Brain Dead

CinemaSerf

5/10

2/8/2024

"Dr. Martin" (Bill Pullman) is a renowned scientist who usually works in a room full of brains preserved in gelatine! Then he is tasked with actually applying some of his theorem and is to evaluate "Halsey" (Bud Cort). Now he used to be a very important mathematician before he became a bit of a paranoid schizophrenic. "Martin" concludes that it might be medically possible to carry out some surgery and restore his memories. This is manna from heaven for his ambitious corporate pal "Reston" (Bill Paxton) and their unscrupulous boss "Vance" (George Kennedy) so his plan is green-lit, and surprisingly successful. On leaving the office shortly after carrying one of his many jars, he is hit by a car and when he awakes he seems a bit different. His personality has changed. Even his wife "Dana" (Patricia Charbonneau) cannot recognise his personality as everyone around him thinks he's lost the plot - totally! He keeps seeing a man in a blood-spattered white coat and is convinced he is being manipulated and conspired against! What's going on? Is it what we think has gone on? The last fifteen minutes or so redeem this slightly in our search for an answer, but for the most part it takes a really flat ping at sci-fi horror delivering a weakly predictable story that ran out of steam quickly and permanently fairly early on. Pullman isn't really my idea of a good comedy actor and the constant vacillation between "dream" and "reality" from auteur Adam Simon ended up more wearisome and repetitive than entertaining. Maybe I just wasn't in the mood - but I struggled to engage with this and found it all just a bit banal.