I need your help in remembering more about a short story that I saw on TV in the spring of 1986.  It was either on "Amazing Stories" or "Twilight Zone" (however, I've checked both their episode lists and can't find it.).

Anyway, it's a story about a woman that is just plain evil.  She lands in prison and then figures a way to escape.  She befriends the prison mortician (who is old and has bad eyes or a bad heart), and tells him that if he will help her out, she can pay for him to have some surgery to make him better.  At this prison, a bell gongs when someone has died, so they decide that the next time the bell goes off, she will quietly slip into the dark morgue and get in the coffin with the dead person, be carried out, be buried, but then the mortician will come and dig her up.

Well, her plans seem to be going well when she hears the gong, she hestitantly climbs into the coffin, listens as she is carried out and buried.  Well she keeps waiting for the mortician to come and she waits and waits getting more and more anxious.  She eventually lights a match (that must've been with her) and to her horror finds out the the bell had gonged because the MORTICIAN had died!!!  AHHHHHHH!!!  He's the only one who knew of their plan and now she's buried alive with him.....AHHHHH! 

Just thinking about it gives me the creeps.  That, to me, is the scariest story ever.

Did anyone see it?  Which TV show (or maybe movie) is it from?????

Thanks!

I know what you mean about creepy. Sorry, I don't know what it is either, but it reminded me of a similar one. Someone got buried alive and they started to dig their way out - but they had been buried upside-down, so they ran out of air before escaping. This one has been used several times that I remember...

I have a vague memory of seeing this, but I can't remember where and we might not even think about the same program. I would say I saw this later than you , probably around 1988 or 1989. I might be totally off track now, and maybe I've only heard someone speak about something similar, but what you're saying sounds very familiar.

/Roger

i totally remember that episode. i related it to a friend of mine a few months ago and he remembers that show as well. both of us agreed that it was from "tales from the darkside". off coarse memory being as it is...

Well, if any of you are interested I (the original poster of the question) was able to find out the answer (I also asked on IMDB boards):

It was from an eighties version of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" called "Final Escape".

Well....it still doesn't make the nightmares go away  :(  :) .

One "scary but clever" show "Tales From the Dark Side" which stays with me was a story of a grandfather who died but came back to the house he lived in . The family was shocked  to see him but told him he was dead,he should go back to his resting place. He denied it and stayed with the family day by day and each day was worse as the smell was putrid.
They kept tellinghim he was dead and should go when finally as they were having dinner(the mom, dad and grandson), the little boy did something off camera with something from the food table.

The grandfather was about to sneeze-as the boy blew PEPPER at him.
The grandfather sneezed , the boy gave him a cloth napkin and the old man finally admitted and gave in..."You're right I am dead!" he put the napkin down and walked out the door to go back to his grave...The camera slowly moves to the napkin he set down and in the middle of the cloth...was the old mans' NOSE! :o

eeeeewwwwww! I guess when you find yourself decomposing, you'll have to admit YOU MUST BE DEAD!

Hope you enjoyed that one! :o     

I think there was an episode similar to that on Tales from the Crypt.



Cat

I enjoyed all those type shows. I also like the Hitchhiker episodes.

Funny you should bring that story up, my pastor used it as an illustration a couple of Sunday's ago. It was definitley an Alfred Hitchcock episode.

I know what you mean about creepy. Sorry, I don't know what it is either, but it reminded me of a similar one. Someone got buried alive and they started to dig their way out - but they had been buried upside-down, so they ran out of air before escaping. This one has been used several times that I remember...

Boy, that's kind of a dumb one. :)  You'd think a person in that situation, even in panic, would eventually realize they're constantly and evenly being pulled "up" into whatever progress they made.

I haven't seen that one, so maybe they had a clever way of getting around the gravity problem.

A nice variation would be that they go a little ways in the wrong direction, notice gravity, and start going the right way, but it's too late.

I remember a Hitchcock episode (from the '80's remake) that was absolutely disgusting.  The commercial for it said "Catlovers of the world unite!".  BUT it was about some rich lady who owned a lot of cats,  and ate them!!!!  They showed her and her husband putting therm in meat grinders!!!!!!  The cats made noises while inside them!!!!!

Does anyone else remember this???        I was a kid,  so I could be mistaken.

That story creeps me out. (I like reading horror stories, and have come across alot of "buried alive" plots.)
:o

The "buried alive" plot:

The most classic story of this kind (and one of the most chilling) is Poe's "Cask Of Amontillado".

(Incidentally, this story got me interested in drinking said beverage!)

"...and the schemer falls into the pit which he digs for another." ;)
--Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Speckled Band, The Adventures Of Sherlock Holmes

OTOH, don't you think the woman, being so diabolical, would think to look at the dead guy's face before getting in the coffin with him?
A definite lapse in judgement, but that could easily have the story skewing into Urban Legend territory! ::)

Your Pal,
Doc
8)

Omg I remember this it still gives me the creeps
When I think of it I have been tryin to google it my self
I thought it was an episode amazing stories they use to give it after
Alfred Hitchcock !!! I wanted my kids to watch it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycUw5WcOwok

Your Pal,
Doc
8)

I have been searching Twilight Zone episodes for weeks with no luck. I so rememeber an episode Hichcock ,or Twilight zone. A man not a women befriended the mortician and agreed when the next prisoner died he would slip into the old wooden coffin and be takin to the cematery. It was a setting in 1800's . The prisoner was notified to get into the next coffin and he had made arrangements with the elderly grave keeper to come and dig him up later .The prisoner was buried with a corpse and waited what seem to be for ever . He decided to light a match and when he did the old man was in the box with him. He had been buried alive and after seeing the old grave master he knew he was doomed forever. No one was going to come and dig him out. This show has stuck with me through out my years . I have so wanted to see it again.