ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

Jimbo Berkey's website, Free Classic Movies, is giving me the chance to see films I've heard about for decades but never actually watched.

Here's a fine example. The Atomic Brain sounds like a wild and kinky cinematic ride. A movie with a demented scientist who puts a cat's brain into a pretty girl is not something a die-hard science fiction fan can pass up.

I'm really looking forward to this one!
_____________________________________________________

In 1963 Doctor Thomas Starzl from the University of Pittsburgh attempted the first organ transplant in a human, trying to replace a liver.
Although that first patient did not survive, medical science was on the way to discovering how to replace diseased organs with fresh organs. Their advances were amazing for the times, and they sparked the imaginations of many science fiction authors, including the folks who wrote the script for this spell-binding movie.

Although I was very young in 1963, my young teen mind would have been both horrified and fascinated by this plot. With my knowledge of rudimentary science, today the plot seems scientifically ridiculous, but when I remember my young teen mindset with 1963 science, this is a frightening tale of horror and drama.

There are enough surprising plot twists near the end that even horror master Alfred Hitchcock would be proud.

Old hag Hetty March is a very wealthy old lady with one wish — to have the body of a beautiful young girl again. To that end she finances a mad doctor to experiment with brain transplants in the basement of her secluded mansion. He's transplanted animal brains into recently deceased bodies with very limited success. What he needs is a fresh young body that is still alive.

__

__

So, old Mrs. March hires three young ladies with no relatives or friends to come and work at her mansion. One of them will become the girl that the mad doctor will transplant her old brain into. But of course there are complications.

__

At first the plot twists are predictable and good, just what I would expect from a 1963 thriller. But then . . . suddenly . . . as the story heads to the evil ending . . . things start happening that I could never have imagined. I call them 'left turns' — just when I think that I know what will happen next, the writers toss in a 'left turn' out of nowhere, complicating the simple plan in devious and amazing ways.

__

And not just one surprise twist, but a long and fascinating series of twists and turns that bring us to a simply awesome ending. I really mean that . . . this ending is a creative masterpiece worthy of the best science fiction minds of the time.

__

Pop a big bowl of white kernel popcorn with plenty of warm melted butter drizzled over it and enjoy the show.

____Jimbo Berkey
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[orzel-w]

I shaved my legs for this? Pfff.

I should've gone with the popcorn.
_________________
...or not...

WayneO
-----------

[scotpens]

I wonder if this picture was a partial inspiration for Steve Martin's The Man With Two Brains.

[Brent Gair]

I have this on DVD but, for the life of me, I can't remember watching it.

[ralfy]

720p resolution:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij0PCOMqxcc

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

IMDB has 11 trivia items for this movie. Here’s a few of the ones I found the most interesting, in the blue text.
________________________________

~ Shot in 1958, released in 1963. According to producer Jack Pollexfen, the production company went bankrupt about halfway through shooting, leaving no money to finish the film. They tried fixing it in the editing room over the next few years, but it was impossible.

Note from me: Sounds like a case of not knowing a lost cause when you see one . . .

~ Producer Jack Pollexfen fired director Joseph V. Mascelli and finished directing the picture, uncredited.

Note from me: Oh brother, you can bet that if the movie hadn't been a real stinkeroo, Jack would have put his name on i!

~ The narrator of the film is Actor Bradford Dillman. He is the younger brother of one of the credited Screenplay Writers on this movie, Dean Dillman Jr.

Note from me: Seriously? THIS Bradford Dillman? Geez, he must have owed his big brother a huge favor.





~ Although he had directed and shot films in the military, this was the only director credit on a civilian feature film for Joseph V. Mascelli. He is best remembered for his book, "The Five C's of Cinematography," which, more than 55 years later (2020), remains in print and is regarded as a classic and one of the most important texts on cinematography.

Note from me: By gum, it IS still in print! (Click below to order it from Amazon.)


_________________


~ The nude corpse in the first scene is played by Margie Fisco. She was 19 and this was her second of only two roles. Her first was Kipling's Women (1960). She played a nudist and she was only 16 at the time.

Note from me: My goodness, what an illustrious career!

She played a nudist at 16, and three years later she played a nude corpse. That's the saddest resume' I've ever heard of!
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)