Weirdhouse Cinema: The Brain

Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. My name is Rob Lamb.

And I'm Jie McCormick. In today, it's all brains.

That's right.

We have a lot of brain content going on elsewhere in the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast feed this week, so we figured, well, we got to do a brain film. There have plenty to choose from. It was actually quite difficult to decide on one, but we're we're also this is kind of double purpose though, because we've been we've been trying to hit some other countries in our Weird House Cinema selections, and today's Weird House Cinema selection allows us to check Canada off the list.

So our Canadian movie, yeah.

I believe it is.

I believe it's our first Canadian film, and you can you can taste the Canadian sensibilities in it, I feel yeah.

So, I mean, one thing to get out of the way right at the beginning is that this is a brain monster movie. And yes, you know who can deny a good brain monster movie. You know you got Fiend without a Face, you got the classics, and this one is a sort of updated version of that fifties vibe. But the other way to look at The Brain nineteen eighty eight is that it is a pretty much perfect mix of videodrome and final sacrifice.

Yeah it is kind of yeah, definitely with video drum. We'll come back to that again and again. This is in many ways, your discount video drome. This is your your bottom shelf video drome selection.

This is your.

We have video drome at home, Timmy moments.

There's got plenty of Cronenberg back at home.

Yeah, yeah, we got plenty chromeber back at home. None of this is to say that this film is terrible that you should watch it. I found this to be very enjoyable. But no, get that sense.

This was very fun be horror. Yeah, thumbs up to this one though, it absolutely is. It has very Cronenberg ripoff vibes. Should we do the elevator pitch to help

YEP, that's absolutely accurate. Again, the video drone vibes are strong and it definitely pays homage to pass Killer Brain films. You mentioned, Feed with a Fiend Without a Face nineteen fifty eight, a horror film, one of the few horror films, or a certain select number of horror films, so you can find in the Criterion collection that one is about brains and spinal columns being taken over by outside alien minds and then coming alive and crawling out of people's bodies.

Especially Brain from Planet a Roosts, because it's just a giant brain, like the Fiend without a Face has brains that are normal sized brains coming out of people's bodies. I think they turn invisible somehow and they attack it, so they're literally there are scenes of people like shooting it, swarms of brains flying at them. But this one is one giant brain. And it's very confusing because the giant brain has a face. It has eyes, and it has a nose, and it has a mouth with pointy teeth.

Yeah, what it is is they probably saw a fiend without a face, and you know, they're like, this is good, but you know what, it's lacking face on it face. It kind of looks like a big gorilla face too, especially in the poster art for this film. I remember seeing that years and years ago, and I got the sense of a monster gorilla as opposed to a brain.

And then this movie is all about the brain. You can tell that the director was in love with the brain puppet they have created because it starts with the brain, it ends with the brain. It's not like Jaws where there's a long, slow build up to it. They're just like instantly throwing the brain right at you and they let you get a long, good look at it.

Yeah, before you see a single human character. You see the brain writhing around. I think it's preface at this point, I didn't have a face yet, but writhing around and its nutrient bay flog in its tentacles and or spinal column around. Yeah, and then it just gets so much screen time, so much screen time, and it looks good. It looks it's definitely that, like you've made the distinction before.

I Like, one thing about the face of the brain is that the brain grows a face right after it eats a human, and so you kind of wonder if like it learned how to do face by taking a human inside of it. There's one part where it, like the lobes of the brain kind of peel open like lips. The two hemispheres open up along the fissure in the middle, and then the cerebrum just gobbles up this lady. And then right after that it just kind of poops a face out of the front of it.

Yeah, and this is a film that it doesn't help you a lot. It doesn't give you a lot of details to go on, which means there's not a lot of you know, exposition to bog you down. So if you like watching a weird film and trying to figure out on your own what's happening, then this, this may be the film for you.

Yes, if you're thinking, I would like a Canadian horror thriller with media and brainwashing vibes, something along the lines of early eighties Cronenberg like Scanners or Videodrome, but less interesting, less subversive, less depressing and dark and grimy and more just kind of rubber monster and slime fun. This is what you're looking for.

That's right.

Well, let's have just a sample of the audio here. I'm not sure that we even have a bit from a trailer, because I was having a hard time finding an actual English language trailer for this film, But we're going to play something for you right now.

Your mediocre mind cannot begin to comprehend the importance of my work. I suggest you look into your own neurotic behavior. Then perhaps you will understand your continuing negativity.

You have to stop this insane research.

That thing isn't satisfied. Just controlling the minds of the people who watch your TV show. It's apparent you and I will no longer be able to work together. Fine with me, but wait till I tell people what's really going on around here. Now take that thing and bury it where a.

Belongs, all right, So who made this thing?

All right?

So let's start at the top with the director, ed Hunt or Edward Hunt as I think they may be actually excited on this. Raised in la but moved to Canada in nineteen sixty nine and clearly brought the B movie bug with.

Him in that move.

He made a film in nineteen seventy seven titled Starship Invasions, which starred Robert Vaughan of Bullet and Lawyer commercial fame. And you've actually, oh.

I'm sorry, well no, did you know in our house we've got a magnet on our fridge that's got Robert Vaughan on it that's for some local personal injury lawyer in Atlanta. And it doesn't identify like it's not. It makes it look like this is a guy who works for the law firm. He's like pointing a stern finger. He kind of looks like pouy w nuts from the sopranos like he's going to beat you up. He's dressed in a suit and he looks like tough, he's gonna

Yeah, yeah, Yeah. They used to air these on television Atlanta all the time. Maybe they still do, and I just don't see them because I don't, you know, just because Robert Vaughn's dead doesn't mean you can't still, you know, be the spokesman for a law firm.

Yeah, they put fred as Stare in a vacuum commercial after he died. They can put Lyndon Johnson and Forrest Gump. Why not get Robert Vaughan to just make lawyer commercials from beyond the Grave until a million years from now.

Yeah.

Now, Christopher Lee, his co star in that film, as far as I know, has not done lawyer commercials. But that would be impressive if you had so. Anyway, ed Hunt, he did a nineteen eighty one horror movie called Bloody Birthday and the Brain was really the tail end of his main period, his heyday of making films, as he didn't direct another film until twenty fourteen's Halloween Hell, which apparently starred Eric Roberts as Dracula, which I think is

You know, draw your own conclusions.

Wait, but that would also count out the Christopher Nolan Batman films.

That didn't star Eric Roberts. But no, Eric Roberts. His presence in a film is not necessarily a good sign. But he's been in some things that I love, so yeah, he was. He was probably in the best for my money HP Lovecraft film. I forget what it was called, Callbough, but he played like a wizard in it.

It was pretty good.

Okay, okay, wait a minute, blind choice right now, two movies you haven't seen, one in which Eric Roberts plays Dracula, another in which post two thousands Rutger Hower plays Dracula. Which one do you?

Oh?

See? Those are both?

These are similar omens, right, because they were both in some horrible films, But individually I like them both as perform forms, as actors. I guess I'd go with rutger I'd probably suffer for it, but I would go with rugger Hower.

Then what you are looking for. Is the Dario Argento Dracula movie that I have never managed to watch more than about thirty seconds off?

Yeah, I know that exists.

Doesn't look good. Okay, So here's the big question that was just haunting me while I was watching this. I tried to google it and I couldn't figure it out. But somehow you must have come across an information source that I couldn't Where was this filmed? Because this movie features some very familiar looking Canadian highways. You ever driven around in Canada, you will see some familiar looking sort of architecture, you know, residential architecture and highway signs and stuff.

Yes, it is the headquarters or one of the headquarters of a nefarious organization that wants to make exact copies of things. It's that it's the Xerox Research Center of Canada. It's it's in Ontario or outside of Ontario some way, it's in within Ontario. Sorry, okay, but yeah, that's what it is. I'm definitely the outsides. And I suspect the interiors in this film as well, because there are some fabulous factory interiors that look very authentic and in use.

Yeah, but there are also these interesting a trio with these very high ceilings and these terrorists is zigzagging walkways with interesting looking railings. It's just a cool building.

Yeah.

That and some some suburbs that look like Freddy Krueger should show.

Up in any moment, you know.

It's just like that, that that eighties level of XS in housing.

Ye.

But now now that you say Ontario, that makes sense. It does somehow look a little bit more eastern than the areas I was thinking of, like in Alberta.

Yeah, and I can't remember the exact city in Ontario, but it's in Ontario. Okay, you can go visit it. I'm sure they want people to show up and ask about the brain, right, you take the brain to her.

Is Sam Neil the son of the railroad tycoon? Or is he the railroad tycoon?

I guess he must be The two thousand and nine seems kind of late for Sam Neil to be playing the love interest.

Yeah, I guess so.

Yeah, but who knows? And then who Puho's Peter o'tool play.

I'm not sure?

Let us place the train is he is the locomotive Peter two.

All right, Let's talk about some of the humans that are acting in this film though, because, first of all, the really big one this is a film that has a mad scientist type character in it. We have a lot of questions about their identity, but the actor playing them is awesome. It is David Gayle, and the character that David Gaale was playing is doctor Anthony either Blake or Blakelee depending on who you're asking.

Everything on the internet said BLAKELYE like Blake l Why but I watched this movie. I am certain they were saying Blake unless they were just unless the l y was silent. Did you ever hear anybody in the movie say Blake Lee.

I never heard anyone say Blakely And in fact, I fooled myself into thinking they were saying doctor Gail at one point, just because the actor's name was doctor was David Kale.

So David Gail is a tremendous villainous character actor. I don't know a lot of his work other than that he was in Reanimator, but he was the villain and Reanimator, and he has this excellent, conceited, smug, elderly patrician character energy. He in some ways he by having a kind of like elongated face and very upper crust yale mannerisms. He kind of reminds me of John Kerry, former US Senator and Secretary of State, but with a with a more like nah, you know, like he's always like rubbing his

Yeah, he has his great presence because he has this wonderfully expressive gaunt face. He has these piercing eyes, great voice, and he has this smile that when he's he seems like his natural smile is for one side to sort of sneer, like he has an anatomical sneer just built into to his countenance, which I really like. And as far as actress, he reminds me of there's like a little bit of Christopher Lee there, I feel, and also a little bit of what's his name, Dan O'Herlihy was.

Oh Dan O'Hurley, Yeah, the old man from RoboCop or the villain from Halloween three.

Yeah.

Now, Gail was younger than both of those actors I just mentioned. Gail lived nineteen thirty six through nineteen ninety one, so he sadly died way too young. He died due to heart surgery complications. He managed to cubment himself as a B movie icon before that, largely due to Reanimator, in which he played Doctor Hill, and I think spends most of the first movie and all of the second movie as just a head in a pan like literally chewing scenery. At times.

You can just imagine that, like, even after his head is removed, he is getting immense pleasure from denying younger scientists tenure. Yeah, you will never be accepted at this university.

Yeah, yeah, he's in the part of the tragedy is like you look at his filmography prior to re Animator, and you know, he did a fair amount of TV work. I think he worked in the New York stage before that, British born, but sort of came up in the New York stage. And after re Animator, you can see that he's suddenly getting all these horror parts because now he's branched off.

Into this new world.

You know, you see him show up in Pulse Pounders, Tales from the dark Side. He was in the movie The Guyver that we've mentioned before that was screaming mad George's film. He was in a film called The Engineer. I guess it's like Sinn Engineer or something from nineteen ninety. Yeah, he was really like cementing himself as this genre staple. I even read that he was going to be the villain in Kicks, that monster movie that we've both seen about Killer Ticks.

Yeah, oh we rented that from video Drome at some point, but I don't remember who the villain in the movie was. I just remember ticks.

I was looking at it, and I guess it was the Clint Howard role. Though Clint Howard and David Gale are two actors that are just miles apart, Like they're both tremendous fun but I don't think of think of them as competing for the same part, you know. Yeah, So anyway, Yeah, Gale didn't ultimately didn't have that many horror B movie credits, that many weird roles, but the ones he did have certainly stuck with us, and in this movie's no exception, he really has quite a fun presence in this.

I would say this movie is all about the villains because we haven't even gotten to the young heroes yet, the main characters, because they almost don't matter. This movie is just about the villains. So you've got doctor Blake played by David Gailee here is like the top villain

What Buza is Like, you know, you hear about figures that show up at all, like these pivotal moments in history, but are largely unobserved. Like Buza is is that like he's he has been in everything he and not only is an actor, he's also done a ton of voice acting. So for instance, one of his most well known roles was voicing a beast on the nineties X Men cartoon.

Oh yeah, okay, but he.

Also did he was in both Droids and and Ewoks, both of the Star Wars animated series back in the day, the old ones before they were you know good uh so, so yeah, he's just been in been all sorts of things. But the weird thing is, like watching this film, I recognized him and yet could not place a single thing that I'd actually seen him in.

Like it was weird.

Exactly the same mental experience here, but I also realized that George Buza is a type we need to discuss this. This is a very important category of older male character actor, the Buza face. And so I know there are other examples that aren't coming to mind, but a few that do would be like George buck Flower, who's in you all kind of like old Westerns and in They Live,

Yeah, the brow is key with this actor, and so it should come as no surprise to anyone that he had a bit part one of his early roles in Jean Jacques Ennode's nineteen eighty one cave man picture The Quest for Fire, alongside far far better known brow based actors Ron Pearlman and Everett McGill.

Well, I've never put those guys together before on the on the strong brow, but yes, you're right, I.

Mean it's a caveman picture, so you know, that's clearly on the brain. As far as his physicality, though, he is a he's a big fella. Yeah, you know, he's he's a bit rotun. But he is also very tall. I think his height that was listened on the internet is six four. So this guy's a monster.

So you know how some people love scenes in movies where Tom Cruise runs. That's a particular cinematic fetish some people have is the Tom Cruise running scene. And he does it in most of his scenes. There's just extended shots of him sprinting across flat spaces. I mean, really, I feel like that. But for George Buza. This movie has several George Buza running scenes and I literally had to rewind them. I just wanted to watch them over and over.

Yeah, they're so weird because he's Buzza's just booking it and these scenes just straight out flat sprinting. In you get the impression that maybe add the director didn't know how to instruct people running, or there was some breakdown in communication, because I feel like you don't really need to run that fast to get the sense of chasing after somebody in the film. But he's just booking it.

Yeah, so he's wearing like a nurse's scrubs, like this all white outfit. His we should mention also his facial hair. He has a goatee that is so thick and luxurious. It's like a mink stole. You know. It just looks absolutely glossy and super thick and like the warm fur code of a northern region's dwelling animal.

Yea.

But yeah, so all of that, all of that glory at full sprint. Yeah, sometimes carrying an act. Yeah, yeah. Indeed, his facial hair is glorious. And you know, I was looking at his his tremendous filmography, and I noticed that he he's voice Santa Claus before. But he also played Santa in the twenty fifteen horror movie A Christmas Horror Story, in which he fights Crampis. I haven't seen this, Joe. I have watched this with my dad one year for Christmas.

All right, we'll have more to say about Buza as we progress here, But I guess just to run through a few other people. Let's see. Tom Bresnan plays Jim. Jim is our our hero. He's the main male kid.

He's he's identified more in the movie by his last name. His character is James Jim Magaluski or Magicvski, and everybody's usually calling him Majielevski. And there is at least one point in the movie where I caught the movie spelling its own main character's name wrong, because so the evil brain monster communicates through it through a computer screen to its henchmen with words on the screen. And there's one part where it spells his name and it's spelled wrong.

Well, Tom does a good job playing Jim. Nothing really to write home about, but it's fine. Likewise, the actor Cynthia Preston plays his love interest, Janet, and again perfectly fine. Nothing really to write home about here, but she is a Canadian actress that's been in a lot of things, including the recent Jack Ryan series on Amazon. She was in the twenty thirteen Carrie remake, and she's popped up on the TV series American Gods.

The main thing I remember about her is actually just the color scheme of her sweater in the second half of the movie, which is very Miami Vice. It's this combination of like light blue and pink. Yeah, you know that Miami Vice color scheme.

Yep, yeah, yeah, So yeah, her sweater does as good a job as she does in this thing.

Oh no, I didn't mean to. I mean she's fine.

No, no, she's fine. I legitimately mean that both of these actors do a good job, young actors getting it done in a movie that's, you know, not meant for the top shelf, but you know it's fine.

Uh.

Now, there's an actress in the film named Christine Cossack who has the distinct honor of being the first character in the film to be eaten alive by the hemispheres of the brain.

That's right.

She plays Vivian, who is the the brain crew's other minion she pops up.

She seems to be like a real medical professional, like she's just trying to do her job. Meanwhile her co workers are trying to hypnotize people with brain poison.

Yeah.

Yeah, so she didn't last too long. But while she's on screen and then she pops up later is kind of a hallucination like an avatar taken on by the brain when it's messing with Jim. While when she's in the film, though, she she has this kind of like solid B movie vixen vibe to her, so she's, you know, she's entertaining, and then she's eaten by that brain. It looks like the actor Cossack. She she wasn't in much

Whether that was her choice or her agent's choice or well, I don't know who edits those IMDb pages, whoever made that choice. It's a good one thumbs out. But she's good at it, good sense of humor. Yeah, you know. One thing I liked about this movie was the music. The opening credits had some fun, had some fun, kind of kicking into high gear electronic music that was paired with a red blade runner title style text that set the pretty well.

Yeah, yeah, the music, and this one is actually quite good. It's an electronic score by Paul Zaza, a Canadian musician who's done a lot of film and TV work over the years. He composed the score for nineteen eighty one's My Bloody Valentine, nineteen eighties prom night, and of course nineteen eighty three is a Christmas story.

Real a few.

Yeah, so he seems to be you know, diverse talent here. He can do a lot of different types of scores, but this one in particular has a lot of like glittering synth cascades and some spooky drum machine beats you know, in the background, that.

Kind of thing.

So like, yeah, it's cheesy eighties movie music, but it's it's the good version of that.

Yeah. Yeah, So I actually listened to this all morning while I was working on notes for this, and well not all morning, but the period of the morning which I worked on notes for this, I played it because it's on Spotify you can and pretty much anywhere you get digital music these days. You can look up the soundtrack by Paul Zaza for The Brain and it's al tremendous.

So it's like a pop single for the film. Yeah, that is a thing I miss is the It was a big thing in the nineties to have a pop song from the original motion picture soundtrack, So a will Smith movie would have a track that went with it, like Wild Wild West or something, or Men in Black, and I miss things like that. I like it when there is an original pop song for the film.

Yeah, it gives you something to play immediately over the end credits oftentimes.

I really like that too.

Now, speaking of the sound in this movie, I just have to say, this is one of those where I had to put subtitles on just because there was so many either low talkers or like the audio for the dialogue.

Was just so much lower weird.

Yeah, yeah, so I not when Gail was talking, not when people were screaming, but the rest of the time, like anytime a teenager is talking to another teen I just couldn't understand a word of it and had to you know, it's either turn up the volume to where the neighbors are complaining about the subsequent screams, or it's just read stuff as it happens.

So, yeah, their friend Willie, I don't think I heard a word he said in the movie. Yeah, Okay, should we do the full plot breakdown.

Let's do it.

So one of the first things we get in the film is just a brain in a big dish with green liquid bubbling all over the place. So they let you know right from the beginning this is a brain monster movie.

Yep.

And then we cut to a standard Canadian suburban household and there is a I guess a mom watching TV while her sort of moody teen daughter is up in her room, I think, putting on Emo makeup. And this thing comes on TV and it's this guy played by David Gail. He comes out and it shows a sign displaying to the audience that says applaud more, smile more, which was pretty good. And the title of this TV

Yeah, except in an enormous industrial complex.

Yeah, this is actually here. This is the Xerox Center. Yeah.

Yeah. And so doctor Blake on TV said, is that this is the biggest show in the metro area. They don't say the name of the city, but it seems like it's a local show, and they're saying, you know, pretty soon we're going to go nationwide and worldwide. And he's selling solutions to the problems faced by everyday households. He says, you know, we face problems in this nation

I mean, I kind of kind of left it as if maybe if you were to watch the full show, you know, there would be more answers. But we're just getting a glimpse of it because it's ultimately not important like, we just assume that there's lots of additional content.

Right well, I think it is absolutely authentic to self help literature and self help and that includes video content and stuff that at least half of the content of self help literature is promises being made about how this is going to help you, rather than the actual help content.

Right though, he's not selling vitamins or anything, no, that I could tell.

One thing I liked in the screen was it had that old thing where somebody's watching a TV screen and it's clear that this is just really being filmed on the TV because you get that flickering effect across the screen in the film that I'm not positive, but I believe that's a problem of synchronization between the shutter speed of the film camera and the refresh rate of the TV. So if they get synced up in a weird or off way, you get these flickers or rolling lines and whatever.

Yeah. I admired that as well.

Yeah, I always like to see it. But so anyway, it's clear that everybody watches the show. Everybody's parents are tuning in to Independent Thinkers with doctor Anthony Blake, and the main thing that seems to happen on Independent Thinkers is everybody watches and then they just repeat verbatim whatever doctor Anthony Blake said said to tell them to think

Yeah.

The what I got from it, and I think maybe they flesh it out a bit later, is that the mind control that's going on is that if you accept it, if you give into the mind control, then you just control. You're just like all the parents. You're like one of the zombies. But if you're a true freethinker, if you're resisting the brainwashing, then that's when the hallucinations occur because

She's killed by the whole process.

Right because she's like, I don't want to watch doctor Blake. Mom I just want to listen to the curor, and of course ends in tragedy. So then we cut to our We meet our young hero, Jim Madilevski, and he is a turbotwerp. He is very The way I would describe him is that his personality he has two personality characteristics, and those are lust and pranks. I was watching with Rachel and she said he was radicalized by Mad magazine.

Yeah, he does have that vibe to him. And yet at the same time, we're told that he is one of the smartest children, one of the smartest teens in this in the school, like he's brilliant. He's like, it's almost like he's too brilliant to fire, even though he's a complete pain in the butt.

Yeah. There's a point later on where one of the vice principals is meeting with his parents because James has been naughty at school again, and they're like, he has one of the highest IQ's in the school, but he is bad. And I'm like, wait a minute, you're comparing all of the students IQ's in this school. I didn't realize that was a common practice in high schools.

I mean, maybe the Canadian school system I don't know.

Maybe well, so anyway, when we first meet Jim Madgielevski, he gets into his car in the morning to drive to school, and I think he drives by the house where this horrible scene we just saw had taken place the night before, and their police everywhere, and the announcer on the radio, the DJ is like, well, we just had three more murder suicides and now here's Joan Jet and we get a rock song, And then I thought this was funny. When Jim actually arrives at school, these

It was supposed to be interesting. Yeah.

But also, so we meet Jim Madgelevski's girlfriend, Janet, and and despite Mazhelevsky us being told that he is very smart and an actual independent thinker, he is not smart enough or at least not disciplined enough to do his own homework and he has to copy his girlfriend's homework.

Right.

Yeah, so there's not a lot to love about this guy. During the introduction.

Here, yeah. Oh, and then also before he goes to class, he goes into the bathroom and he gets out of his pocket a container that is labeled like pure elemental sodium so metallic sodium, which I'm sure we've talked about this on the show before that if you combine pure elemental sodium with water, there will be extremely I guess you would call it an exothermic reaction. It will cause it will basically explode, catch on fire, and it's really bad.

We should stress just like the movie itself stresses that you should not try this at home.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

The closing credits, it's the first thing you see, like not even a before you see a single human credit. There's a disclaimer at the end of the movie that is like, do not put sodium in your plumbing, extreme injury could result.

Yeah, so seriously, don't do it.

Yeah, but it's funny to imagine. So who is the legal council for production of The Brain nineteen eighty eight who told them they had to put that in there.

I don't know. I'm guessing just is another big brain in a tank. That's just like watching the film. It's like, nope, nope, disclaimer on that.

That's all right.

But I guess it is actually the sodium in the toilet sequence that leads to the parent teacher conference where we find out that James has one of the highest IQ's in the school, but he is very badly behaved, and they tell him that it is your attitude that is causing your anti social behavior. But fortunately the teachers and administrators they've got an answer, and the answer is he's got to watch doctor Blake's tapes.

Yeah.

I mean, it's really it's it's it's a this was gonna work out great. We have the like a leading figure in self help. It's based in the same city, and he has these tapes. He has this center. Let's hook Jim up with some help.

At some point, somebody says doctor Blake wouldn't be on TV if he wasn't good.

Valid.

Yeah, it's perfect logic. Yeah, And so they send Majelevski to the Psychological Research Institute. This is where we first get into this big, interesting building, and of course while he's there, he's wandering around trying to get you know, get processed, to get his paperwork done, to meet with doctor Blake and I don't know, get diagnosed, or find out how he can have better behavior at school. And so we meet a few characters along the way. There.

It is Verna, I believe, hmm.

Okay, I don't remember that. I just thought of him as Booza throughout the movie.

But yeah, Booze is better.

We meet Bouza and then Magjelevsky goes in for his session, and it's hard to describe exactly what happens here. So he meets Christine Cossack, the nurse there, and they hook electrodes up to his head and do you remember the sequence of what exactly happens here. I'm a little fuzzy on this.

Yeah, it's a weird sequence. It's it's actually pretty pretty effective because, yeah, they're hooking him up. There's some she's asking him questions and they're showing him a video, right, and then.

Oh, I know they're trying to brainwash him. Actually, they hook him up to the electrodes that are secretly, unbeknownst to him in the other room, hooked up to the giant killer brain. Though I guess we haven't seen the brain kill anybody, and so I think what they're trying to do is just like indoctrinate him into becoming a psychic thrall of the giant brain creature. So they've got the electrodes on him and they're showing him a video

Right suddenly, she's topless, but then she's also stepping out of the television into his physical space. And this is definitely a moment where we get very videodromy you know, definitely strong videodrone vibes in this sequence.

And somehow he ends up meeting doctor Blake here and it's clear that this kid is not going to be effectively indoctrinated, and he gets creeped out and he leaves. And then back in the brain room, we have doctor Blake and Vivian and Bouza and they're all hanging out around the brain and it's green tub and talking about what's what's just happened and why the indoctrination did not

Yeah, that's how it goes down pretty much cover it. Sorry, yeah, no no, but it's it's it's a great sequence. Like it's a sequence where a monta rubber monster suit eats a woman entirely, like with her legs, you know, kicking out the back. It's very reminiscent of a lot of old horror monster movies. So it's again a sequence where you can really, you can really see how much love they had for these older, like fifties and sixties monster films.

Does the brain burp?

I don't think it burps, but it well could have, and it would have been totally appropriate.

Okay, So after this, we see Mandzelewski leaving and he is driving his car and there is a steering wheel tongue attack. I think what's happening here is that now that he has resisted the brain's attempts to indoctrinate him with the electrodes, now he's just gonna have continuous hallucinations of the brain trying to kill him that will in reality cause him to actually like wreck cars and stuff.

Yeah, that's pretty much's pretty much what's happening, which which is a great I think it's a pretty great little premise, you know, you know, tying into two actual issues of like teen alienation, you know that we often see reflected in these horror films where teenagers are going up against the adult system of their local town. You know, it's it's pretty you know, wisely put together.

Yeah, So Majeleowski goes to meet his friends. He goes to meet Janet at the burger bar where she works, and he's just the immediately hallucinating tentacles in the pickle jar and stuff. And also their other friends are there. They've got a couple of other friends, I think one of them is named Willie, and he's freaking out in the burger bar, but George Buza catches up to him, and Buza comes in and drugs him, takes him back to pri I.

This was a whole sequence where my wife was briefly tolerating this film. I was watching it and I commented to her as like, I don't think Jim's gonna be able to defeat this brain, Like Jim is losing hard to team Brain at this point.

But he's an independent thinker, so we can at least count on him to come up with outside the box solutions, but she does in the end sort of.

Yeah.

So we're back at pri I again where we just were, and this time Janet has to come to the rescue with Willy to get him out, and so somehow he escapes his room. I think he runs into the patient that he was talking to earlier, who sneaks into his room and trades places with him, letting him out.

Yeah.

And then Janet and I think Willy are busting him out, and then Willy gets eaten by the brain, right, Like, the brain attacks them in the boiler room of this place and it just gobbles him up.

Yeah.

The brain requires underlings, clearly, but yet is very confident on its own if it needs to lash out at somebody within the Xerox facilities here, right.

And then we get we get a part of the movie that I thought was just maybe my favorite part, which is just George Buza chasing Janet and Madgelevski for I don't know, solid fifteen minutes.

Yeah, this is that full bore running.

Yes, just running after them. And then they get in the car and flee and he's chasing them in the car. At one point, George Buza chops off a CoP's head with an axe, and then another police car arrives on the scene and he start Booza's flagging them down, but he's got the axe in his hand.

Yeah.

You get the impression that David Gayle's character that the doctor just told him like, look, we got it. This town is brainwashed. You can do absolutely whatever you need to do. You need to chop the head off of a cop and brought daylight by the roadside, do it because the brain has your back on this one.

Yeah, And so he flags down the cops and seems to get I think he's like, Jim did it. It was Majielevski last. So they're on the run for a while. They go into a house and they come across a lady who is just happens to be watching Independent Thinkers on TV. Again, it seems like all anybody in this town does is just watch the show all day. And it's David Gail, through the tear starts psychically communicating directly with her, saying like, how many times has your husband

I think this should be our next next time they ask us to do a promo for the podcast, we should do it like that. We should say how many times has your spouse refused to listen to the Weird House Cinema episodes?

Assertive?

Right, we should enforce like cult separation policies on our listeners. Like fans, you either bring all of your friends and family in as listeners themselves, or you cut them off.

I'm just kidding.

Don't please, don't do that.

Don't do that.

But but this is missus Woods and so did we next see her go outside and try and convince mister Woods?

Oh, this was the vice principal earlier that Madjelevski did his Mad magazine sodium bomb on and was telling his parents about his bad behavior. So now he's out building a deck in his backyard and it turns out he won't watch this show with his wife, and then his wife comes out and kills him by shoving a chainsaw into like his stomach crotch area.

Yeah, because he refused to listen because he's like, look, I told you, I just don't like it, and she's like all right, and then she kills them with a chainsaw. A fine little extra bit of connections on these two. The actor playing mister Woods was in the two thousand adaptation of The X Men. Oh, and he played like somebody attending the Magneto at some point. It's just some bit part I believe. But Buza was also in that

Wow. Interesting, well, I like how after she kills her husband with the chainsaw, she starts like she flags down a police car. I guess they're just driving by all the time, and she's like, Madgielevski cut my husband in half. So they're just blaming all crime on Magelevski. He's omnipresent. Everything that happens goes wrong in the city. It's like, oh, light bulb burned out, must have been Majelevski.

Yeah, the brain really is controlling everything.

So they end up Janet and uh, what's his name? And Magjelevski end up going to their high school, which should be empty because it's a Saturday, and there's a scene where Janet calls her dad on the on the phone, who is a fan of the Doctor Blake Show, and she's like, Dad, we're on the run and he's been brainwashed. He's just like that boy is dangerous. He's a psycho killer.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's easy to kind of tune out during this part of the film, but it's leading to something great.

Well yeah, well, he eventually drives his car off of I don't know what this cliff was supposed to be. He drives his car off of like a ten thousand foot drap.

Yeah, we almost get that classic car exploding at the bottom of a canyon scene. Tunes is the driving cat moment.

I'm a little skeptical that there are drop offs this far in Ontario, but of course this is a standard, you know, horror thriller structure, so you know what's gonna happen. They've got to go back to pri and face the brain. So Magic goes back and they're about to do a big broadcast at this place that will send the brain's control signal out into millions of viewers and seemingly hypnotize

Really, those are the type of signals that your brain is sending to your feet, your hands, in any part of your body at any point. It's just like fools move.

For me, yeah, yeah, motor control. So the brain tries to do a few things. It tries to give Madjialuvski more like Randy hallucinations in order to throw him off course, but that doesn't work, and then he somehow Matjielevski runs into his parents. It looks like they're having a party in this place, but they're fully brainwashed. Now they're just

If you guessed sodium, then you are absolutely correct.

So what does he do well?

Well? For one of the first things that happened is there's a big showdown on the set of an independent thing.

I can't believe I almost.

Get to that.

I'm sorry, No, what happens here?

Okay, So it's it's the big moment, right, this is the big broadcast. This is gonna be the one that takes over the world. So Jim mage here. He gets on the stage and confronts him, and you know, Gail tries to the doctor, tries to to, you know, to win him over one last time with a small evil monologue,

Wait, I can't remember what happens to Buza in the end.

Does something It's eaten by the brain.

Okay, okay, Yeah, so he wasn't whatever doctor Blake was. Buza was not like that. Buza was just an earth human with red blood.

Yeah, he was just an eager, perhaps brain washed underling. But yeah, he ends up he's chasing him, chasing the kids, and the brain's after the kids, and for some reason he runs into the brain and the brain is like, I can't take it any more. Your soda delicious. I'm just gonna eat you, and he eats Buza.

Yeah.

So the elemental sodium goes into the brain's mouth and it explodes.

Yeah, and it's a big, fiery like fireworks explosion.

It's pretty great.

Oh and of course he u Majaluski rescues his girlfriend Janet so they're okay in the end, but then we get a stinger after that when it seems like evil has been conquered and everything's okay again, But then we just get a stinger of it's like a it's like a triangle shaped wipe on the screen that just fills the screen with the brain going like a right.

Yeah, chasing it lungeon at y out of.

The dark, and I don't know what it's supposed to mean. This is like, wait, was it not killed? After all? It's not presented in the context of any scene or anything. It just shows you the brain at the end.

I feel like it was like it's kind of like a casting cause, like Ladies and Gentlemen one more time.

The brain.

What an awesome wasn't it the best part of this film? And everyone's like yeah, and then you're.

Just roll credits really really good. But before it gets to the credits, of course, there's the warning about not using sodium like you saw in this film. Yeah, especially because the very ending of Videodrome, if you'll recall, is that the main character dies by imitating an act of violence that he saw on television.

That's right, yeah, yeah, but Ben wil since I've seen Video Drome in full. I have a copy of it Criterion Collection in Facts.

Yeah, I've got that too. Okay, monster science.

All right, Well, you know, there's not a lot to go on here. We've got a big old brain with tentacles, and as it grows it develops eyes and teeth as well, and so to a large extent. You know, again, it's just a great schlocky monster suit. It's a manifestation of humanity's terror at being a brain. But then the film does seem to be flirting with the idea of humans versus brains as well, you know, you versus your own brain, you versus the brains of others, especially on the other side of.

The media lens. Here.

So when considering a brain that grows eyes and teeth, I can't help but think of this little like rather crude little bit of dialogue and william S Burrows make it lunch this applying to another part of the anatomy, but here we could easily apply it to the brain. Like the brain is getting to where it can eat, it can see, it can chew, it doesn't need the

Oh what if the brain in this film is not an alien from another planet, but it is just straightforwardly a human brain. It is a human brain that has been freed of the constraints of the rest of its body and is thus as alien to us as a creature from another planet would.

Be righted, And you need, it's going to end up going up against creatures that are more ruled by their body, like teens. You know, they're going to all those changes. You know, they're hard to control.

Huh.

I do like that the movie has decided there is essentially an equivalence between actual independent thinking because Madjeleevsky resists the brainwashing that everybody else succumbs to, and like having a mad magazine style sensibility, you know, being into pranks and bad behavior.

Yeah, and and in a way it is kind of well, it's kind of well done in the film that the idea of of some of someone being really upfront about being an independent thinker and encouraging you to be an independent Thinker could conceivably be a way of trying you to think a very particular way that yeah, lines up with the speaker's wishes.

Well, that's so this movie is in many ways very dumb. It is very dumb down Cronenberg in a way, I would agree with that. But I think one aspect of it that's actually pretty perceptive and good is the satirical aspect about the TV show being called Independent Thinkers. It's a show that is just straight brainwashing telling viewers that they're practicing independent thought. And that kind of thing happens in reality all the time. I think about how often

Yeah, It's like if someone refers to other people as sheeple. You can often guess exactly what the key bullet points of their worldview are, right, and it's generally just a matter of reversing other bullet points, right.

No, Yeah, I mean, of course, in reality, we are big fans of independent critical thinking. I think that's one of the most important parts of having a good life. But talking about the fact that you practice independent critical thinking is no guaranteed that that's actually what you're doing, and sometimes it means exactly the opposite.

Right, yeah, I mean to a certain extent. It's just like any term can become then used by a disinformation campaign or being or used to sell something, etc.

So I absolutely by this satirical aspect of the movie. The world, especially today, is just full of people who are constantly, almost mindlessly, repeating talking points that have been prepared by other people without thinking about them critically, and while doing so, they are congratulating themselves for being able to think independently, unlike the people who disagree with them.

Yeah, it would be interesting if they remade this today, If somebody remade it and they, you know, they put some thought into some of these themes, I wonder what direction they could go in would doctor Blake have a podcast.

That would be interesting?

Oh god?

Or maybe he'd be on YouTube. I'm not sure.

Well, one pretty dead dead on signal that you're dealing with somebody who is not actually encouraging you to practice independent thinking and may only be using the rhetoric of independent thinking without that being the substance of their message. Is someone who presents themselves as the answer to all your problems, as doctor Blake does in the movie That's Your your Number one red flag?

Really yeah, yeah, doctor Blake has all of the answers. Yeah, so be afraid because there's probably a giant brain in a vat somewhere just itching to gobble you up. All right, So nineteen eighty eight's the brain. If you've listened to all this and you're asking yourself, how can I see this wonderful film? Well Shop Factory has a really nice Blu ray of it out that's you know that. You can order its imprint, seemingly complete with commentary tracks from

Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest a topic for the future, just to say hello, you can email us at contact Stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.