Home | Movies By Year | Movies from 1990
A Cat in the Brain
Buy A Cat in the Brain now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the movie. And once you've experienced the movie, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
'A Cat in the Brain'Thrower, Stephen (1999). Beyond Terror, the films of Lucio Fulci. FAB Press. page 281. , also known as 'Nightmare Concert',Thrower, Stephen (1999). Beyond Terror, the films of Lucio Fulci. FAB Press. page 281. is a 1990 Italian horror film written and directed by Lucio Fulci. Fulci stars as a fictionalized version of himself, a tortured horror filmmaker who is driven by the violent visions that he experiences both behind the camera and off the set. Feeling like he's losing his grip on reality and disturbed by murderous fantasies, Fulci consults a psychotherapist, who is secretly a serial killer and using hypnosis, exploiting the director's vulnerabilities to his own murderous ends.[http://cinefantastiqueonline.com/2009/03/cat-in-the-brain-1990-dvd-review/ "Cat in the Brain (1990) - DVD Review" by Drew Fitzpatrick, Cinefanastique, March 31, 2009]
'A Cat in the Brain' has been called the horror film equivalent of Federico Fellini's '8', using cynical, Grand Guignol humour.[http://www.horrorview.com/Reviews/C/Cat%20in%20the%20Brain%20Uncut.htm Horrorview: "Cat in the Brain" (UK release review)] Juxtaposing gory horror clips from several of his own past horror films which he had worked on, Fulci shot a wrap-around segment featuring his own plot and used Vincenzo Tomassi's film editing to create the storyline a personal insight into the effects of horror filmmaking on the psyche.[http://www.thespinningimage.co.uk/cultfilms/displaycultfilm.asp?reviewid=579 The Spinning Image UK "Cat in the Brain" a review][http://www.sexgoremutants.co.uk/catbrain.html SexgoremutantsUK - "Cat in the Brain" (UK DVD review) by Alan Simpson]
Plot
Lucio Fulci (playing himself) is a former medical doctor-turned director of gory horror films. He wraps up shooting for the day on his latest film, 'Touch of Death'. Fulci leaves the Cinecitt Studios for a local restaurant down the street. The waiter recognizes him and suggests his typical meal. Fulci cannot look at the sample plates of meat without having flashbacks to the cannibalistic scene he'd been filming earlier. Shaken, he leaves the restaurant without ordering. Later, while checking special effects from another movie, Fulci irritably snaps at a technician to get a plate of animal eyeballs out of his sight.
Returning home to his row house in an old suburb of Rome, the troubled director tries to sleep, but the noise of a handyman's chainsaw outside keeps him awake with recollections of his own recently shot chainsaw mayhem. In a rage, Fulci storms outside and smashes a hatchet into cans of paint belonging to the handyman. Fulci goes to see a psychiatrist, professor Egon Schwarz who accepts Fulci into his books for a session. Schwarz discusses Fulci's recent problems and suggests that he's "breaking down the barrier, the boundary between what you film and what's real."
Fulci is revealed to be making two films simultaneously: 'The Touch of Death' and 'Ghosts of Sodom'. After Fulci leaves the set, his producer steers him into a studio suite for an interview with a Munich news crew. The sight of the tall, blond, German lady reporter's long legs triggers a vision of sexual abandon in Nazi Germany (from the film 'Ghosts of Sodom'). When Fulci recovers from his vision, Filippo then informs the confused director that he has just run amok, smashed the TV crew's camera, and tried to rip the interviewer's clothes off.
Professor Schwarz calls Fulci for another consultation after he had watched all of his films. He suggests using hypnosis. Once Fulci is under, the Professor's true colors are revealed. He switches on a buzzer device and describes a mad scheme: "You'll do everything I tell you when you hear this sound. You will slowly be possessed by madness. You'll think you've committed terrible crimes." After the session is over, Fulci leaves, unable to remember anything. Schwarz then embarks on a killing spree, starting with the murder of a local prostitute that evening. Fulci arrives on the scene and thinks he committed the murder.
Back home the following morning, Fulci is plagued with visions of violence from his movies. He goes for a drive, but Schwarz follows him and commits more murders, again Fulci thinks he committed them. Fulci hallucinates running over a tramp (from the movie 'Touch of Death'). After returning home, he phones the police station to speak to his friend Inspector Gabrielli, intending to make a "confession." But learns that Gabrielli is on vacation.
After another visit to Professor Schwarz is of little help, Fulci decides to drive over to Inspector Gabrielli's house in the hope of speaking to him. Schwarz follows him there with the buzzer device. Fulci lets himself into the house, and immediately suffers from visions of Gabrielle's family being murdered. Fulci staggers outside to be greeted by the returning Gabrielle, when Fulci expresses his visions to him he reassures the director that his family are safely on holiday in Sardinia.
Meanwhile, Professor Schwarz murders his wife with piano wire. Schwarz then follows Fulci, who, again under the influence of hypnosis, has more visions of violent imagery and faints in the middle of a field. He comes round the next morning to discover a cat digging up the loosely buried remains of another Swharz victim. As Fulci scrapes soil from the dead features, Inspector Gabrielli appears behind him. Before Fulci can protest his innocence, Gabrielli informs him that Schwarz has been shot dead by his men who were tailing Fulci which he ordered after their conversation the previous day, who caught the mad psychiatrist in the act.
Several months later, Fulci and Nurse Lilly sail on his sailboat, 'Perversion' (named after his movie). Fulci follows the young nurse into the cabin-quarters. Suddenly, the sound of a chainsaw revs up, followed by her screams. Fulci emerges from the cabin with a basket of her body parts and attaches them onto fishing hooks. Just when it appears that Fulci is a crazed killer after all, it is revealed that its the end of his latest movie, 'Nightmare Concert', captured by a film crew in another boat sailing alongside. Bidding goodbye to his colleagues, Fulci happily sails out of the harbor with his very-much-alive leading lady.
(An alternate ending added by the Italian distributor to the Italian language print ends with a bloodcurdling scream from below deck dubbed onto the soundtrack after Fulci and the girl sail away from the dock, hinting that Fulci 'was' a maniacal killer.)Howarth, Troy (2015). Splintered Visions: Lucio Fulci and his Films. Midnight Marquee Press.
Cast
* Lucio Fulci as Himself
* Brett Halsey as Human Monster (archive footage from 'Touch of Death')
* David L. Thompson as Professor Egon Schwarz
* Jeoffrey Kennedy as Officer Gabrielli
* Malisa Longo as Katya Schwarz
* Ria De Simone as Soprano (archive footage from 'Touch of Death')
* Sacha Maria Darwin as Woman in the oven (archive footage from 'Touch of Death')
* Robert Egon as Himself/Second Human Monster (also archive footage from 'Ghosts of Sodom')
* Shillet Angel as Filippo, the producer
* Lubka Lenzi (stock footage from 'Massacre' (1989))
* Paul Muller (stock footage from 'Hansel and Gretel' (1989))
* Maurice Poli (stock footage from 'The Murder Secret' (1988))
* Vincenzo Luzzi as Chainsaw man
* Marco Di Stefano (stock footage from 'Bloody Psycho' (1989))
* Layla Frank
* Judi Morrow as Nurse LillyThrower, Stephen (1999). Beyond terror: the films of Lucio Fulci. FAB. . p. 281.
Production
The film was composed almost entirely in post-production, assembled from clips of two of Lucio Fulci's past horror films, "Sodoma's Ghost" (1988) and "Touch of Death" (1988), as well as from a few horror films made by other directors which were supervised by Fulci: Leandro Lucchetti's "Bloody Psycho" (1989), Giovanni Simonelli's "Hansel e Gretel" (1990), Andrea Bianchi's "Massacre" (1989) and Mario Bianchi's "The Murder Secret" (1988). The wrap-around segments were largely shot in and around Rome's famous Cinecitt Studios and on Fulci's private yacht, "Perversion".
Release
The original film was first released in Italy on 8 August 1990.Thrower, Stephen (1999). Beyond Terror, the films of Lucio Fulci. FAB Press. page 281.
Home media
The theatrical version of the film was released in the US and Japan on LaserDisc in the late 1990s. The uncut, uncensored director's cut of the film was released in North America for the first time on VHS and DVD by Image Entertainment in 2001 (in very limited quantities) as a part of "The Euroshock Collection", then reissued on 31 March 2009 by Grindhouse Releasing on the Ryko/Warner Brothers label.[http://iconsoffright.com/news/2008/12/lucio_fulcis_cat_in_the_brain.html Icons of Fright News and Updates: Lucio Fulci's Cat in the Brain Coming to DVD March 31st][http://dvdtrash.blogspot.com/2009/01/dvd-release-cat-in-brain.html DVD Trash: DVD Release: Cat in the Brain][http://www.fearnet.com/news/b14163_final_cat_in_brain_dvd_specs.html Fear.net "Final Cat in the Brain DVD Specs", Dec. 29, 2008, by Gabrielle DiPietro]
In 2016, Grindhouse Releasing released the uncensored director's cut of the film on Blu-ray.
References
Sources
*Buy A Cat in the Brain now from Amazon
<-- Return to movies from 1990