TV Reviews : Chilly ‘Buried Alive’ a Funny, Fresh Thriller

The chiller “Buried Alive” (at 9 tonight on the USA Network) is a genuine hoot. Well, it’s not exactly genuine. Mark Patrick Carducci’s horrific script lifts curdling devices from Edgar Allan Poe, embalming room dramas (remember “The Loved One”?), marital treachery (“The Postman Always Rings Twice”) and even lobs in a vengeful twist on that blissful greeting, “Honey, I’m home.”

On rare occasions, a derivative story is produced so well that it looks fresh. That’s the case here, where director Frank Darabont marshals the sickening ingredients into a spiral of a thriller. But if claustrophobia is troublesome--as in sharing a casket with a squirming body in a rain-soaked grave--you might find a measure of relief in that the carcass delicti is the result of a lethal toxin from puffer fish. Check it out. It’ll give you a heart attack.

That’s what befalls the victimized husband (Tim Matheson), who’s buried alive after being poisoned by his nasty wife and her vile lover (Jennifer Jason Leigh and William Atherton). With his loyal, fangy Rottweiler by his side, the husband returns from the grave and, like the professional carpenter he is, saws, hammers and nails his way to excruciating vengeance in the pretty house he built for his thankless wife.

Matheson, Leigh and Atherton are deliciously crazed, and Hoyt Axton, in a paunchy, down-home turn, is the plot’s nod to sanity.