If you're a fan of cheesy sci-fi flicks from the 1950's, there's no way you can pass on a title like "The Brain Eaters". Truthfully, this wound up pretty interesting, and I'll get into that in a minute. The flick got me hooked with Dr. Kettering's statement after firing his gun into the cone shaped object, which is the basis of my summary line above. It's so basic that it sounds like it might have some usage in actual science, but I've never heard it before. Very clever, but if it were actually true, that bullet would have come back to injure Kettering, so I'm thinking it was all made up.

What really impressed me when the whole story was over was how much integrity the story line maintained. The whole idea of an alien life form searching out a useful host to take over required no more thought than a lot of films of the era did, but showing a dead dog on the way to the site of the cone helped convey the idea that other life forms were tried and discarded; that was pretty unique. The instances where the host humans were shown with bulging backs was also a neat device to allow the viewer to know that danger was imminent, even if the characters on screen were oblivious. So you had some building of suspense that coincided with the modus operandi of the brain eating parasites.

But come on, the best part of all of this was the goofy stuff going on that flew right in the face of real time continuity. Like the alternating day and night time scenes that defy any concept of time management. And how about Senator Powers' mustache, it seemed to come and go from scene to scene! I'm also kind of curious as to the selection of Riverdale as the location of the story, that was also the home of Archie and his pals, but I don't know if their Riverdale was ever mentioned to be in a particular state.

I guess one of the cooler items this film has to offer is future Star Trekker Leonard Nimoy in the role of a professor who disappeared with a colleague five years earlier and had his life form taken over by the aliens. If you don't know he's in the picture, his appearance on screen won't really help since his face is obscured by a beard, but if you listen closely there's no mistaking the voice. I wonder if he was upset that his name was mis-spelled in the credits.

Usually with these kinds of pictures, I'm not willing to rate them much more than a four or a five because really, they are pretty dumb. But with this one, I've got to say that with the hero Kettering sacrificing himself at the finale for the good of all mankind - that's got to be good for at least a bonus point. Look, it's not "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", but for a mere sixty minutes of your time, it's worth at least a single viewing to be able to say - I just watched "The Brain Eaters"!

I found this movie amusing for its low budget effects and several flaws in its continuity. The most frequent flaw was the splicing of scenes in which it would appear to be day and then night and back and forth. Despite, or perhaps because of its flaws, I liked it. It does help if you like 1950's "B" sci-fi films and Shostakovich to start with.

In addition to the plot strongly resembling Robert Heinlein's "Puppet Masters", the music was also not original. I could find no evidence that there ever was a "Tom Jonson" who wrote any music for this film or anywhere, ever. Most of it was taken, uncredited, from Dmitri Shostakovich's symphonies 1, 5, & 10. I also recognized an excerpt from Sergei Prokofiev's music score for the Russian language film Alexander Nevsky. At the time Brain Eaters was distributed these composers were not as frequently performed in the US and their music would not have been familiar to almost all movie goers. Both composers were from the Soviet Union (Prokofiev died in 1953). They were perceived as Communist and there was a certain amount of prejudice and/or fear about performing it. During the cold war it would also have been difficult for Shostakovich to pursue legal action against the film company if he even knew his music had been used. I suspect this is exactly why this music was used.

I also would not be surprised if it turns out that the source of the performances were records purchased at a record store and the musicians were not compensated either. The credits do not list any orchestra(s)/conductor(s). The editing of the background music was also poorly done. There were several places where the music did not transition smoothly to the next scene or even within the same scene.

One of B-movie legend Bruno VeSota's three directorial efforts, 'The Brain Eaters' shows enough promise to make one wish he had split his time more evenly between acting and directing.

We are once again in the realms of 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' and 'I Married a Monster from Outer Space', with aliens trying to take over the population of an isolated American town. The spaceship turns out to have burrowed up from beneath the earth's surface, letting loose vindictive slug-like creatures which attach themselves to peoples necks, taking over their minds. Lots of Communist paranoia/infiltration undertones as usual.

The plot manages to lose itself despite a running time of only 60 minutes, but at least 'The Brain Eaters' recognises its limitations. The film prevents the normal ridicule caused by feeble special-effects by not having any and within the boundaries it sets itself, there is nothing to offend.

Like most releases from American International Pictures the film is primed for entertainment value, if not artistic merit, and it is none the worse for that.

I remember a particularly good scene where the camera follows one of the malevolent slugs point-of-view as it stalks its victim ready to latch onto the neck - an early influence on Spielberg for 'Jaws' maybe ??