Customer Reviews

Brainiac

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is an amazing film from our friends in Mexico. I give it five stars for hilarity and pompousness in equal combinations. You will be unable to stop rolling your eyes at this film.

The premise is that in 1661 this guy, Baron Vitelius of Astara, was burned as part of the Inquisition in "New Spain" (Mexico), and he vows revenge on the descendents of those who wrongfully executed him in 300 years, when the comet that was overhead at the time of the execution returns. We know he is serious, because he appears to have ill defined magical powers, including the power of invisibility, which for some reason he does not use to escape the fire.

In 1961, right on schedule, the comet returns, the Baron riding along with it, only now he is the Brainiac, a monster who must eat human brains. The comet needs an aside here: never before has a comet looked this hokey in all of film history (you simply must see this for yourself), and secondly, the comet lands (!) by gently dropping to the ground with a thud. It appears to be papier-mache. No smoke, no crater, nothing. Then Brainiac gets out. Amazing.

Brainiac is able to transform himself into a suave Baron who eats brains out of a casserole dish after he removes them (intact, somehow) from his victims skulls using his tubular, bifurcated tongue while in his Brainiac form. After we meet the Brainiac we get to a long monologue that was not dubbed into English, so perhaps it was a great scene, but somehow I doubt it. In the end he succeeds in killing the descendants of his old rivals and meets his own demise, oddly enough through the genius of special effects, in his underwear.

The special effects throughout this film are delightfully bad, and none is worse than the puffy, hyperventilating Brainiac himself with his rubber forked tongue and hairy hooves that he uses like big, hairy tweezers.

This movie is so bad you almost feel sorry for it. It is un-scary and tedious, yet pompous, pretentious, and so badly executed that like a train wreck, it is impossible to look away.

CasaNegra continues it's top-notch quality preservation of old Mexican horror films with "El Baron del Terror" or "Brainiac". The film is absolutely ridiculous, cheaply made but beautifully shot in gorgeous b&w. And it's this wonderful quality that CasaNegra preserves. The print is immaculate, enabling you to see fine details like the unbelievably cheap sets and the unbelievably cheap "comet" that brings our monster "el baron" to earth 300 years after he was burned alive for heresy, debauchery, sorcery and so on. One thing must be said, though, the story is imaginative. But the baron (played by the producer Abel Salazar), in monster form, is one of the screen's most ludicrous looking things I've ever seen. He's hysterical. And likes brains, which we won't get into because he keeps them unrefridgerated and, well, nobody seemed to catch that they would SMELL after a while? Anyway, this is a fun film that's enjoyable to watch in such beautiful, sharp condition and to savor and share with your friends who also might enjoy hoots like this. The dialogue is not to be missed either. Says a detective, "A maniac with knowledge is a threat." Hmmm...guess so. Please enjoy!

First of all I would like to mention the quality of the image and sound, is superb. This movie was made in 1962 and you will never notice that, what a great job doing the transfer.

The Villian of the movie get's killed by fire when the movie starts and swears to come back and kill the descendants of those who took his life, and no he is not Freddy Krueger ;)

Two hundred years later he comes back to fulfill his promise. Of course this time he can transform himself into a "horrible" monster, of course is a very cheesy one and it will make you laugh a lot, This classic has all the elements of a fun campy horror movie, cheesy monster and FX's, some bad acting, some not that bad acting and specially "The Look", you will understand it when you watch it :D

I never thought I would see such a good print of this title. The DVD revolution is fantastic.

One of my favorites from south of the Border. The monster is so over the top and the storyline so nutty, not to mention the crazy dubbing. If you love Plan 9 or Robot Monster, then pick this up.
The lead (German Robles) has played other great Mexican Monsters - he was the lead in the classic, The Vampire and The Vampire's Coffin.

Well, it's cheap, cheesy, but a good laugh. I especially liked the
scene with the big bowl of brains -- the "good guy" slurps a spoonful. I assume that since this movie was made in Spain that they are real brains (calves brains?) and not Jello. Yuck.

There is nothing that has not gone wrong with this movie. Please do buy it, and from the opening credits to the most amazing ending there are lots of laughs. It's so badly written, acted, filmed and dubbed, that one finds it hard to belive it wasn't masterminded by at least someone who screwed it up intentionally. The transformation scenes and the final outcome (monster) must be the lousiest in the rich history of stinking bad cinema. A true masterpiece!!!

it's a dirty shane casanegra entertainment is no longer making these great mexican horror films on dvd.they were a great company who restored these movies to near perfection.this movie for example--the brainiac,made in 1962,has abel salazar for a change playing a real bad guy,who gets revenge on the judges who sentenced him to death back in 1661 by coming back to modern times and killing off one by one the descendants of the judges by sucking the brains out of,burning to death,and drowning in one case.i have all the casanegra dvds they made in 2006 and 2007 and unfortunately they are all out of print.they had scheduled 2 more great horror movies for release,"the living head" and "the world of the vampires" but unfortunately this great company went out of business before they could be released.you can't go wrong with any of the casanegra dvds but to me this one is the most fun to watch.i hope one day casanegra entertainment will make a comeback--to have a company restore these lost classics to near perfection is rare nowadays,so let's keep our fingers crossed that someone purchases this great company and releases more great mexican horror movies the way they should be(and by the way they come with both english and spanish audio tracks).

The Brainiac is a movie so silly that Frank Zappa had to make references to it in one of his songs! And silly it is, in a kind of Mexican Plan 9 sort of way. The plot is the whole heretic guy getting burned during the inquisition with the whole "I curse you and your descendants" thing. Kinda like Bava's Black Sunday, but one thing Bava's film didn't have is a monster like this one. Once the condemned Baron turns up again 300 years later, he basically looks normal until he decides to get down and dirty with revenge. After hypnotizing his victims(an optical trick that makes his face blink like a vehicle's turn signal), he turns into...THE BRAINIAC. The Brainiac looks like a kindergartener's attempt at making a troll mask complete with rubber forked tongue. He's a hoot! Unfortunately that's all the movie really has going for it. The scenes in between have a few unintentional chuckles, but it's all rather boring. The best scenes are when The Brainiac appears, and unfortunately, they go by a little too fast. Regardless of it's shortcomings, I'd definitely recommend this movie to all fans of the schlocky and the bizarre.

This movie is absolutely incredible and styrange. In the 1987 many fans were introduced to this film when clips

from it were included on the home video release "Zacherly's Horrable Horror'. At the time, the Brainiac had dissapeared from regular TV showings and, for many, this was all that could be seen. It was a revelation that blew our minds. Clips showed a cone shaped rock drop from the sky and land flat. It then transformed into

a huge hairy headed creature with sucktion cup fingers who is depicted changing into a human and, incredibly,

sucking the brains out of victims with a probing tongue. All thw while his head is expanding and contracting like a Rob Bottin bladder effect. Amazing. Glad that I can now see the whole movie. Its mind blowing. Way ahead of its time. This creature was a radical departure from the standard vampires of the time. Its the Grandad of the Chupacabra.