Director Report Card: John Landis (2010)

20. Burke & Hare

In 1828, a pair of grave robbers in Edinburgh, Scotland realized the bodies they stole and sold to the local medical academy would be worth more if they were fresher. The men, William Burke and William Hare, began to murder people and sell the bodies for a profit. The local physicians, eager to learn more about human anatomy, were happy to purchase them. The crimes were a major scandal of the day, calling into question the limits of medical science and drawing attention to the crime of grave robbing. Sixty years later, Robert Louis Stevenson would write a short story inspired by the duo, bringing their crimes into the modern age. From there, filmmakers and playwrights would be inspired by the notorious killers, at least seven distinct movies telling their story. Somehow, we would see two films inspired by the grave robbers last decade. “I Sell the Dead,” which added zombies to the mix, came out in 2008. Two years later, John Landis would make his big comeback to narrative features with his “Burke & Hare,” a distinctly more light-hearted take on the infamous duo. 

Landis' “Burke and Hare” follow the bare bones outline of the true story but add countless fictional elaborations. (As the opening scene puts it, "This is a true story. Except for all the parts we made up.") Burke and Hare are con men living in Edinburgh, just trying to make a buck. When a lodger in Hare's house dies, the two men set upon an opportunity. They decide to sell the body to Dr. Robert Knox, an anatomist determined to win the king's favor by completely mapping the human body. Realizing this is a good source of in-come, Burke and Hare begin to murder people to sell their bodies. Hare is egged on by his greedy wife while Burke continues the crimes to fund an all-female production of “MacBeth,” being staged by a former prostitute he has fallen in love with. 

After striking the perfect balance of comedy and brutal violence in “An American Werewolf in London,” John Landis had a lot of trouble finding that equilibrium again in his later films. Throughout the likes of “Into the Night” or “Susan's Plan,” broad comedy would stand awkwardly next to sudden blood and guts. “Burke & Hare” sees the director doing a better job of mixing humor and death. Maybe the period setting adds the appropriate distance. Or maybe this story being such well-trotted cinematic ground makes exaggerating Burke and Hare's crimes into absurd actions easier to digest. Perhaps the gags here – like a body ghoulishly bent in half to fit in a barrel or blood spurting from a severed foot onto an unsuspecting student – are simply just better than what we've gotten in the past. 

Or, perhaps, the director was simply feeling more like himself this time. “Burke & Hare” has that particular John Landis feeling more than many of his latter day pictures. Once again, we see the filmmaker mocking the establishment. Burke and Hare, criminals though they may be, are also working class guys just trying to get by. Their foils are well-to-do physicians, stuffy royal guardsmen, and rich gangsters. Through his willingness to disregard the law, Dr. Knox is revealed to be as greedy and immoral – and as driven by petty grudges, considering his rivalry with another anatomist – as the resurrection men. The guardsman is a glory-seeking nut while his men are buffoons. “Burke & Hare” sees Landis happily returning to his anti-authoritarian roots, mocking those in power and making the common, slobby guys the heroes.

There is a degree of this subtext built into the real Burke and Hare story, after all. Many adaptations of the story give into an anti-science prejudice, asking how far science will go in the pursuit of knowledge. However, most of the other “Burke & Hares” realize that money, not science, is the bad guy here. Burke, Hare, and their victims are all being abused by a system that prioritizes profit over human life. They murder because it gets them cash, the people-in-power indifferent to their crimes as long as they get what they want. In Landis' take, Hare kills to please his power-hungry wife and Burke goes along because he fears Ginny won't like him if she learns he's poor. Cash motivates everyone to misbehave.

No matter how grim the subject matter may be, “Burke & Hare” keeps the tone light. It is, in fact, a romantic-comedy. Burke and Ginny's romance is based around a classic misunderstanding. He doesn't want her to know he kills people for money. She doesn't want him to know she used to be a prostitute. Both are hiding something and eventually learn that they love each other for who they are, not who they aren't. The film also mines a lot of humor from the couple's repeated inability to consummate their relationship. (This is not a problem Hare has, as the film treats us to several explicit, and farcical, love scenes between him and his wife.) It's nothing we haven't seen before but is mildly cute here.

Another decent gag the movie returns to repeatedly is an anachronistic streak. The film presents several characters taking credit for more modern inventions and ideas. Nicephore Niepce, one of the early inventors of the photograph, waltz through the story as a cohort of Dr. Knox. (In truth, Niepce actually died only ten years after the Burke and Hare murders.) Hare's wife gives him the idea to create a funeral parlor business, the body snatcher easily sliding from one profession involving cheating people and death to another. I'm pretty sure funerals were already around by this point but it's a solid joke. So is a mobster in the story inadvertently inventing the idea of paying protection money... Which quickly evolves into the idea of life insurance. It's a chuckle-worthy set-up that the film happily does multiple times.

Sadly, not all the gags in “Burke & Hare” are this inspired. The movie features its fair share of uninspired slapstick. An early sequence involves a barrel, stuffed with the titular duo's first victim, rolling down the street. A decent enough joke at first, this particular gag goes on for far too long. More than once, “Burke & Hare” tries to wring laughs out of hoary comedic moments. Like the duo being splattered with waste from a dumped chamber pot. Or a guard getting his foot smashed in a door. These are not Landis' most funny-bone-tickling jokes and many seem included as desperate attempts to get the audience to laugh.

While describing “Burke & Hare” as a horror movie is a slightly misleading statement, John Landis returning to the United Kingdom does allow for him to touch on a similar atmosphere as to what we saw in “American Werewolf.” There's a sequence where an obese dandy is stalked through the foggy Edinburgh streets by Burke, eventually being frightened to death by Hare appearing suddenly with a hammer and sickle. The combination of that foggy Scottish atmosphere and a decent building of tension makes for a memorable scene. Much of “Burke & Hare” was shot on a sound-stage too. When combined with the period setting and grisly story, this can't help but remind me of Hammer Studios' classic horror pictures. Which was likely an intentional homage. 

Despite its frequent weaknesses, “Burke & Hare” still remains largely charming throughout. And that's mostly thanks to its cast. “Shaun of the Dead” would briefly turn Simon Pegg into a movie star, Most of the films Pegg would make without Edgar Wright's involvement would be pretty lame. While “Burke & Hare” arguably belongs in that company, Pegg is still delightful throughout the film. His ability to be comically exasperated is put to good use, Burke responding to the increasingly ruthless events of the story with shock. Pegg's ability to be a charming, everyman also makes him ideal for this part. So, no matter no depraved his actions may seem, the audience is always on Burke's side.

David Tennant was originally intended to star opposite Pegg but he dropped out before filming began, with Andy Serkis stepping into the role. Serkis happily hams it up as Hare. He plays Hare as a man who is always after his next con, totally feckless about everything as long as it means he gets paid. This ruthlessness is pragmatic, Hare simply seeing murder as the most direct path to success. Serkis brings a gleeful nastiness to the part, his sleazy smile often bringing a certain comedic energy to even the film's most dire jokes. It's an unlikely leading role for Serkis but he equates himself with the disreputable character well enough.

While the buddy dynamics of Pegg and Serkis clearly dominate the film, there's some strong supporting turns too. Isla Fisher is adorable and funny as Ginny, making it easy to see why Burke falls for her so quickly and so hard. Jessica Hynes, who also appeared o “Spaced” with Pegg, is amusingly wicked as Hare's Lady MacBeth-like wife. Tom Wilkinson is a workable straight man as Dr. Knox, playing the role as a man utterly convinced of his goals. Landis being the kind of director he is, he includes colorful supporting roles fro some lovable character actors. Tim Curry curls his fingers and chuckles devilishly in that wonderfully Tim Curry-like manner as Knox's rival, a stuck-up fop with a foot fetish. Christopher Lee has only one scene but makes an impression, getting to shout theatrically in a wild accent. There's also a bit part from director Paul Davis, who made the “Beware the Moon” documentary and who I used to occasionally talk with on the old MovieManiacs.net forum.

“Burke & Hare” was developed by Ealing Studios, the same company behind famously beloved dark comedies like “Kind Hearts and Coronets” and “The Ladykillers.” This put “Burke & Hare” in good company. However, the film is not destined for classic-status like those pictures. Like most of Simon Pegg's non-Edgar Wright films, it would come and go from the box office without making much of an impression. While the material is sometimes weak, the cast proves charming enough and there's just enough laughs to justify watching it. If you want to watch a good film inspired by Burke and Hare, check out “The Body Snatcher” or “The Flesh and the Fiends.” If you want to see that John Landis could still string together a half-decent motion picture though, this one at least proves that. [Grade: B-]

Obviously, “Burke & Hare” was meant to be a comeback vehicle for Landis and, obviously, it didn't exactly work. He hasn't made another film in the ten years since. It's possible, in this day and age, that a director with the kind of baggage Landis has just can't be hired anymore. Either way, he has slipped comfortably into the elder statesman role, being active as a producer and continuing to appear in retrospectives. (As well as being a regular on the “Trailers from Hell” Youtube series.) Watching all his films was sometimes an exercise in tedium but it did contain a few surprises and most of those classics remain unimpeachable.