Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (film)

Let Sleeping Corpses Lie
Spanish theatrical release film poster.
Directed by	Jorge Grau
Produced by	Manuel Pérez, Edmondo Amati
Written by	Juan Cobos, Sandro Continenza, Marcello Coscia, Miguel Rubio
Starring	Cristina Galbó, Ray Lovelock, Arthur Kennedy
Music by	Giuliano Sorgini
Cinematography	Francisco Sempere
Editing by	Domingo García, Vincenzo Tomassi
Distributed by	Hallmark Releasing Corp. (1975) (USA)
Release date(s)	28 November 1974
Running time	95 min
Country	Spain/Italy
Language	English

Let Sleeping Corpses Lie (Italian title: Non si deve profanare il sonno dei morti)^[1], also known as The Living Dead at The Manchester Morgue^[2] is a Spanish/Italian horror film from 1974 written and directed by Jorge Grau and starring Ray Lovelock, Arthur Kennedy and Cristina Galbó.

Plot summary

The film begins with George on a trip from his Antique shop in Manchester to the Lake District to work on a new house with some of his friends. On the way his Norton motorcycle is accidentally damaged by Edna while reversing her Mini Cooper at a petrol station. He demands she give him a lift to his destination. Edna is on her way to visit her troubled sister and asks to go to South Gate first then George can use the car to get to his new house in Windermere.

George asks directions from men using an experimental machine from Department of Agriculture in a field. It is supposed to cause all insects to fight each other and die using ultra-sonics. The couple gets lost in the country lanes in the darkness. It then shows the first victim, Martin, a photographer killed by a tramp who drowned a week ago. Edna’s drug addict sister Katie West (married to Martin) barely escapes and is found by George and Edna.

When they report the death, the aggressive police Sergeant thinks that Katie did it. George, forced to stay in South Gate, takes the roll of film from Martin’s camera (now in the police car) to a chemist in town to have it developed. They book into The Old Owl Hotel. Katie has had a breakdown and is put into a local hospital. At the hospital, it turns out that babies are affected too, biting people with homicidal intensity. The range of machine is up to a mile, but is hoped to reach 5 miles soon. It affects primitive nervous systems only.

Back at the chemist's, they pick up photos, but the dead man does not show up in pictures. The Sergeant shows up and takes photos and when the couple leaves, sends PC Craig to trail them, but he loses them. They go to the graveyard and in a room in the chapel find a half eaten meal. Following noises to a crypt, they come across a murdered man and are locked in with the unkillable, very strong zombie tramp who brings the other bodies to life by touching their eyes with his blood-stained fingers.

The pair manages to make a hole they can escape from and Edna does, only to find herself in a pit while the zombies have hold of George's feet. Meanwhile PC Craig turns up and helps Edna out of the pit. George manages to get free and follows and now the zombies are after the three of them. They lock themselves in a room but are trapped there, Craig soon finds that his gun is of no use against dead people. He makes a dash for the police radio he has dropped outside but is caught by the zombies who tear his chest apart and start eating his insides.

The dead break into their room and in desperation George throws a lit oil lamp at them. It smashes and the zombies quickly burst into flame. The two escape to their car and Edna is sent off to tell the police. George is going to use the unmarked police car to go and smash the machine but it has no key so he runs off. At the machine, the farmer and two machine men don’t believe George and reveal that the machine is now working up to a five miles radius. They try and stop him but he smashes the machine and they drive off to get away from “the mad man”.

The Sergeant has found PC Craig and the Caretaker’s bodies, and thinking they may be devil worshippers which would explain the damaged tomb stones, issues orders “to shoot to kill” on George and Edna, believing them responsible for the murders. He is then told that George has deliberately wrecked the machine. Edna has arrived at her brother-in-law’s farm only to be met by Martin who is now a zombie, but she manages to run over him as she escapes. George finds her, drops her off at a petrol station and drives off with a large can of petrol. George is caught in a police trap and Martin’s body is taken back to the hospital.

In a field, the machine is repaired and switched on again which is rather a shock for the man in the morgue, where there are other dead bodies waiting to be revived with the man providing food for them. George escapes in a police car and finds Edna has been taken to the hospital, where the local morgue is. She is being sedated while George is now being chased by the police as he drives to the hospital where the zombies are now killing people, including Katie who as a zombie tries to kill her sister.

George arrives and starts setting fire to zombies but though he had believed he was in time, it turns out that he was too late to save Edna (we see has zombie pupils to her eyes) and as she suddenly attacks him, he pushes her into a room which is now burning. George is then shot four times by the over-zealous police Sergeant. Everything is over as far as he is concerned now and the Sergeant heads to a room at the hotel in South Gate for the night. After shooting him down in cold blood, the Sergeant wishes he would come alive again so he could shoot him again. He gets his wish as zombie George is waiting for him in his room, but now bullets won’t stop him. In a field nearby, the machine continues working.

Alternate titles

• No profanar el sueño de los muertos^[1]
• Non profanare il sonno dei morti^[1]
• The Living Dead at The Manchester Morgue^[2]
• Don't Open the Window^[2]
• Da dove vieni?^[1]
• The Living Dead^[1]
• Breakfast at The Manchester Morgue^[2]
• Breakfast With the Dead^[1]
• Brunch with the Dead^[1]
• Weekend per i morti^[1]
• Weekend with the Dead^[1]
• Invasion der Zombies^[1]
• Das Leichenhaus der Lebenden Toten^[1]
• Levende Doden in het Lijkenhuis^[1]
• Massacre des Morts-Vivants^[1]
• Dejen que los Muertos Duerman^[1]
• Zombi 3 - Da dove vieni?^[1]
• Fin de semana para los muertos (shooting title)^[1]

Cast

• Cristina Galbó - Edna
• Ray Lovelock - George
• Arthur Kennedy - The Sergeant
• Aldo Massasso - Kinsey
• Giorgio Trestini - Craig
• Roberto Posse - Benson
• José Lifante - Martin
• Jeannine Mestre - Katie
• Gengher Gatti - Keith
• Fernando Hilbeck - Guthrie
• Vera Drudi - Mary
• Vicente Vega - Dr. Duffield
• Francisco Sanz - Perkins
• Paul Benson - Wood
• Anita Colby - Nurse

Production

The hospital exteriors were shot at Barnes Convalescent Hospital in Cheadle, Cheshire. The story is set in the English countryside near Windermere, but was actually filmed in Italy. Some scenes were filmed in the Peak District in Derbyshire, not far from Sheffield. Hathersage is the location of the church, while other scenes were shot in Castleton and Dovedale. The title scene, with the montage, was filmed in Manchester. According to Edgar Wright, the promotion of the film during its exhibition in the United States was one of the inspirations for the fake trailer Don't, which appears in the 2007 release Grindhouse.^[3] The pesticide in some ways resembles the grasshopper poison nosema locustae.

Release

Some confusion exists about a reported "eyeball eating scene". While there are claims that a scene in which a zombie eats an eyeball was filmed, no such scene exists in any surviving print of the film, according to the liner notes of the Blue Underground DVD release. During the scene in which Craig is eaten, the female zombie reaches down towards Craig's eyeball, but before anything happens, a seemingly sloppy edit cuts to a long shot of all the zombies feasting. It is part of the DVD Stephen Romano Presents Shock Festival which was released on 8 January 2010 in the United States.^[4]

References

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p} "Release info for Non si deve profanare il sonno dei morti (1974)". Internet Movie Database. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071431/releaseinfo. Retrieved 2008-04-25. 
2. ^ ^{a b c d} Fleming, John (June 1977). "The Living Dead at The Manchester Morgue". The House of Hammer (London: General Book Distribution) 1 (9): 36. 
3. ^ "Online Exclusive: Horror Film Directors Dish About 'Grindhouse' Trailers". Rolling Stone.com. http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/14022408/online_exclusive_horror_film_directors_dish_about_grindhouse_trailers. Retrieved 2007-04-04. 
4. ^ DVD Verdict Review - Stephen Romano Presents Shock Festival

External links

• film review
• Non si deve profanare il sonno dei morti at the IMDb
• Let Sleeping Corpses Lie at Rotten Tomatoes
• Let Sleeping Corpses Lie at AllRovi