The Brain That Wouldn't Die (also known as The Head That Wouldn't Die) is a 1962 American Science fiction film/horror film directed by Joseph Green and written by Green and Rex Carlton.The film was completed in 1959 under the working title The Black Door but was not released until May 3, 1962, when it was renamed. The main plot focuses upon a mad doctor who develops a means to keep human body parts alive. He must eventually use his discovery on someone close to him, and chaos ensues.
Plot
Dr. Bill Cortner (Jason Evers) is a successful surgeon who has just saved a patient pronounced dead in the emergency room — a patient of his father (Bruce Brighton) — with an unorthodox surgical method. After the younger Cortner and his beautiful fiancée Jan Compton (Virginia Leith) are involved in a fiery car accident that decapitates Jan, Cortner collects her severed head and rushes it to his home basement laboratory, where he revives it and manages to keep it alive in a liquid-filled tray.
Cortner now decides to commit murder to obtain an attractive Head transplant. As he hunts for a suitable specimen at a burlesque bar that night and on the street the next day, Jan begins to hatch a murderous plan. Filled with hatred for Cortner because he won't let her die, she communicates telepathy with a hideous mutant in the laboratory cell, telling it to kill the scientist.
The mutant monster begins by mortally wounding the doctor's assistant, Kurt; after feeding the monster and doing some general cleanup around the laboratory, he unwittingly stands before the hatch in the door of the monster's cell (which he left unlocked), whereupon the monster thrusts his giant arm through and tears the assistant's arm off.
In the meantime, Cortner brings figure model Doris Powell to his residence under the pretense of studying her scarred face for a promised Plastic surgery, and, drugging her drink so that she loses consciousness, carries her down to the laboratory. Jan protests when Cortner explains his plan to transplant her head onto this new body, and he summarily tapes her mouth shut.
Dr. Cortner then stands in front of the door to the monster's cell, with the hatch again left open. This time, the monster grabs the scientist through the door and, securing him in a headlock, applies such force that the door is torn from its hinges. The monster is finally revealed as a seven-foot giant with a horribly deformed head, presumably the result of various failed transplants and/or other surgeries, and, in a scene that is often (if jumpily) edited out of television broadcasts, subsequently bites a chunk of flesh out of Cortner's neck. In the process, the laboratory is set ablaze; Cortner lies dead on the floor and the monster carries the unconscious Doris away to safety. As the lab goes up in flames, Jan is heard saying "I told you to let me die" followed by a maniacal cackle.
Cast
Jason Evers as Dr. Bill Cortner
Virginia Leith as Jan Compton
Leslie Daniels as Kurt
Adele Lamont as Doris Powell
Bonnie Sharie as Blonde Stripper
Paula Maurice as Brunet Stripper
Marilyn Hanold as Peggy Howard
Bruce Brighton as Dr. Cortner
Arny Freeman as Photographer
Fred Martin as Medical Assistant
Lola Mason as Donna Williams
Doris Brent as Nurse
Bruce Kerr as Beauty Contest M.C.
Audrey Devereal as Jeannie Reynolds
Eddie Carmel as Monster
Sammy Petrillo as Art
Production notes
The film was shot independently around Tarrytown, New York in 1959 under the working title The Black Door. Some prints of the film use both the opening title The Brain That Wouldn't Die and the closing title The Head That Wouldn't Die.
The monster in the closet is played by Eddie Carmel in his first "cinematic role". Carmel was a well-known Israeli-born circus performer who worked under the name "The Jewish Giant". He was the subject of a photograph by Diane Arbus, titled "The Jewish Giant at Home with His Parents in the Bronx, NY, 1970".
The score, titled "The Web", was composed by Abe Baker and Tony Restaino and was noted for creating a sinister mood.
