American Masters (TV Series) Edgar Allan Poe: Buried Alive (2017) User Reviews

As you'd expect, an excellent documentary from PBS.

[planktonrules · 9/10 · 1 November 2019]

"Edgar Allan Poe: Buried Alive" is an excellent film about the life of the world famous poet and thriller writer. I saw it when it debuted, but IMDB didn't have a listing of it until recently--during a re-showing of the excellent documentary.

Why is it so good? Well, it has two excellent things working for it...its recreation of events in the life of Poe AND it tries very hard to re-examine and re-interpret the man's life. Instead of the usual story of Poe, it manages to give the story a different slant...and is both informative and entertaining.

A Misunderstood Man

[Hitchcoc · 9/10 · 4 May 2019]

Edgar Allan Poe is certainly one of the greatest writers and poets who ever lived. This documentary traces his life. Unlike the portrayal we usually get, he was, for the most part, an ambitious man, a man who wanted success. His weaknesses were his basic honesty and his tendency to alienate people. Had he been willing to back off on occasion, he would not have burned so many bridges. He was a devoted husband and father and cared greatly for his family. We could even forgive him for his romantic indiscretions as his wife, Virginia, lay ill with tuberculosis. But the public was fickle and unwilling to forgive and it put him in arrears with them. Above all, despite his angst, he was a great writer. One thing I never noticed is the small number of horror stories that he wrote. As with many of the American Masters biographies, this one is very well done.