While there was another movie with a similar theme, that I watched last year, I thought this would be superior to that one. I mean this is made by John Landis. So I was expecting quite a bit more from it, I have to admit. It does not disappoint completely, it just feels like a bit too light. There seems to be something missing. Character development is straightforward, but still it's nothing grand. Something I came to expect from a Landis movie.

Of course I might be nit-picking. The movie is not bad at all. It has quite a few comic moments (an intercourse scene that is just funny and could not be called arousing at all, works greatly, there are scenes of great comedy value besides that too),but there is still something missing to make it better. I would recommend a watch. I'd just say not to expect too much!

Edit: I just found out a month ago, that there is a very good chance, that there is another cut of this movie. A cut approved by Mr. Landis himself (which seems not to have been the case with this one) ... that would explain quite a lot ...

Simon Pegg and Andy Serkis play the infamous Burke and Hare--two horrible criminals who provided bodies to Edinburgh medical schools in the 1820s. Why was this so horrible? Because the folks they 'procured' weren't dead when the pair found them. Eventually the two were caught and the rest is history. This horrible series of crimes was the basis for many movies over the years--some of which changed the details and some of which stuck quite close to the actual events. I've already seen "The Body Snatcher", "Corridors of Blood" and "The Flesh and the Fiends"--and there are several other versions of the story out there to be seen. Of those I've seen, clearly "The Body Snatcher" (which is a fictionalized account that was written by Robert Louis Stevenson) is the best.

In this 2010 film, the filmmakers have attempted to do something different--to make a comedy about the events. This is very problematic for two main reasons--it's hard to make a comedy about such grisly things and because the film just isn't very funny. If you are a fan of Pegg's looking for another "Hot Fuzz" or "Sean of the Dead"--keep looking. The problem is that the film just plays it all too straight and isn't wild or crazy enough to make the whole thing darkly funny (such as how they handled this sort of thing in "Sweeney Todd"). As a result, the characters are unlikable and flat.

If you can ignore the fact that the film is not especially enjoyable, you can at least appreciate the look of the film. It looks very 1820s--except when they talk about photographing the corpses, as photography wasn't even invented until a decade LATER!!! Also, if you do watch, look for the least romantic sex scene ever filmed.

I wonder who thought a comedy about Britain's most famous graverobbers would be a good idea? A brief look at the credits of the guys who did the screenplay soon reveals that they're the ones behind ST TRINIAN'S 2: THE LEGEND OF FRITTON'S GOLD. That alone speaks volumes.

Of course, the story is doomed to failure from the very beginning, because comedy is so hard to get right. The jokes are either funny or they're not. It goes without saying that I didn't laugh once during the course of this film. The gurning, mugging, getting-crap-poured-over-them gags aren't an example of getting it right. In fact, BURKE & HARE gets it very wrong indeed, which is kind of sad because back in the day John Landis was a great director. Now he's mired in the dreck.

Simon Pegg plays Simon Pegg, with the addition of that Scottish accent he used in STAR TREK. Andy Serkis is Andy Serkis with a similar-sounding accent. Both seem to be in it for the money. Isla Fisher – well, don't get me started on Isla Fisher, and her extensive sub-plot involving some rubbish about the first all-female production of Macbeth. Huh? I thought this was meant to be a film about graverobbing, yet half of it's about bloody Macbeth, and the other half just changes history when it feels like it.

Lots of effort was made in recreating 19th century Edinburgh, and the supporting cast is, frankly, astonishing. Tom Wilkinson, Tim Curry, Christopher Lee, David Schofield, Ronnie Corbett, Hugh Bonneville, Jenny Agutter, hell, even Stephen Merchant, Michael Winner and Paul Whitehouse. And what do all these fine people have in common? They're singularly wasted, either relegated to boring serious roles or blink-and-you'll-miss-em cameos. No, I won't waste any more time on a film I'd rather forget even exists – especially when you have a wealth of minor classics on the same subject (THE BODY SNATCHER, THE FLESH AND THE FIENDS, BURKE AND HARE…even DR JEKYLL AND SISTER HYDE!).