Wednesday, December 27, 2023

Heinlein Sues!

 

 (imdb)

THE BRAIN EATERS-1958-In the town of Riverdale, IL., a huge cone shaped object is discovered. Hick senator Powers (Cornelius Keefe) takes charge of the investigation and meets the mayor's son Glen Cameron (Alan Frost aka Alan J. Factor) who informs Powers there have been 3 murders since the discovery of the cone and his dad is missing. Dr. Kettering (co-producer Ed Nelson), Dr. Wyler (David Hughes) and Alice Summers (Joanna Lee) are studying the cone. After Kettering goes into the cone and finds nothing, the mayor (Orville Sherman) shows up, goes crazy and is shot to death. He seemed to have some kind of parasite on his neck that destroyed his nervous system. And there are more! While one guy roams around recruiting victims, Kettering tries to come up with a solution. He hardly has time to mourn when Alice is taken over and just as suddenly a missing scientist emerges from the cone. Later Kettering and Cameron go into the cone and meet another missing scientist (Leonard Nimoy). 

This is a nice low budget sci-fi film with some unusual camera angles by Bruno VeSota. Co-star Joanna Lee was in Ed Woods' PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE the next year. Author Robert Heinlein sued the film company saying the script was based on his novel “The Puppet Masters”. Uncredited executive producer Roger Corman settled out of court with Heinlein.

Thanks for reading!

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