My Top 10 Favorite Movie Cemeteries

 

  When it comes to spooky locations in movies, Graveyards are an easy win. However, the location isn’t bound to horror movies either, and can be a meaningful setting for drama’s, westerns, animation and others. Whether a cemetery is used as a frighting location or a dramatic location, they’re always a captivating set-piece to look at when presented in a movie. So, for this October season, I thought it would be fun to stop and rank my personal top 10 favorite movie cemeteries.  

 

#10 The Cemetery from “The Adams Family” (1991) 

When you’re a family as dark, mysterious and kooky as the Adams Family … a morbid and often creepy location like a graveyard is suddenly a place of peace, relaxation and tranquility. Rather than go to any regular cemetery, the Adams graveyard is exploding with personality in its details, design and presentation. What other graveyard would have a couch carefully preserved as a center piece anyway? 

Well, one for two people who look forward to one day being buried side by side and six feet underground. It’s an unusual movie cemetery to say the least, but for the Adams Family, I’d be disappointed if it was anything less.  

 

#9 The Cemetery from “Frankenweenie” (2012) 

In Tim Burton’s often overlooked animated picture “Frankenweenie” (and by extent his short movie of the same name from 1984), a young boy tragically loses his pet dog Sparky after a collision with a car. Shortly after, the dog is buried in the local pet cemetery, and unlike the significantly creepier version from Steven King, this pet cemetery takes on a life of its own and wonderfully designed.    

Granted, just like with the Steven King story, the pets do still come back to life, all though, through different means ... like a kid performing a Frankenstein style experiment to bring his pet back, followed by all his classmates trying to do the same. Amidst all this, the cemetery becomes a character in of itself and one that frequently gets revisited. My favorite scene in the whole film is this quiet little moment when the resurrected dog Sparky runs away from home and goes to his own gravestone … as if he feels like he belongs there. It’s a somber little moment, and I feel you can analyze something of substance from it. 

 

#8 The Cemetery from “Haunted Mansion” (2023)

Back when I was a little kid, I was obsessed with the Disneyland Haunted Mansion attraction, and all I could think about was how cool it would be to see this brought to life in a live-action movie. The graveyard setting was an especially big highlight and had unlimited potential for a memorable set piece in a movie. After the so-so attempt in 2003, we got another movie version in 2023. 

It wasn’t perfect either, but it sure had its highlights and knew how to make great use of its awesome graveyard setting. While not quiet the upbeat party of the ride, it’s still utilized as an exciting setting for the film’s final battle, with hordes of ghosts floating through the air, green mist, coffin holes opening in the ground, and all kinds of striking, spooky imagery on display.

 

#7 The Cemetery from “Night of the Living Dead” (1969) 

Here it is, one of the earliest and most classic zombie movies ever made … and features a most memorable graveyard opening to boot. Most of the action is confined to a single house location, but it’s in a small, local cemetery when the tension and freighting encounters really kick off, with the very first zombie attack. It’s an iconic and frequently replicated sequence, with phenomenal buildup, and a memorable payoff. 

As we’ll see on my list, some movie graveyards stand out for how they’re uniquely designed, while others are memorable for sequences set on the cemetery grounds. This setting is unmistakably for the sequence alone … but what a memorable sequence it is, and a great way to kick off a legendary horror classic.

 

#6 The Cemetery from “Hocus Pocus” (1993) 

When three goofy witches come back from the dead to terrorize children on Halloween night, all the action builds to a final showdown in a cemetery, which is a terrific set piece. It’s also gorgeous with the sun rising in the background, and I love the concept of the graveyard being hollow ground that witches can’t set foot on. This pays off with one of my favorite Halloween villain deaths. 

The lead Witch lands in the cemetery, transforms into a stone statue, and explodes along with her sisters when the sun rises. Whereas most other graveyards try to look spooky in their presentation, this really is one of the rare ones that looks colorful and angelic in its design and presentation … especially with the closing shot of the gates, which are framed to look like the pearly gates of Saint Peter.

 

#5 The Cemetery from “Frankenstein” (1931) 

While this movie was made famous for its titular monster, it was also a stunning production for its time. For an old movie from 1931, it’s got a surprisingly epic size and scope. From beginning to end, it’s just incredible to look at. Personally, I think this film has the most memorable imagery of all the classic Universal Monster movies. The opening scene in the cemetery kicks things off and shows how Doctor Frankenstein collected bodies for his monstrous experiment, making for an important piece of the narrative, and a striking set piece all at once.

 

#4 The Cemetery from “Army of Darkness” (1992) 

Lone anti-hero Ash Wiliams has one job, say a magic chant and prevent the dead from rising … to bad he’s a goof-up and goofs up royally, by accidentally resurrecting an army of corpus from their graves. When it comes to supernatural encounters in a graveyard setting … it’s the 1992 horror comedy “Arny of Darkness” that I feel goes all out with the mayhem and fun. 

The design of the cemetery is basic, but like many others on this list, it’s the sequence that makes it a first-rate movie graveyard. From the dead hands bursting through the ground like a mine field, to reanimated skeletons arriving on the scene like a Disney Silly Symphonie, this sequence has all the spooky fun and excitement a fan could ask for.   

 

#3 The Cemetery from “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” (1966) 

Now we come to the least Gothic cemetery setting on my list, but still one of the absolute best … largely due to the films iconic finale, in which our three main characters converge onto buried treasure, and have a nail-biting three-way standoff. Typically, when I think of my favorite climaxes, I think of the grand, relentless battles featured in the “Star Wars”, “Avengers” and “Lord of the Rings” movies … and yet, this film likewise features one of my all-time favorite finales, and it barley has more action than a single gunshot. 

All the excitement of this sequence comes from the build-up, the intensity, and all the little exchanges between our players, who don’t even speak much. It’s just this exciting montage of close-ups, riveting music, and brilliant editing that make this scene a work of art … and by extent, it makes the cemetery location one of the all-time greatest.

 

#2 The Cemetery from “The Phantom of the Opera” (2004) 

While the 2004 movie musical “The Phantom of the Opera” garnered mixed reactions, most still praise the production design. For me, the set design of the cemetery during the song “Wishing you were Somehow here Again” is a thing of Gothic beauty to look at. It makes for a great setting for a morbid song, and it also makes for a cool set-piece for a sword fight. 

It wasn’t a real location and was built on set at Pinewood Studios in England, but it was modeled after the real-life Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. Even though it’s a set, it invokes a sense of grandeur and atmosphere that captivates me every time I watch this. There is so much detail to take in, and for me, it's still one of my favorite movie Graveyards. 

 

Before I reveal my number one favorite movie Graveyard, here are some quick Honorable Mentions … the cemeteries from …

Disney’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” (1949)

“Frankenstein meets the Wolf-Man” (1943)    

“Pet Sematary” (1989)

“The Frighteners” (1996)

“Cemetery Man” (1994)

 

#1 The Cemetery from “The Nightmare Before Christmas” (1993) 

While stop-motion had been utilized before, it had never been seen on this big a scale. The detailed set designs, the striking colors, the creative camera movement, the layered environments … it just creates a life all its own. These sets also lend themselves to some visually striking musical numbers, and for me, the cemetery set design for Jack Skellington’s opening song number always comes to my mind first when I think of my favorite movie cemetery. 

Just like in “Frankenweenie”, there is so much personality and detail on display, and the image of Jack on that strange hillside is about as iconic as they get. It’s truthfully not one of the scariest movie cemeteries, but it’s certainly the one that left the biggest impression on me as a striking, unique design, and to this day is my personal favorite movie cemetery.

Thanks for reading my countdown … and continue to enjoy the movies you Love!