Max (Demián Salomón, Terrified) lives in Buenos Aires and has a career that is not thriving, in fact has quite a bit of debt. He receives a call from Héctor (Hector Alba), who still resides in the hometown and family compound, saying their “father” has passed away and should return to settle the inheritance and other matters. He is received by Héctor as if he is family, but the viewer soon begins to find out the father was the patriarch of an orphanage where several boys were raised. The boys were raised to be known as brothers and each character is introduced gradually as the days go by for the burial to take place – at the designated time as Hector keeps repeating. This is a huge clue that something is not “normal” as Max repeats, but the longer he stays in the hometown, the more he is reminded of what their brotherhood means with flashbacks to his teen self. Max has been gone a couple of decades from the small town and learns the “brothers” are in leadership positions, or with some authority, including a police chief, newspaper editor, a priest and a manager of the soccer team.
As the men gather, the viewer will learn about the power and rituals they carry out with the unburied corpse and sacrifice of an individual outside their circle. I am not familiar with this type of process and ritual through other films, so it did hold my interest to view until the end. Some of the scenes of the cattle are more gruesome when being slaughtered, so the viewer comes face to face with how beef goes from farm to the local market.
Written and directed by Alejandro Cohen Arazi, the script is such that it is a tad predictable, but it does not mean it is cause not to view it. The actors turned in a good performance for the characters as written. It is Demián Salomón who stands out as a conflicted “outsider” after having been gone to the city so long, but eventually succumbs to being the leader of this pack.
The Unburied won several awards on the festival circuit including Best Film at the Philadelphia Unnamed Film Festival and Best Makeup FX at the San Cugat Fantastic in Spain. It also played FrightFest (UK), Dublin Horrorthon (Ireland), Feratum (Mexico) and Rojo Sangre (Argentina). It was originally titled El Cadáver Insepulto (The Unburied Corpse).
The Horror Collective is releasing the award-winning Argentinian horror feature film, The Unburied, this month of October in North America, Australia and New Zealand on October 4. The release is available on-demand on home video.
The Horror Collective is the genre label of Entertainment Squad — a production and distribution company founded by veteran producer Shaked Berenson (Turbo Kid, Tales of Halloween).
Source: Entertainment Squad