rarely seen (or even 'lost') nuggets of Euro-Horror released by the specialist labels." Burrell sees the current selection of titles as a boon. "It's been especially gratifying to see so many gialli other than the obvious Dario Argento classics dusted-off and remastered for both dedicated fans and new audiences alike. It also means that as a genre journalist, I'm spoilt for choice, but that too is a good thing!"
For someone who has seen a vast catalog of European cult cinema, Nigel describes the elements he believes makes for a cracking good Euro genre film. "A combination of well-plotted script, great visual style, apt music and either good scares or jolting graphic violence (or indeed both together!). Two of my favourite 1970s Italian films are Francesco Barilli's PERFUME OF THE LADY IN BLACK, with its weird combination of sub-Polanski Satanic shenanigans and Lewis Carroll, and Marcello Aliprandi's creepy-kiddy ghost story A WHISPER IN THE DARK, a subtle, almost Arthouse film that contains some of the most haunting (sorry!) and beautiful imagery one could wish to see. As far as gialli go, one can do no better (in my opinion) than Argento's DEEP RED. When I first saw this film it literally changed my whole outlook on genre cinema."
When talk turns to the many boutique companies now releasing Italian and European genre cinema, Nigel is happily diplomatic. "To be honest - and this is going to sound like a cop-out! - they have all provided 'must-have' releases at various points, but both Blue Underground and No Shame (both in Italy and the States) have served Euro-Horror fans particularly well, and Italian label Raro are doing wonders too," He says."I'm a fan of Kult X's lovely 'big-box' packaging, but their output is hit and miss."
So for someone whose seen an awful lot, what's on his wishlist, "Sergio Gobbi's ENFANTASME, the Spanish edit of Enzo G. Castellari's KYRA, Giulio Paradisi's THE VISITOR (long Euro-edit), Mimmo Cattarinich's PICCOLE LABBRA (uncut version), Pier Carpi's RING OF DARKNESS, and the only Nazi-themed film I can tolerate (other than Visconti's THE DAMNED) RED NIGHTS OF THE GESTAPO (Fabio De Agostini), in its ultra-sleazy uncut version."
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More of the dvd centric interview with Nigel at Gli Attore
For more about Nigel's work at Midnight Media
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Additional information on Let Sleeping Corpses Lie
Ray Dark Side interview at lovelockandload.com