In a town in New England named New Gilead, in the 19th Century, an unscrupulous alcoholic named Waldo Trumbull (Vincent Price) runs a funeral parlour he acquired from a former business partner, Amos Hinchley (Boris Karloff). Trumbull is married to Hinchley’s daughter Amaryllis (Joyce Jameson) but wishes he wasn’t. Trumbull employs an ex-con named Felix Gillie (Peter Lorre) as his assistant. They use the same coffin over and over again, dumping the departed. Sometimes they murder wealthy clients to pick up some more business. Trumbull is an abusive husband and is poisoning his wife’s father for his inheritance. Gillie is in love with Amaryllis but fails miserably at seducing her. Trumbull is drinking away his business profits.
Their landlord, John F. Black (Basil Rathbone) is threatening to evict the family for a year’s overdue rent. So Trumbull plans to murder a wealthy shipping magnate and charge his family for a huge funeral. But it seems the magnate’s trophy wife has disappeared with his fortune. After Black’s final demand for the rent, Trumbull sends Gillie to murder him. Gillie flees when he finds Black awake and spouting Shakespeare, but Black has a heart attack and seems to die. Only his servants know he has catalepsy.
Trumbull and Gillie bring Black to the mortuary, but his allergy to Cleopatra, the family cat, wakes him up. Then Black suffers another heart attack. Put back in the coffin, Black awakes again and Trumbull knocks him out. The funeral proceeds and Black is placed in the family crypt. Trumbull gets drunk and counts his money. He ignores Amaryllis and she decides to run off with Gillie. Black wakes up and escapes his tomb, going after the family with an axe. Amaryllis faints, Black chases Trumbull and Gillie around the house. Gillie falls down the stairs and is knocked out. Trumbull shoots Black, who, after a final soliloquy, dies.
Amaryllis comes to and thinks Trumbull killed Gillie. She threatens to call the police and Trumbull strangles her. Gillie awakens and attacks Trumbull with a sword. Trumbull knocks him out and drifts off into a drunken stupor. Hinchley wakes up and tries to revive him with his medicine. Turnbull realizes he has drunk his own poison and drops dead. Cleopatra the Cat walks by Black, who wakes up again.
The film was directed by Jacques Tourneur, using much of the cast of Tales of Terror, made the year before, and is a follow-up to The Raven. Basically, it is a horror-movie takeoff on Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors. Writer Richard Matheson got tired of writing about people being buried alive and wrote a joke about it. It was panned by critics. Of course, it was shot in 20 days on a 12-hour a day schedule, so it’s a little frantic and a bit broad for my taste. Comedian Joe E. Brown appears in a small but funny segment, his last role. Actually, the fans came to like the movie and it ended up with 89% positive on Rotten Tomatoes.
Originally, Karloff was supposed to play Black, but he was not strong enough for the strenuous part, so he played Hinchley, who sleeps most of the time, and Basil Rathbone was hired to play Black. He was also a bit long in the tooth but carries off the manic part with bravado. Peter Lorre died two months after the film’s release. Rathbone kept the cast entertained with rude jokes and stories, but never told them the punchline. It’s obvious on the screen that everyone is having a good time. It’s not certain that any particular audience member will be as amused as they are. Basil Rathbone and Boris Karloff steal most of the movie and Rhubarb the Cat steals the rest.