Man with the Screaming Brain (2005)

[trekgeezer]

All right I mentioned this in another post, but from seeing the ads I'm jazzed about it. It looks like true B-Movie schlock from The Bruce himself.

He wrote, produced, and stars in it. Of course Ted Raimi is along and also Stacy Keach.

Check it out here. Make sure to watch the promo (Quicktime required) and download the cool movie poster (Adobe Reader required) which is a whopping 27"x40" if you have a printer big enough to print it. I reduced it to 8.5x11 and it still looks great.    



Post Edited (08-31-05 13:32)

[Mr. Lobo]

At the Cinema Insomnia website Mr. Lobo has a 15 minute interview piece with Bruce Campbell about this movie. It's in Quicktime. I think you see some sides of Bruce not often seen and It's funny.

your horror host,
Mr. Lobo
http://www.cinemainsomnia.com

[trekgeezer]

Bruce plays William Cole, an American drug company executive who come to Bulgaria to invest in a subway that the communists had started but never finished.  Meanwhile,  a mad doctor (Stacy Keach) and his not so bright assistant (Ted Raimi), have developed a new anti rejection drug which would allow a damaged brain to be repaired by replacing the damaged parts with parts of another persons brains. (See where this is going?).

The plot gets a little convaluted and anyway Bruce and his Russian cab driver both get killed by the same crazy gypsy lady and Bruce ends up sharing his body with half  of the Russian guys  brain. The gypsy also kills Bruce's wife and her brain ends up in a robot that Ted Raimi built.

Overall I was a bit disappointed, although there are some amusing bits in the film  I expected a liitle more from "The Bruce".  Most of his schtick in this one is pretty well recycled from his past films.

If you like cheese and you like Bruce , you'll like his little movie, but don't expect to be floored by anything in it.

[Just Plain Horse]

trek_geezer wrote:

> Overall I was a bit disappointed, although there are some
> amusing bits in the film  I expected a liitle more from "The
> Bruce".  Most of his schtick in this one is pretty well
> recycled from his past films.
>
> If you like cheese and you like Bruce , you'll like his little
> movie, but don't expect to be floored by anything in it.
>

I had mixed feelings as well, but it is still the best thing I've seen on the Scifi channel in a long time. I liked the Russian guy better than Bruce's character... and I couldn't help but think of Steve Martin's "The Man with 2 Brains" at times. For some reason, the idea of his wife ending up in a so-called "robot" made me laugh, especially when Bruce has to act with it. Okay for a near one-man show for Bruce- keep in mind, the stuff that made him famous was mostly Sam Raimi's ideas, and it's clear Raimi definitly has more experience in making the action films one is inclined to desire to see Campbell leading in- here's to hoping he loses the moustache and plays someone a bit more assertive-albeit dense and clumsy- in whatever he does next. I felt like he was trying to do something different, and that is never easy to get accepted in regards to the film world; it was no Army of Darkness, and personally I liked his character in Alien Apocolypse better, but at least it was something different (he's probably a bit tired of taking on monsters all the time), but then, what can you expect from a movie about brain transplants? When you look at it from that angle, it was pretty good.

[Mr. Hockstatter]

I'm afraid I only made it about halfway through.  When the robot started doing the robot, that was just too much.  Bruce's character, well, none of the characters had the slightest bit of depth and most of them were intentionally unlikeable.  And to say the story was uninteresting would be to give it too much credit.  The movie was just a long slapstick routine with the two guys trying to control the same body.  And I really don't get into slapstick.  I mean, telling Medieval Europeans to shop smart, shop S-Mart, that's clever, this stuff was not.

[trekgeezer]

I have to confess that I fell asleep for about 15 minutes after the robot was activated. I woke up in time enough to catch the end.

[Mr_Vindictive]

I stopped watching about the time that Bruce had the run in with the gypsy while in the hotel room.  They made out and then his wife walked in.  I couldn't take much more after that.

I love Bruce and I used to think that he could do no harm, but now I'm starting to rethink that.  It seemed entertaining to begin with but was ultimately just too boring to keep me interested.  I might catch it when it reairs this week or will probably pick it up on DVD when it gets released.

Bruce, I'm disappointed.  You're better than that!

[Just Plain Horse]

Skaboi wrote:

> I love Bruce and I used to think that he could do no harm, but
> now I'm starting to rethink that.  It seemed entertaining to
> begin with but was ultimately just too boring to keep me
> interested.  I might catch it when it reairs this week or will
> probably pick it up on DVD when it gets released.
>

Everybody can do harm, it's part of hollywood. They ride a wave of success and then PLOP! they fall on their face... what seperates them is who gets back on their feet and how soon.

I DVR'd the movie and then fast-forwarded through whenever I got bored. Bruce's character was pretty flat, and I found myself asking, "What's the point?" but I have seen worse... I couldn't help but think this film was supposed to be bad... Maybe Mike Nelson can give a commentary on it if the opportunity presents itself. "I'm only too happy to comment on a film sponsered by the tv station that took us off the air after three seasons... No, I'm not talking about Fox... that would actually be very generous of them..."

I am puzzled about your last part of my quote... you were dissapointed, but you'd buy the DVD? That's helping fund another film of this type, I think... well, your choice and your money...

[LH-C]

For what it was, I actually thought it was fun! And I am going to buy the DVD! But I do hope in the future that Bruce has some more serious (but still b-list) projects he wants to make.

[Mr_Vindictive]

JPH,

Well, I'll buy the DVD in hopes that the film got better after the point that I turned off.  Also, how can I not buy something with Bruce Capbell in it?

[Just Plain Horse]

Skaboi wrote:

> JPH,
>
> Well, I'll buy the DVD in hopes that the film got better after
> the point that I turned off.  Also, how can I not buy something
> with Bruce Capbell in it?
>

Hmm... well, maybe the Scifi channel cut out the part that made it ten times better. Maybe there's a really good scene where Campbell has a 3 stooges styled fight with an army of zombies, where they start throwing skulls instead of pies... or maybe he runs past an S-mart store and into a guy named Arthur who is pushing a shopping cart full of cans... Well, probably not...

Nothing against Bruce, I'll still watch the next thing he's in, but I can't pretend this one was on the level of his previous works; but, it was different, which is kind of refreshing... I think it's really hard for the people making a film to know exactly how it's going to turn out and how it'll be received... so there's that...