THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE / Rex Carlton Productions - 1962

Welcome everbloody to Monster Monday with Tabonga, here at The Dungeon! What a wild one we gots tonite, and, one that Eegah!! and I saw back in '62 at the old Sierra Theater. Neccos were a nickel, which was a great deal, because, there were about 30 of them, and, when you got to a flavor you didn't like, you could fly them like frisbees at your unsuspecting victims! They were even more effective from the balcony!!

What can we say about this super flip flick that hasn't already been covered?.. Well, you might be surprised!

The music is great, sooo sleazy, the best! It's by those two guys in the credits there for 'The Web' theme, by permission of Laurel Records... Nuf said?

Now it's time to bring in our littlest Dungeon helper, Rufus The Gnat! Rufus always pushes the big red 'GO' button on Mondays, and starts our Eariffic Earclip rolling along. Push the button now, Rufus! Here's... THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE!

Jason Evers plays Dr. Bill Cortner, he had his first bit part in a war movie from 1943, GUADALCANAL, and, was in a TV episode of BELIEVE IT OR NOT from 1950. Anywho, check out this photo of the experimental surgery the doc is performing and see if something seems amiss, I'll be back in 30 seconds...

dum de dum... Okay, there's no skull!!

In 1962, I sent in a letter to the letter dept. of FAMOUS MONSTERS and they printed it in issue #22, shown above!! It was a (bad) review of this very movie. Since I have sold my copy, I can't remember the entire content, but, it was a little lengthy. Check it out if you have access to that issue.


Bill ignores the curve sign, crashes his car and then has to pull the severed head of his fiancée off the seat! I could never understand why there wasn't an inquiry by the cops, since he just left the car burning there on the side of the road with a decapitated body in it, and, registered to him!.. Weird.

The doc shows his helper, Kurt, how far his experimentation has advanced. That's Virginia Leith as The Head. Looks like she's got a little gas!

Here's a quote from Kurt, and, from what his hand looks like, makes him an expert on the subject... "The paths of experimentation twist and turn through mountains of miscalculations and often lose themselves in error and darkness!"

Bill takes a peek to check the progress of his latest screw up, and, gags at the sight!!

Bill goes out prowling for bodies. Wait, where's the gal in the poster?!

The doc has it all, good looks, coolness and a new convertible! And, he has a hot tip on a hot body to boot!

Hubba hubba... Adele Lamont... Make Tabonga come unglued! There's a joke there.

I love this shot of Bill, he's kinda impressed by her deadly mental handywork!

Lookit the size of that mitt! The Head sets up Kurt by warning the monster in the closet when to strike thru mental communication!

No doubt about it, the monster, played by Eddie Carmel, was shocking! Reminds me of the twisted-up victims 3 years later in THE CURSE OF THE FLY. Lots of blood, too! Eddie was in one other flick, something called 50,000 B.C. (Before Clothing)! He was an uncanny 7' 6-3/4" tall, wow! Also, Sammy Petrillo is the only actor to not get a credit in this film!

And, finally, Bill gets a taste of his own medicine!

I ended my review in FM with something like... I guess that the lady and the monster went and got married!

And, to top it all off, here's a rare publicity photo from the shoot, must of been a hoot!! I censored it, just to make sure we don't offend.

And, and... Here's a shot of Sammy Petrillo as one of the pervs with a camera (on the right). Another special request insert for Prof. Grewbeard.

And, and, and!.. Since Eegah!! took the time to write out my original review from FM #22 in the comments section, we're going to add it here at the very end of the post. In my original letter I used Herb Ever's name, they changed it to 'hero' when published, out of courtesy to Herb/Jason I suppose! Anyway, here's the entire review from FM #22's letters page, I was 14 years old and had monster fever.

THE PAIN THAT WOULDN"T DIE....

"Yesterday I saw THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN"T DIE. It was the most ridiculous picture since PHANTOM PLANET. The acting was the worst yet, not to mention the unspecial special effects. It was terrible from the start when the leading man saved a man's life by pinching the victim's brain with a pair of tweezers. To get to the victim's brain, he cut & pulled back a layer of skin that was about 100th of an inch thick. I didn't think this was so bad until I realized that he had no skull. It would be awful hard to have facial features without a skull but I guess he was one of the lucky ones. I didn't think the picture could get much worse but I was wrong. When he took the head of the woman he loved from the wreck, it was already cut off for him so that he wouldn't have to go back to the hospital to get a scalpel. Of course his serum kept the head alive. All thru the picture there was a mutilated creature in the closet. Hero was ready to take the body of a woman when the creature broke out. My friends and I cracked up. The creature had the worst make-up job since the pop-eyed men in KILLERS FROM SPACE. The creature took the woman & left after he accidently knocked over some chemicals & started the lab on fire. Hero and the brain were left to die. The creature & the woman most likely got married."

Ghoulnight Everbloody!!..

THE LODGER - Friedhofer / Bellwood / Herbert / Crook / Chevalier - "There's Been Another Ripper Murder" (1944)

Whenever our pal Greg Goodsell gives us a tip, we try and pay attention, and tonight's shocking feature entitled "The Lodger" is the direct result! The main soundtrack music was written by Hugo Friedhofer who was up to his elbows in music of some form in everything from "Casablanca" to "Jungle Moon Men" and so much more!! He won an Oscar in 1947 for "The Best Years Of Our Lives!" See kids, playing the cello can pay off!!

Gawd, what a great movie! It's a Victorian London scene and everybody's having a good time except it's a fact that Jack The Ripper is on the prowl, so the local Constabulary is on double extra alert! The drunken louts outside The Weavers Arms are singing a tune called "What Cher 'Ria" written by Bessie Bellwood and Will Herbert in 1885! I like the fact that it's not only a Saloon, it's also a Bar!!

There's been yet another murder, and Hey Kid, shouldn't you be home in bed?

The not even half-assed subtle 6' 3" Laird Cregar as Mr. Slade comes onto the scene looking for a place to live temporarily, a lodger as it were! Laird Cregar was a massive talent that would never have a chance to peak because he only lived to be 31 years of age. They say he went on a crash diet that took him from 300 to 200 pounds and that his heart would just not accept the challenge!

Sara Allgood as the rather wealthy but down on hard times Ellen Bonting shows Mr. Slade the room that she and her husband are willing to allow him to rent! There are a lot of shots from down low that make Laird look even larger than he already was! Sara was Mrs. Higgins in the 1941 version of "Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde," and Mrs. Midget in the 1944 flick, "Between Two Worlds."

The fabulous Merle Oberon is the Bonting's niece, Kitty Langley, and she is quite the distinguished performer as you can see from the advertisement!

The song that Merle and the girls are performing is called "Tink-A-Tin" and was written by John Crook and Albert Chevalier back in good ole 1891, and you gotta love those outfits!

Since Jack The Ripper has a penchant for showgirls and prostitutes, backstage after Merle's act, George Sanders as police Inspector John Warwick has some questions that need to be answered! It's not often that you can see outrageous muttonchops and headgear all in the same shot! "The Lodger" has got it all!!

Inspector Warwick shows Kitty some of the features of the police's own little horror museum, meat cleaver and all!

There's been another Ripper murder! Is this a great shot or what?

The stunningly beautiful Kitty is also staying with her aunt and uncle, so now with Mr. Slade there too, they've really got a full house! She hears some odd noises and then sees some smoke coming from somewhere!

As he burns bloodied garments, Mr. Slade explains to Kitty that he is a pathologist, and sometimes performs strange experiments, and everybody but the viewer falls for all his bullshit, that's the amazing thing! Sure, Mrs. Bonting was getting suspicious by his werid nocturnal adventures, but her husband and Kitty always just seem to think she's overreacting despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary!

Geoge Sanders keeps on uselessly looking for clues!

Kitty and the gals have a new song and dance routine to debut called "The Parisian Trot," and it's just about as much as Mr. Slade can take!! "The Parisian Trot" was written by Lionel Newman and Charles Henderson!

Still not even having a clue, Kitty had invited Mr. Slade to the show to see her new act, and all that skin is going to push him way over the edge! I need to go back and count how many movies we've written about that had Can-Can dance numbers in them, it's got to be close to 100!

It should come as no shock that Kitty's going to have a very expected unexpected visitor!

There's really no weird twists or turns or mystery to the story at all! You know who the killer is from the first second you see him, but that's not really the point, since you know what's going to happen, the fun is just watching the story unravel!

You know I'm a sucker for a classic spiral stairwell that looks like the inside of a conch shell!

The authorities are especially clueless and ineffective the whole way!

I don't usually like giving away endings, but since you know what's going to happen anyway, it doesn't matter this time! Good night Mr. Slade!! Sweet dreams!

Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, and Kurt Cobain only made it to 27 years of age, Laird Cregar was 28 when this film was made. Hard to believe he only got third billing! God willing, and the creek don't rise, one of these days, we'll get around to another Cregar classic, "Hangover Square!"