The Brain from Planet Arous

source: The Brain from Planet Arous

The first few minutes of this film had me thinking maybe I was about to see an unappreciated gem. The science actually made some sense, and the banter between the leads was fairly sharp and believable. This all changed a few minutes into the movie when the most likable character, the scientist's assistant, is unceremoniously killed. After that, the once-promising movie degenerates into the usual 50s sci-fi silliness, still amusing and worth seeing through, yet sadly lacking the promise of those first few shining minutes. I will say it was heartwarming to see how quickly the girlfriend and her father accept the presence of the second, good alien brain. They would be ideal emissaries to alien worlds in view of their great flexibility of mind. The desert settings used in this film are also attractive. Finally, I must hand it to the U.S. military for being so quick to deduce that an alien invasion of some sort was taking place.

As a boy this movie scared me to death! Now as an adult with better video sources I can say: "You can hardly see that string!"

The 1950s was a great era for making low budget monster movies in California. All you needed was a camera, a cheap monster, and Bronson Canyon, and boom, you've got a monster movie. This film is no exception. It definitely has a place in there with "Teenagers from Outer Space," and "Robot Monster," but isn't quite so bad. Don't get me wrong it delivers the cheese, but somehow it isn't quite as bad, it's just kind of boring. John Agar plays a nuclear scientist who works too much. He and his assistant discover radiation emitting from a mountain in the middle of nowhere and go out to investigate. They end up finding a brain from outer space that uses Agar as a host and kills his dorky assistant. The brain takes a hankering to Agar's fiancée and tries to woo her by making him act like an even bigger idiot than he already was. The alien brain has the power to unleash atomic explosions using Agar's eyes. The brain has a scheme to take over the world (every evil alien brain does) by blackmailing the governments of the world. Oh, and there's a good brain from the same planet that comes to help the fiancée and her father stop the bad brain by living in the family dog (I kid you not). The special effects weren't that good (you could see the wire when the brain was "floating") and the special effect with Agar's eyes was pretty lame, but they needed to do something to show the change. The acting was alright (nothing to write home about) and the plot was the same old space monster thing. If you need to see some cheesy space monster movie, this isn't that great.

In the 1950s and 60s, John Agar made a ton of ultra-low budget horror films of varying quality (though most were pretty poor--at least when it came to the technical aspects of the films). While many would make fun of the films, I like them because of their campy qualities and sense of nostalgia. So, when I found THE BRAIN FROM PLANET AROUS, I was thrilled to see it. Oddly, however, the film is a combination of an excellent and rather original plot and super-duper cheese! The film begins with some sort of light crashing in the nearby desert. Agar and an expendable friend go to investigate. It turns out that there is a giant translucent brain with eyeballs named Gor who is waiting to be "rescued"--because he plans on taking over a body and setting about taking over the Earth. You really have to see this stupid special effect to believe it--it's incredibly dumb. Also, having already seen the really bad Peter Graves sci-fi film, KILLERS FROM SPACE (1954), I knew that nothing good would be waiting for him in this cave!! Too bad Agar's character hadn't seen it--he would have known that only bad things are waiting inside! Once back home, you know that the alien living within Agar is evil, as the dog doesn't like him and Agar is really interested in sex---reaaallly interested! This SHOULD have let his fiancée know that he was an alien or a Communist or something bad (as every clean and good American can only think of sex once legally married) and eventually she and her dad go to the cave themselves. This is an interesting point in the film, as ANOTHER floating eyeballed brain appears to them, but this is a good one. It seems that Gor is an evil being that escaped from his prison and he's come to help the Earth rid itself of this over-sexed alien. Who will prevail? Will the evil Gor become our overlord? Is the nice alien really nice or able to defeat Gor? Will Gor get laid? Tune in and find out for yourself! Just be forewarned that the final scene with the inflatable brain suspended by wires is a sight you won't soon forget!! Overall, while silly and cheesy at times, the plot is interesting and it's fun to watch Agar, as he really does great in this sort of role. In other words, while a low-budget horror film, Agar puts a lot of energy into it and plays up the "evil Agar" to the hilt! While for years he's gotten a lot of ribbing for bad acting, in this film he was perfect for the role and I think that sometimes he's unfairly attacked. While certainly no thespian, what could you expect from Agar with the sort of parts he was offered in the years following his divorce from Shirley Temple? Plus, his antics as Gor were just darn funny--and were meant to be. While not a film I'd recommend to the average person, for lovers of 50s sci-fi, this is an absolute must!

This movie has a very simple plot-it provides for a lot of drama: A bad brain takes over John Agar's body and tries to take over the planet and a good brain takes over his girlfriend's dog's body-the good brain has to try to stop the bad one. But it is a crazy film because you get to actually get to see the brains-at the beginning and at the end of the show- flying around. I recommend watching this show if you haven't seen it before,especially if you get in a mood to watch a wacky film. I own this film and am proud of it- my favorite scene in the film is when John Agar(who is being controlled by the bad brain)-tells an assembly of foreign ambassadors to conform to his demands;the Russian guy stops and says "...that's impossible, Russia will never stand for this..." John Agar replies "I have a simple solution to that- th'ill be no more Russia." I am not sure- but the dog in this movie looks exactly like the one in "Revenge of the Creature" John Agar stars in that one too.

This movie is probably the only place where John Agar's natural talent for cackling like a demented chicken and mugging the camera with a goofy, forced-looking grin is actually appropriate for the role. Otherwise, the film has little to recommend it. The thin, conventional plot is stretched way beyond its limits. Scenes end up being repeated in slightly altered form simply to pad the film out to the requisite hour and ten minutes. The only talented actor in the film, Robert Fuller, plays a character that gets killed five minutes into the film, which coincides with the disappearance of anything mysterious, tense, or mildly interesting from the movie. The female lead, Joyce Meadows, plays her role in a depressing monotone, and always seems like she's just about to throw up. The rest of the cast is even flatter and more non-descript than that. The special effects are crude (toy airplanes on visible strings, the brain obviously nothing but a painted balloon) and descend into the ludicrous at the end, when they are most needed. And, once again, for the umpteenth time in a 50's horror film, the monster is radioactive for no reason whatsoever. If there is an archetype for a lousy 50's horror film, "Brain from Planet Arous" is it.

As a kid growing up on Long Island in the 1970s, I was lucky enough to watch TV shows like "Creature Features" on Channel 5 and "Chiller Theater" on Channel 11. Movies like "Brain from Planet Arous" were staples of these SciFi and Horror- themed formats.... I have just ordered a copy of this movie and am anxiously awaiting seeing it for the first time in probably 30 years! I don't remember a ton of the plot details but I do remember that John Agars silver/black eye pupils were FREAKING CREEPY LOOKING, and the "Brain" monsters were pretty scary... at least to a 10 year old. Definitely a MUST SEE MOVIE for any serious SciFi buff! If I had to list the Top 5 Best / Scariest SciFi movies from when I was a Kid they would be: #5)"Fiend Without a Face / Night of the Blood Beast" - 2 different movies; one of these was pretty scary. (I just don't remember which one...) #4)"Attack of the Crab Monsters" - The giant crabs faces and voices were pretty scary, as I recall... #3)"Brain From Planet Arous" - As a kid, I used to imagine Gor (the evil Brain) was hiding in my bedroom closet, waiting to "get me"... #2)"The Killer Shrews" - our basement was dark, had a space under the stairs AND a wet bar; just like the one where the Killer Shrew hid and waited to bite his victim! #1) My ***All - Time Favorite Scariest B-Movie*** is "Terror From the Year 5000", with the mutant woman who fries you with her shiny Lee Press-On Nails and then steals your face!!! (Salome Jens, you totally hot mutant babe, you!)

If you watch 1950s sci-fi much, then you're familiar with John Agar. Using a flashlight, he conquered an entire civilization in "The Mole People"; he saved a small Arizona town from destruction in "Tarantula"; but here, he really excels—Agar saves the entire universe! When scientist Steve (Agar) and his assistant Dan (Robert Fuller) notice a "blast of radiation" from Mystery Mountain, they decide to investigate. In a nearby cave, they're attacked by a giant floating brain with eyes, which kills Dan with a bright light and then (in a very inept special effect) hides in Agar's body. Back at the lab, the brain emerges from Steve, introduces himself as "Gor" from the Planet Arous, and tells Steve he'd better cooperate—or else. Since Gor is so powerful, he can control everything Steve does, and pretty soon Steve starts getting quite lecherous with his fiancée Sally (Joyce Meadows). This has to be some sort of cinema first…a sex-starved floating brain! Later, Sally and her dad John (Thomas Browne Henry) are visited by yet another floating brain, this one's named "Vol" and is a law-enforcement brain from Arous. Vol announces that he also needs a body to hide out in, and after thinking it over, decides to hide in Agar's dog, George. Not silly enough yet? Just wait…. When he's not pawing Sally or tormenting Steve, Gor blows up a passenger plane, kills the local sheriff, burns up an Army colonel, and sets off a nuclear explosion. He then assembles representatives from all the world's countries and tells them that they must help him construct a fleet of spaceships so he can conquer Arous, then the universe! (At least Gor doesn't think small.) Things are looking pretty bleak, so Sally has a chat with Vol. He tells her that Gor could conceivably be killed by a direct blow to the top of his, uh, cerebrum in the area of the "Fissure of Rolando". She leaves a note to Steve telling him about Gor's weakness, so when Gor emerges again, Steve grabs a convenient ax, and beats the offending brain to death in a bravura climax. Probably the most fascinating thing about this movie is that the cast keeps perfectly straight faces throughout the whole film. If you're in for vintage entertainment with the most outrageously silly sci-fi plot of all time, you should watch this.

Next to the movies that come out today this is 2001 A Space Odyssey. Actually it is pretty good if you can get past the hilarity of brains floating around with two eyes. The eyes were very expressive. I call them phony Disney eyes. You know the eyes all the Walt Disney cartoon characters have had since the 80's. John Agar who married a very young Shirley Temple years ago is the star of this movie along with the pet pooch. I understand he had a little drinking problem and that did not help his career. Still he was skilled enough not to make this into a over acted mess like most of actors who portray superhuman aliens that can destroy the universe. He acted like a regular guy most of the time. I am not going to give away the whole movie other then to say it looks like Gor a alien from this planet escaped the police and landed in John Agar's brain. We know this because Vol is another alien from Arous but he is cop looking for the elusive Gor. Vol is also a floating brain but he decides the family dog is the best place for him to hide out. In the meantime John Agar kills his colleague because he is a rival for Joyce Meadows affection. Vol let's Joyce and her father know that her boyfriend is acting strange because Gor has taken over his body. Gor/Agar can blow up airplanes just by looking at them and he does. There is a Atomic Age sub story. Gor shows his might by demanding a meeting by all the superpowers take place so he can show them he is even more powerful then the A Bomb. This is all very entertaining. I like the idea that the Joyce Meadows character is not your typical blithering idiot girlfriend. Gor/Agar becomes a little frisky with Joyce but the dog is not going for it, The Alien in the dog is a good idea because the dog can hang out with Gor/Agar without any suspicion being cast. So as silly as it seems, it works. It it much better the Vol hiding outing in a human whose presence has to be explained. The end comes quickly and I am not going to give it away. But this was a nice little movie that is not as bad as the title makes it seem.