Let Sleeping Corpses Lie

aka Non si deve profanare il sonno dei morti
aka The Living Dead at Manchester Mourge
aka Do Not Speak Ill of the Dead
aka Don't Open the Window

1974 / Dir. Jorge Grau / Written by Sandro Continenza and Marcello Coscia / Starring Cristina Galbo, Ray Lovelock, Arthur Kennedy, and Aldo Massasso

From the start this is quite obviously a retread of Romero’s Living Dead territory, like so many zombie films in the early 1970’s that were influenced by his seminal work. But unlike those films, Corpses is genuinely scary with some great atmosphere and special effects, and a story that actually works. It begins rather slowly taking us from city to rural England, where local farmers are ecstatic about a new technique to kill crop pests by using a giant tractor-like machine and a wand that omits radioactive sound waves. The problem is, these waves also jump-start the nervous systems of slumbering residents of the local cemeteries, and the deceased rise from their graves to hunt for – what else? – braaaaaaaainsssss. Our heroes are caught between proving this to the police (and thus proving their own innocence) in what appears to detectives to be Manson-like crimes committed against families living in the countryside. The ending, like many of the zombie effects, will definitely remind you of Romero; however, this film feels more like a reinvention than a rip-off in a surprisingly succinct collaboration between Spanish and British filmmakers. The film on its own would probably have received 3 ½ stars on my rating system if not for the terrific introduction by director Jorge Grau on the American DVD, who asks that you “suffer profoundly” while watching his work. That’s the right attitude for a horror filmmaker – and definitely merits a half star extra in itself. ****