In Riverdale, Illinois, a man carrying a lighted glass container bumps into a pedestrian. The container is broken, and a fight ensues.
On their way home, Glenn Cameron and his fiancée, Elaine, are distracted by a light. They stop to investigate in nearby woods and find dead animals before coming upon a metal structure resembling a rocket nose cone.
Two days later, in Washington, D.C., a committee reviews classified army footage of the object. Also noted are several murders in the nearby town. Sen. Walter K. Powers and his assistant Dan Walker fly to Riverdale to investigate and are met by Glenn Cameron, whose father, the mayor, is missing. The three drive to the object's location. Alice Summers, the mayor's secretary, assists Dr. Paul Kettering, the committee's chief investigator, by recording test results. The senator approaches the cone to question Kettering and his assistant, Dr. Wyler. The cone appears to be indestructible, and its interior is a maze of tunnels.
Meanwhile, Mayor Cameron returns to his office, acting as if possessed. He takes a pistol from his desk and struggles to point it at his head. Kettering, the senator, Alice and Glenn arrive. Kettering notices a mound near the mayor's neck and asks him about it. The mayor strikes Glenn while attempting to flee. The mayor starts shooting and is eventually killed in the hallway by a deputy.
During the autopsy, the doctor and Kettering find a dead creature attached to the mayor's neck; it injected a toxin into his nervous system. Even without being shot, he would have died within 24–48 hours.
While driving toward the cone, the sheriff sees a man lying on the road. The sheriff tries to help the man, who attacks him. Another man, holding a glass container, watches the fight. The sheriff is knocked out, and the two men remove something from the container. The sheriff revives and the three drive off in his car.
Aided by Alice, Kettering experiments with a piece of the creature that infected the mayor. Like a parasite, it attaches itself to Kettering, who frees himself by burning it. Wyler calls Kettering, and they drive to the cone. En route, they discover an abandoned electric company utility truck. Sen. Powers calls the sheriff, who does not answer, struggling with being possessed. Three groups are organized to search for other metal objects. Kettering and Alice find the body of the truck's driver with two puncture wounds on the neck. While searching, Glenn and Elaine are locked inside a cabin. Someone tries to set the cabin on fire, but Glenn shoots at him and escapes with his fiancée. The three groups reassemble at the mayor's office and discover two glowing containers holding more parasites. The senator calls the telegraph office to send a warning to the governor. The telegrapher takes down the message but, being possessed, does not send it.
Three men drive to Alice's apartment and plant a parasite in her room. She is taken over and joins the men. Realizing she is missing, Paul and Glenn drive back to the cone and see Prof. Helsingman, a dying man who vanished five years earlier along with a scientific expedition. Discovering marks on his neck, they take him to hospital. Kettering questions the professor, who only utters the word "Carboniferous", referring to a geologic time period millions of years ago. Sen. Powers tries to make calls, but is told that the lines are busy. Glenn and Paul go to the telegraph office to find out if the warning was sent to the governor. They are attacked but manage to subdue their assailants and flee.
Kettering climbs the cone to check on his equipment. He realizes the two deputies on guard are now possessed, and both are shot and killed. Kettering and Glenn crawl inside the cone and discover a room behind a sliding wall. They are greeted by another member of the missing expedition, an old man who says he was once Prof. Cole but now holds "a position of a much higher order." Apparently, the parasites' invasion is coming from inside the Earth. They want to force upon mankind a life free from strife and turmoil, creating a utopia. After the possessed Cole disappears, Kettering shoots and kills the lurking sheriff. Parasites then chase Kettering and Glenn outside.
Kettering formulates a plan using the abandoned truck. Using a harpoon gun, he connects an electrical wire from one end of the ravine to the other. He prepares to shoot a connecting wire from the cone to a high voltage transmission line, completing a circuit. Before Kettering can finish, Alice exits the cone. Kettering tries to rescue her. Being possessed, she refuses to move and kills him with a pistol. Glenn fires the harpoon gun, making the connection to the transmission line, which engulfs the cone in electricity. Alice collapses as the parasites inside the object are electrocuted. Walking away from the site, Glenn and Elaine later embrace.
Leonard Nimoy (credited as Leonard Nemoy) as Professor Cole
Doug Banks as Doctor
Henry Randolph as Telegrapher
Saul Bronson as Professor Helsingman
Hampton Fancher as Zombie
Production
Advertisement from 1958 for The Brain Eaters and co-feature, Earth vs. the Spider
The Brain Eaters was known during production as, variously, The Keepers, The Keepers of the Earth, Attack of the Blood Leeches, and Battle of the Brain Eaters.[2]
Actor VeSota wanted to direct a film, so he approached Corman with the script. Corman helped him raise the modest financing needed, as well as arranging distribution through AIP. The film was shot over six days on a budget of $26,000.[3]
After its release, science fiction author Robert A. Heinlein sued for plagiarism, asking for damages of $150,000, claiming that The Brain Eaters was based on his 1951 novel The Puppet Masters. Corman insisted that he was unfamiliar with Heinlein's work, both while reading the script and during the film's production. He did, however, see the obvious comparisons once he'd read the novel, so Corman settled out of court for $5,000 and acceded to Heinlein's demand that he receive no screen credit, as the author found the film "wanting".[3] The lawsuit that resulted halted actor John Payne's intention of producing a film based on Heinlein's novel.
The Puppet Masters is a 1951 science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein, in which American secret agents battle parasitic invaders from outer space. It was originally serialized in Galaxy Science Fiction.
The Trip is a 1967 American psychedelic film released by American International Pictures, directed by Roger Corman and written by Jack Nicholson. It was shot on location in and around Los Angeles, including on top of Kirkwood in Laurel Canyon, the Hollywood Hills, and near Big Sur, California, over three weeks in March and April 1967. Peter Fonda stars as a young man who experiences his first LSD trip.
X, better known by its promotional title, X: The Man with the X-ray Eyes, is a 1963 American science fiction horror film in Pathécolor, produced and directed by Roger Corman, from a script by Ray Russell and Robert Dillon. The film stars Ray Milland as a scientist who develops a method to extend the range of his vision, which results in unexpected complications. Comedian Don Rickles co-stars in one of his few dramatic roles. Diana Van der Vlis and veteran character actor Morris Ankrum also make appearances.
Edwin Stafford Nelson was an American actor, best known for his role as Dr. Michael Rossi in the television series Peyton Place.
Battle Beyond the Stars is a 1980 American space opera film produced by Roger Corman, directed by Jimmy T. Murakami, and starring Richard Thomas, Robert Vaughn, George Peppard, John Saxon, Sybil Danning and Darlanne Fluegel. Inspired by the Americanized edit under Corman's lead; Battle Beyond the Sun (1962) of Soviet film Nebo Zovyot (1959), it was intended as a futuristic "Magnificent Seven in outer space", the screenplay was written by John Sayles with the score by James Horner and special effects designed by filmmaker James Cameron. The film was theatrically released by Corman's New World Pictures and was a moderate box office success, despite receiving mixed reviews from critics.
The Cars That Ate Paris is a 1974 Australian horror comedy film, produced by twin brothers Hal and Jim McElroy and directed by Peter Weir. It was his first feature film, and was also based on an original story he had written. Shot mostly in the rural town of Sofala, New South Wales, the film is set in the fictional town of Paris in which most of the inhabitants appear to be directly, or indirectly, involved in profiting from the results of car accidents. The film is considered part of the Australian New Wave genre.
Night of the Creeps is a 1986 American science fiction horror comedy film written and directed by Fred Dekker in his feature directorial debut, starring Jason Lively, Jill Whitlow, and Tom Atkins. The film is an earnest attempt at a B movie and an homage to the genre. While the main plot of the film is related to zombies, the film also mixes in takes on slashers and alien invasion films. Night of the Creeps did not perform well at the box office, but it developed a cult following.
Dinocroc is a 2004 American horror film directed by Kevin O'Neill. The film's plot revolves around a genetically engineered Suchomimus terrorizing the lake-side residents of a small town. The film stars Matthew Borlenghi, Jane Longenecker, Charles Napier, Costas Mandylor, Bruce Weitz, and Joanna Pacuła.
3:10 to Yuma is a 1957 American Western film directed by Delmer Daves and starring Glenn Ford and Van Heflin. Based on a 1953 short story of the same name by Elmore Leonard, the plot concerns an impoverished rancher who takes on the risky job of escorting a notorious outlaw to justice.
Watchers is a 1988 science fiction horror film directed by Jon Hess and starring Corey Haim, Michael Ironside, Barbara Williams, and Lala Sloatman. It is loosely based on the 1987 novel Watchers by Dean R. Koontz.
Patrick F. Kilbane is an American actor, comedian, and screenwriter best known for his three seasons as a cast member on MADtv (1997–2000), as well his memorable appearance in the 1996 "The Bizarro Jerry" episode of Seinfeld. Kilbane's first book, The Brain Eater's Bible: Sound Advice for the Newly Reanimated Zombie, was released on March 18, 2011.
A Bucket of Blood is a 1959 American comedy horror film directed by Roger Corman. It starred Dick Miller and was set in the West Coast beatnik culture of the late 1950s. The film, produced on a $50,000 budget, was shot in five days and shares many of the low-budget filmmaking aesthetics commonly associated with Corman's work. Written by Charles B. Griffith, the film is a dark comic satire about a dimwitted, impressionable young busboy at a Bohemian café who is acclaimed as a brilliant sculptor when he accidentally kills his landlady's cat and covers its body in clay to hide the evidence. When he is pressured to create similar work, he becomes a serial murderer.
The Horror of Party Beach is a 1964 American horror film in the beach party genre, directed and co-produced by Del Tenney. The film is described as "a take-off on beach parties and musicals", with film critics characterizing it as one of the worst films of all time.
A Bucket of Blood is a 1995 American comedy horror television film. A remake of the 1959 film of the same name, it follows the original closely, adapting it to a contemporary setting. The film was directed by comedian Michael McDonald, produced by Roger Corman, and co-written by McDonald and Brendan Broderick, based on the 1959 screenplay by Charles B. Griffith.
Capone is a 1975 American action crime film directed by Steve Carver and produced by Roger Corman, based on the life of notorious 20th-century gangster Al Capone. It stars Ben Gazzara in the title role, along with Harry Guardino, Susan Blakely, John Cassavetes, and Sylvester Stallone in an early film appearance.
Gunslinger is a 1956 American Western film directed by Roger Corman and starring John Ireland, Beverly Garland and Allison Hayes. The screenplay was written by Mark Hanna and Charles B. Griffith.
Von Richthofen and Brown, alternatively titled The Red Baron, is a 1971 war film directed by Roger Corman and starring John Phillip Law and Don Stroud as Manfred von Richthofen and Roy Brown. Although names of real people are used and embedded in basic historic facts, the story by Joyce Hooper Corrington and John William Corrington makes no claim to be historically accurate, and in fact is largely fictional.
Slasher is a 2007 German slasher film written and directed by Frank W. Montag, and co-written by Jörn Döring.
Less Than Kin is a lost 1918 American silent comedy film directed by Donald Crisp and written by Marion Fairfax and Alice Duer Miller. The film stars Wallace Reid, Ann Little, Raymond Hatton, Noah Beery, Sr., James Neill and Charles Ogle. The film was released on July 21, 1918, by Paramount Pictures.
The Last Stagecoach West is a 1957 American Western film directed by Joseph Kane and starring Jim Davis, Mary Castle, Victor Jory and Lee Van Cleef. The film's art direction was by Ralph Oberg.
↑ Gary A. Smith, The American International Pictures Video Guide, McFarland 2009 p 33
1 2 Mark McGee, Faster and Furiouser: The Revised and Fattened Fable of American International Pictures, McFarland, 1996 p121-122
Bibliography
Warren, Bill. Keep Watching the Skies: American Science Fiction Films of the Fifties, 21st Century Edition. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, 2009 (First Edition 1982). ISBN0-89950-032-3.
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