Brainiac (1961) El Baron Del Terror

An astounding horror film from Mexico must be seen to be believed. Watch a handsome young man turn into a brain slurping demon from hell. Mind-boggling transformation scenes of gut-wrenching horror. Extraordinarily silly but an incredibly delightful movie.

Amazing scenes of mayhem as Brainiac slurps the brain out of skulls like slurping a milkshake at The Hot Spot. Colossal achievement, horrendously awful, hernia inducingly funny, truly diabolical stuff. It’s a classic midnight movie if ever there was. We give this our highest recommendation.

Proceedings begin with the trial of Baron Vitaleus during the inquisition of the 1700s by a kangaroo court of masked judges resembling members of the KKK. The trial is fixed against a defiant Vitaleus who is put to his death torched in a massive bonfire. Before he is baked into a crisp burrito, he swears retribution to a mocking audience before perishing in a puff of smoke. It’s a suitably dramatic opening for the mind-altering horrors that are to follow during the rest of this triumph of a horror-disaster movie.

Vitaleus uses his dark powers somehow to transfer his soul into the body of a comet and swears that when the comet (actually a sparkler) returns 300 or so years later, he will exact the most horrendous revenge on the jury that condemned him to burn.

Centuries pass, and we move to the present time (early 60’s) to the lab of an astronomer who excitedly informs his accomplices about the arrival of a strange new comet after an orbit of around 300 years or so. As the comet crashes to some remote desert area, the vengeful spirit in the form of a rubbery lump unleashes Baron Vitaleus as a ghastly blood-sucking vampire-like bat-thing.

This creature proceeds to search out the family of his detractors and make them pay for the injustices done to him all those centuries ago. The creatures modus operandi is to create a ghastly incision in the victim’s skull and then suck out their brains in the most horrific manner. After the gruesome deed is done, the body is discarded like a pair of old socks, and the creature transforms into the human form of the resurrected Baron Vitaleus. One by one, the beastly brain slurping creature tracks down his victims and does his thing. The question is, how can he be stopped?

The film is a master class for several reasons, but above all, it has given cinema one of the most endearing and stunningly frightening monsters in cinema history. The acting is also sublime, and the direction and background music is of the most lavishly over the top nature. The film is a sheer delight and rightfully holds its own among celebrated masterpieces such as Robot Monster, Plan 9, Glen or Glenda and co. Brainiac exceeds them all for top class entertainment.