Carradine's Last Movie

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BURIED ALIVE-1989-A teenage girl runs away from Ravenscroft Hall, a kind of correctional institute for young women, but is caught by a masked person who beats her then walls her up in an underground cave. After the credits Janet Pendelton (Karen Witter) comes to teach at Ravenscroft. She meets Dr. Gary Julian (Robert Vaughan), head of the place. Later after she imagines a brick wall is breathing, she meets the weird Dr. Schaeffer (Donald Pleasence in a wig with German accent). All the girls are an unruly bunch of bitches and Janet gets a little roughed up by Yvonne (Dee Dee Eybers) who's later electrocuted while curling her hair with a mixer. Julian tells Janet she ran away. Then Janet hallucinates she's being buried alive. Debbie (Ginger Lynn Allen) is the big trouble maker. Janet has some problems especially over the death of her father.

One girl says "You're messing with my head, man". Then she's captured by the masked killer and walled up in the basement while the other girls have a secret party. While doing some investigating Janet finds some unusual equipment in the basement and an old man ghost (John Carradine) seems to come out of the wall asking for help (although he's strangling her too!). It turns out the old man is Julian's father Jacob. When Debbie sneaks out to meet her pusher/boyfriend Tim (Bill Butler) they're both abducted. Julian tells Janet she was transferred. After the local sheriff (Arnold Vosloo) looks into their disappearance, Julian asks Janet to marry him! Of course Julian is a nutty killer who kills the sheriff with a spade. When Janet realizes her boss is a loony he loses it completely and chases her through the catacombs of the place while declaring his love for her. Dr. Schaeffer (who it turns out is a former patient) tries to stop him but has his brain fried. When Julian tries to wall Janet up she sticks a needle in his eye. He goes crazy with an ax and then his dad (who he obviously walled up too) comes crashing through the wall in a wheelchair and there's an explosion. Neither father or son seem to be dead in the final scene. 

This kinda whacked horror film was directed by Gerald Kikoine (from France) who made the equally bizarre EDGE OF SANITY with Anthony Perkins the same year. As of this writing they were his last two films. BURIED ALIVE also marked the final film appearance of the great John Carradine who died in November of 1988. The film is dedicated to his memory. Vaughan and Pleasence were also in RIVER OF NO RETURN the same year.

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