June 16, 2002

It is called “The Brain That Wouldn’t Die” formerly titled “The Head That Wouldn’t Die” but should more appropriately be called “The Brain that Couldn’t Die” or even more appropriately, “The Brain That Wasn’t Allowed to Die”. Am I carping? Good. That’s what I’m here for.

No matter which of those titles you slap on this movie, the true purpose behind “The Brain That Wouldn’t Die/”The Head That Wouldn’t Die” has nothing to do with the cranium at all but is an excuse to leer at the God-given goodies affixed to the endless parade of buxom harlots who put on a bathing suit and got their day’s pay. The movie is a dodge, you see, to leer at young beauties while disguising itself as a masterpiece of unspeakable horror.

But I’m getting ahead of myself, perhaps you are unfamiliar with this multi-titled piece of Z-Grade corn from the bin of early 60’s sci-fi, so I will fill you in:

“The Brain That Wouldn’t Die” is a film that touts itself as one of those movies about a scientist who tampered with nature and will pay the ultimate penalty. It stars Herb Evers as Dr. Bill Cortner, a young doctor who is obsessed with limb transplants. We know right away that Dr. Bill isn’t going to play by the moral code because his father reminds him not to play God and besides that, there’s never been a scientist in a B Picture that didn’t play God.

His fiancée is Jan Compton (Virginia Leith), a fellow doctor whom we are correct in guessing possesses the organ of the title. They are nauseatingly happy and looking forward to their future of incisions and triple-bypasses. What no one knows is that Dr. Bill has a "country house" out in the middle of nowhere where he keeps a Franken-pile of limbs and vital organs for his looney experiments. There are only two occupants in the house. One is Dr. Bill's assistant whose right hand Dr. Bill disfigured in an accident (and he hasn't brought up a malpractice suit becaaaaaaaaaaaaause?! What? Help me out here.) The other occupant is a creature from a botched experiment that the good doctor hasn't gotten around to getting rid of (it's kept in a closet with several padlocks). Imagine if Sloth from The Goonies were a conehead and you can imagine how ridiculous this thing looks.

Well, old Dr. Bill is always pushing the envelope as far as his work in the lab but he makes the fatal mistake of pushing the envelope with his car. He cracks up his convertable on the way to the "country house" and Jan is decapitated. Removing the head from the burning wreck he runs away with the head under his arm (wrapped in his coat) like a star quarterback making the winning touchdown.

Back at the lab, Dr. Bill concocts a strange looking device, which has chemicals dripping into a pan that is keeping Jan’s head alive. The device looks like a moonshine still and despite having no lungs or voice-box, Jan is able protest this predicament. The "neck juice" seems to also affect Jan's brain because she becomes telepathically linked with the thing in the closet. She orders it to kill and what does she do for it? Again, help me out.

Besides keeping Jan's head alive in a pan of medicated Yoo-Hoo, Dr. Bill has another agenda in mind. He goes hunting for a suitable new body onto which he will graft Jan's head. Here, the true nature of TBTWD is revealed as he goes from strip-clubs to beauty contests looking for just the right curves to give his girl. My favorite is a "Body Beautiful" contest in which the audience is told that they will judge the five finalist and one by one all four girls are introduced.

Anyway this whole seamy bit of whoring leads him to Doris (Adele Lamont), a curvacious little floozy who poses for pictures in her leopard-skin skivvies on Wednesdays and Saturdays and claims to hate all men (no, she's not one of those). Despite her icy demeaner, she is rather touched when Dr. Bill doesn't pitch his cookies when she reveals that one side of her face is all scarred-up from an accident. He uses the excuse that he'll take her back to his lab and fix her up and we don't have a be John Forbes Nash to see what this all adds up to. Yes, the creature kills the assistant, then kills Dr. Bill and sets the house on fire. The beast grabs Doris, and leaves and Jan in the Pan scolds the dead Dr. Bill that he should have let her die.

I have to give The Brain That Wouldn't Die props for having the nerve to be so cornball. It's a bad movie but not totally unwatchable. Strange when you think that someone went into this with good intentions. You almost need a pen and paper in hand to write down all the improbabilities that this movie has to offer (try it, it's fun). It is a little Ironic that a movie with this title is so delightfully . . . brainless.