Burke & Hare

Plot:  A black comedy about two 19th century grave robbers who find a lucrative business providing cadavers for an Edinburgh medical school.

Director:

John Landis

Writers:

Piers Ashworth (screenplay), Nick Moorcroft (screenplay)

Stars:

Bill Bailey, Tom Wilkinson, Michael Smiley, Simon Pegg, Andy Serkis, Isla Fisher

When two small time crooks discover that the medical school in town is paying top dollar for corpses, they get inventive in helping some of the town's people shuffle off the mortal coil quicker.

Simon Pegg's movies (Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead) are usually rather formulaic and they have a certain sense of humor.

This movie is not like these movies.  

This is a remake of a 1972 horror movie of the same name, only this one is much more hokey and silly.  

The story of Burke and Hare is real, and the reality is rather disgusting.  However, it's been almost 200 years since the killing so it's ok to mock it apparently.

I'm wondering if they will do the same with the 9/11 terrorist attacks.  Imagine Airplane but with a very different ending.

Anyway, fair warning that this isn't like the other Simon Pegg comedies.

This isn't a bad film per se, it's just not very good.  If you want to watch a dark comedy, I recommend Big Nothing.  It's one of my personal favorites and this other Netflix blogger indicates that he watched it on NetFlix.  I'm not sure if it is or not, I would have to check.  I own it on DVD myself

2/5 STARS