User reviews

One might think with the extremely low budget, the lack of true star power, and a title like Creature with the Atom Brain that this project would be nothing more than many of the same types of science fiction/horror films grinded out in the 1950s, but it is better than you might expect. Sure, it looks pretty cheaply made. Yes, Richard Denning is it when it comes to a name your average 50's movie fan might know. Like other movies of its era and genre, the film is fast-paced and to the point without a lot of expository information given to the audience. What makes this film a bit different is that the story, even though quite ridiculous in and of itself, is rather inventive and the script keeps to that inventiveness quite nicely. Both the story and script are the work of Curt Siodmak, the famed horror/science fiction writer of such films as The Wolfman, I Walked with a Zombie, and so many others. The story is simply that a gangster who had been run out ten years ago comes back with a German scientist that has discovered how to reanimate dead bodies with uranium. The gangster then commands these dead bodies with a microphone and looks at what they see through their eyes on a big screen as they are sent to avenge those men that put Frank Buchanan(said gangster) in exile. The dead bodies have super human strength but otherwise look somewhat normal except for cutting lines around their foreheads. Some of the scenes with the dead are very persuasive, and director Edward L. Cahn knows how to keep the pace tight and the action relevant. The acting including lead Denning as the man able to solve the mystery of the dead rising and taking their revenge is adequate with S. John Launer as Captain Harris, Denning's partner, standing out in an interesting role. Angela Stevens as Denning's wife has little to do, but she looks very nicely doing it nonetheless.Michael Granger and Gregory Gaye play Buchanan and the scientist respectively and are also adequate. But the real stars of this film are the script and Cahn's solid direction with limited resources. The hideout for Buchanan and the way they crawled through these blowing tubes were really inventive uses of limited means. While not a great film, Creature with the Atom Brain is a solid 50's sci-fi addition and quite possibly even a forerunner to movies like The Night of the Living Dead.

I finally bought a copy of this movie off of eBay because I had heard the Roky Erickson song of the same name like a billion times. I expected a cheesey flick, but instead watched a good, solid feature. It's definitely a B-movie, but that didn't mean "bad" back then. It just meant unknown talent and lower budgets. This is a decent story about an exiled mobster and a German scientist who reanimate the recently deceased with atom rays, and control them to take revenge on those who once testified against the mobster. A well-done but obscure flick.

This is a pretty weird sci-fi/cop film, but because it is well written and carried off very well, it works. However, with such a strange plot, it could have easily just been a grade-z film.

The film begins with a robbery and murder. How the perpetrator was able to so easily snap the neck of the victim stumps the cops as well as the strange glowing trail left following the attack. A short time later, another man is killed in a similar manner. With the second murder, a pattern has emerged. Both men had testified years earlier in a trial of a mobster--who has since been deported to Europe. When a third man, also involved with this trial, is killed, it's certain why the killings are occurring--but how?! The police have a crazy idea that dead men are being reanimated using atomic power--making them robotic zombies!! As I said, it sure sounds like a plot that COULD have made for a dumb film.

Here are some of the reasons for the film working. First and foremost, the idea works because the writing is crisp and works well. Second, while the actors in the film are mostly unknowns (with only Richard Denning being recognizable to only a few discerning viewers), they did a great job--and the director did a good job eliciting good performances from all, though I must admit that the little girl in the film was a bit of a weak point--not terrible but not particularly good. Another minor problem is that the reanimated folks talk just like robots BUT no one seems to notice this!! After all, this is a dead giveaway that something is amiss, but time and again none of the living seem to notice! Overall, this is a great film for lovers of 1950s sci-fi/horror/cop films. The rest may just find it all a bit silly, but if you give it a chance you might be surprised to see it's pretty good. It sure ain't Shakespeare...but it is entertaining.

I first saw this film when I was about twelve years old on T.V., and at the time I didn't think it was anything special. I saw it again recently for the first time thanks to modern miracle of video. I must admit that I remember many scenes from this minor little picture more vividly than much better films I saw as a kid: atomized Karl "Killer" Davis busting into a room to break the back of a gangster, the scene where Richard Denning discovers his partner has become a zombie, and the films climax where an army of creatures with atom brains do battle with the police. Oh! and I almost forgot, the scene where walking dead "Uncle Dave" tears Richard Denning's daughters doll to shreds. In retrospect, the scene makes little sense, but it came as quite a shock.

Most of the cast is acceptable. Edward L. Cahn's direction is perfunctory but he keeps things moving. Seen today by younger audiences influenced by MST3K or cheaply cynical critics like John Stanley and Randy Dreyfus, CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN probably looks pretty bad. However, if one views this film in the right frame of mind, it is very entertaining.

Apparently CREATURE WITH ATOM BRAIN has effected a lot of people over the years. Clips from this film have turned up on few TV shows and movies. Roky Erikson (13 Floor Elevators) wrote and titled a song about this movie on his album "The Evil One". He even incorporated lines from the movie in his song "Creature With The Atom Brain."

***SPOILERS*** Far out yet down to earth sci-fi thriller about a number of mindless atomic zombies being used by a vengeful gangster to get even with those who had him deported into exile in Italy. Gangster Frank Buchanan getting involved with ex-Nazi scientist Dr. Wihelm Steigg has him create a number of zombies from corpses, that he stole from the local city morgue, to go out and kill those who had him sent away.

By rejuvenating their dead brains cells with high doses of atomic energy Dr. Steigg is able to make the dead rise again as their sent out to kill those whom Buchanan commands them too. Leaving a trail of radiation in their wake the zombies ,like the sparrows flying back to Capistrano, go back to where they came from their base in Dr. Steigg's laboratory. Buchanan, who's illegally and happily back in the USA, conducts his zombie search and destroy operations out of Dr. Steigg's secret hideout outside the city via a TV monitor that receives transmissions from the Zombies brains.

With the murder of hoodlum boss Hennessy and D.A MacGraw a patten is discovered, by police lab supervisor Dr. Chet Walker, in their deaths. Both were involved in putting Buchanan behind bars and on a boat out of the country. It's now becomes apparent to Dr. Walker that former Buchanan Gang members Dunn & Banning, who gave evidence against him at his deportation trial, are the next to be knocked off and are given a round the clock police protection.

With police Captain Dave Harris kidnapped killed and mind controlled by Buchanan and Dr. Steigg he's then sent back to his police station to finish off both gangsters Dunn & Banning, who are there in protective custody, in order to get his revenge on the whole lot: Hennessey MacGraw Dunn & Banning.

By now Dr. Steigg is scared stiff that Buchanan's mad actions will lead the police to his hideout and wants to call it quits. Only to have the gangster kill him and take over the control of the atomic zombies. It's the mine controlled Capt. Harris who leads the police Army Marines and Air Force back to Dr. Steigg's and Buchanan's hideout as Buchanan sends them, his gang of atomic zombies, out to do battle with the US Armed forces. Winning the first round against the US Army the zombies also start causing havoc all over the state with them, by using their atomic brains, having planes fall from the skies trains derail and cars and trucks lose control on the highways and slam into each other.

Just when it looked like curtains for the US Army and local police with the zombies, and Buchanan, about to take over its then when the mind numbed and brain dead Capt. Harris comes back to life. Breaking into Dr. Steigg and Buchanan's laboratory Capt. Harris nukes Buchanan, with a blast of atomic energy, and destroyed the machinery that controls the rampaging zombies causing them to drop harmlessly like flies.

Captain Harris is the big hero in this film even though he never knows it with his brain in limbo only being, for a time, able to take orders from Buchanan. Harris somehow seemed to be able to get it all together in the end realizing, if only by instinct, that by following Buchanan's orders he was doing himself as well as his country, the USA, serious harm. You can't say that Captain Harris gave his life for his country in being destroyed together along with Buchanan and Dr. Steigg's zombie-control machinery since he was already dead. But at least he made his brief yet explosive stay on earth, as a living dead man, a rewarding one in putting an end to the evil Buchanan/Steigg atomic zombie menace.

I stumbled across Creature With the Atom Brain during my period of collecting 50's and 60's sci-fi. I don't know how I had never caught it before. It's a very decently written and acted low budget film. Unlike many of the films of its genre it relies more on story and atmosphere to create fear as opposed to goofy costumes. The film grabbed and held my attention throughout. The trivia section states that it was released as a double billing with It Came From Beneath the Sea, which may explain why this little gem has been overlooked or lesser known. I found it to be a wonderful addition to my collection. I think it falls more directly in the category of films about the fear of what radiation can do as opposed to a true "creature feature"; which makes one think more of vampires, werewolves and the like.. I hope this helps.

I'm glad that Skin-amax aired this monster movie from the 50's. In my opinion, this is not your typical cheesy b-movie material for MSTK3000 because the plot is surprisingly good and the atmosphere is beyond cartoonish. Well, you can't ask for spectacular f/x (or even decent ones) but this movie delivers.

The acting is beyond regular. The cinematography and the plot are the strong points of this b-movie. I highly recommend it for fans of old monster movies.

The effort deserves a mention mainly because the plot is well crafted and actually delivers some chills. Not in the likes of "The Elephant Man" but still it makes you imagine scary things.

This is a b-movie that deserves some little respect.

Edward L. Cahn…I'm definitely a fan! The name of this b-movie director probably won't ring any bells, but I invite everyone here to click on his name and check out his impressive repertoire! He was an incredibly busy bee, with sometimes up to twelve movies directed per year, and active in various fields and genres like crime, western and horror. Admittedly he never made any true classics or influential milestones, but he did deliver a lot of fun movies like "It! The Terror from Beyond Space", "Invasion of the Saucer Men" and "The Four Skulls of Jonathan Drake". And, most of all, he – unwarily – contributed to the historic development of cinematic zombies with this unbelievably underrated and surprisingly suspenseful "Creature with the Atom Brain". This is just my own personal theory, but creation of zombie cinema roughly occurred in four phases and, as far as I know, this cool little movie kick-started phase II… Phase I started it all with the legendary pioneer movie "White Zombie", featuring what is arguably Bela Lugosi's best performance (yes, better than "Dracula"). In these very first zombie movies the living dead are portrayed as disciplined and docile slaves, solely resurrected from their graves to work for evil plantation owners. To a lesser extent, "I Walked with a Zombie" and "King of the Zombies" also fit into this initial phase. Then we have phase II with this "Creature with the Atom Brain". The zombies are still just slaves, but now they are brought back from the dead to serve as controllable murderers with superhuman strengths. The idea is brilliant, as far as I'm concerned, and results in a handful of truly suspenseful and innovative sequences. "Invisible Invaders", also directed by Edward L. Cahn, also belongs in phase II and here the zombies are controlled by extraterrestrials. Phase III – a very short one – almost exclusively contains the very first adaptation of Richard Matheson's monumental novel "I Am Legend", retitled "The Last Man on Earth" and starring genre icon Vincent Price. After a worldwide deadly plague, the dead rise again and act entirely by themselves for the very first time, but they are more reminiscent to vampires since they only come into action after dark. Then, of course, we have George A. Romero to thank for phase IV, as he made zombies to what they still are to this date with "Night of the Living Dead": vile and merciless undead monsters that hunt down the living in order to feast on their flesh and brains.

So, I'm probably exaggerating a bit, but I personally think that "Creature with the Atom Brain" is a historically relevant little B-movie. But more importantly, it's a very clever and entertaining '50s horror gem with action and suspense. Frank Buchanan, a nation-wide feared mafia gangster enlists the help of a brilliant former Nazi-scientist to extract vengeance on all the people responsible for his conviction. Through zombies that are brought back to life with atomic energy and remote-controlled through brain wave manipulation, he kills off prosecutors but also fellow gangsters that betrayed him, while he remains within the safe and heavily isolated walls of his mansion. The screenplay of "Creature with the Atom Brain" is very talkative and many of the dialogs are quite tacky, but the underlying ideas of the film are compelling and – as stated above – quite renewing. The film does remain a low-budgeted '50s Sci-Fi/horror production, so naturally the special effects are cheap and cheesy. Still, the close-up zombie hit men are rather uncanny. Edward L. Cahn also maintains a grim atmosphere throughout and even the sequences with the head investigator's 6-year-old daughter aren't that irritating. Good movie, strongly recommended to horror fans with an open-minded mentality.

Richard Denning (neatly coiffed as always) plays a police doctor tracking down who, or what, is bumping off several important people. Michael Granger plays mobster Frank Buchanan. Granger enlists the aid of a German scientist (is there any other kind) Dr. Wilhelm Steigg, played by Gregory Gay. Steigg is a specialist in "amygdale stimulation," and has discovered a method for re-animating corpses by pumping some weird fluid into their veins, transplanting some weird stuff into their brains, and turning the eyeballs into miniature televisions. Naturally, he has done this for the good of mankind, but Buchanan has other ideas - like using the creatures to knock off his enemies. The film starts to fall apart when Homicide Captain Dave Harris (John Launer) is turned into a creature, yet it takes the cast members quite awhile to notice the scars running around his forehead.

The rest of the cast is rather unusual - "Killer" Karl Davis, Charles Horvath, and Dick Crockett turn up as creatures. Tris Coffin plays the D. A., and the always useful Pierre Watkin plays the Mayor of the city. However, my favorite character is Radio Broadcaster Dick Cutting. Folks, you just can't make this stuff up.

The film runs around 70 minutes and has some production value. Denning gives it his best shot, despite having to wear a ridiculous flat hat. However, Granger takes the fashion prize, wearing the worst-fitting suit since Frank Gerstle.

Having just seen this for the first time, I was pleasantly surprised; this is a solid, well-acted and scripted, somewhat tongue-and-cheek but scary horror/sci-fi film with a premise simutaneously nightmarishly banal/outrageous: a petty American criminal (looking like a cheap burley thug, the kind who would "threaten" George Reeves on the cheap sets on the t.v. Superman) hooks up in Europe with a German (read: Nazi) scientist experimenting with neural stimulation, and uses the doctor to seek revenge on his enemies by having the doctor's lab subjects become zombiefied killing machines, all via t.v. screens and microphones. The scenes of the gangster and the conflicted scientist constantly standing in front of the screens is at once deliberately "boring" and yet so weirdly disturbing. Even more disturbing and nightmarish are the two of them constantly donning radiation suits to crawl through what looks like some sort of embryonic white plastic tunnel to get to the lab and work on the zombies brains. The science fiction is contrasted humorously with the white-picket fence-ish 1950's domesticity of Richard Denning and his little family. Ah, Richard Denning! Golden wavy-haired, stalwart, fine-figured, supremely handsome, serious yet light-hearted, flirting with his wife yet always ready at a moment's notice to follow up any lead as a police doctor. One of the delights of this movie is a sort of spoof of pipe-smoking! Denning and a detective constantly light up so much that the detective offers Richard to "try my special blend". We also get the much used and appreciated staple of 50's sci-fi movies, the educational film strip, although here it is a bare, er, "bones" demonstration, with just a little doggy who has electrodes on his head. (I do NOT recommend this film for children say, under 12 years old!) The climax has a very "modern" Night of the Living Dead feel to it. The plot moves along at a satisfying pace and never lags. The dialog is punchy and clever. The villains are definitely memorable in a strangely "unmemorable" way. (the genius of the movie, I think!) I highly recommend this to all sci-fi/horror film buffs.

"Creature with the Atom Brain" is fun for what it is, a quick and amusing B picture with a cool premise courtesy of Curt Siodmak. It's agreeably performed, has a good mixture of talk and action, features some decent makeup effects, and it builds to an interesting climax. It hits the ground running and runs just over 69 minutes.

The story has a vengeance crazed mobster named Frank Buchanan (Michael Granger) hooking up with a mad German scientist, Wilhelm Steigg (Gregory Gaye) who is able to reanimate dead bodies using atomic energy. Granger sends these zombies after his enemies while police lab doctor Chet Walker (Richard Denning) and the cops try to solve the gruesome crimes.

Zombies and gangsters prove to be a diverting mix, and director Edward L. Cahn, a prolific director of movies such as this, guides it all with efficiency. The handsome Denning is an engaging hero, while fine supporting performances are supplied by Granger, Gaye, S. John Launer as Chets' colleague "Uncle" Dave Harris, and Angela Stevens and Linda Bennett as his family. It's enjoyable trivia that this was one of the first movies to use squibs to indicate gunshot wounds, and the aforementioned finale with the cops taking on the zombies is a hoot. In fact, the movie does have a not-entirely-serious tone to it that makes it quite irresistible, especially the part where pipe smoker Chet is encouraged to try the "special blend" that another character offers!

All in all, this is a charming diversion from the golden age of science fiction and it's over before you know it.

Seven out of 10.

This one's basically an update of Boris Karloff's Mad Doctor cycle of the 1930s and 1940s, many of which were actually made at Columbia. It concerns an ex-gangster teaming up with an eminent German scientist who has fallen into disrepute of late; together, they contrive to re-animate a series of dead bodies (apparently, their second life-expectancy is very short!) in order to eliminate the people involved in convicting the mobster – unsurprisingly, some of the victims end up themselves as zombies!!

In this respect, the film is mildly entertaining – but, in view of the utter lack of novelty on display (the means of resuscitation may have changed but the result is the same as before), it tends to feel draggy even at a mere 69 minutes! A measure of the film's low-budget is the fact that the montage half-way through of the zombies' exploits is assembled from shots that would eventually form part of the film's very own climax! The lead here is played by lanky Richard Denning (from TARGET EARTH [1954] and THE BLACK SCORPION [1957] – neither of which I've watched) as a scientist/cop. By the way, director Cahn later made the similarly cheapskate IT! THE TERROR FROM BEYOND SPACE (1958).

CREATURE WITH THE ATOM BRAIN is actually the first Sam Katzman-produced horror film I've checked out – and it's one of four that were recently packaged together in Columbia's ongoing "Icons Of Horror" series of genre Box Sets; a second, THE GIANT CLAW (1957), followed this straight away…and, even if I wasn't exactly enthused with either of them, I'd still like to catch up with the remaining two titles (namely THE WEREWOLF [1956] and ZOMBIES OF MORA TAU [1957]). Incidentally, watching this I was reminded of a couple more low-brow sci-fi outings I had rented as a double-feature DVD some years back, which I might as well add to my collection at this juncture i.e. Edgar G. Ulmer's very minor THE AMAZING TRANSPARENT MAN (1960) and the semi-interesting THE BRAIN THAT WOULDN'T DIE (1962)

A high minded German scientist [in the 1950's??] is duped by a vengeful, deported gangster into creating atomic-powered zombies from the recently deceased, stolen from the local morgue, in order to wreak revenge upon his enemies.[Whew!] Now that is a dynamite combination! Never mind how they got six or seven bodies out of police custody; or where they got the radioactive isotopes they are waving around. This one is fun!

A classic, know-it-all police MD, with a pre-women's lib, blonde bombshell wife, and just-too-cute little daughter, is on their trail. He patiently tracks them down with the help of another scientist and his doomed police captain boss. The pipe smoking scene is hilarious; as is the inevitable science film: a trained dog being stimulated with electrodes. The villains give the doctor some scary moments. They even tear his little girl's favorite doll limb from limb. But since the German scientist is radioactive, he cannot escape the ubiquitous geiger counter that appears in all of these films. The climactic battle between the police, the army, and the zombies is to be savored time and again. This one is a classic, and worth your while!

Richard Denning was another actor who for better or worse got to do some truly dreadful science fiction films of the 50s. I think if you took the comparative works of him, Peter Graves, and John Agar it might be a good contest to see who did the most dreadful.

Creature With Atom Brain is among the dreadful. Denning is a doctor in a police laboratory who gets himself a pair of unusual cases, a mobster and a District Attorney killed apparently by the same man and method. Denning was only half right there, but his investigation leads to some startling conclusions.

Talk about evil combinations. Former gangland boss Michael Granger who was deported years ago with the DA's prosecution and his former underboss ratting him out. Granger while in Europe hooks up with a former Nazi doctor Gregory Gaye who has been experimenting with dead animals by injecting the brains with radioactive electric impulses.

Having a whole army of zombie hit men sounds like one fabulous idea for any would be Mafia don. So Granger and Gaye get some dead bodies and start recruiting. Lots of possibilities here, but Granger's going to settle some old accounts before moving on to new and better rackets.

These 50s science fiction movies, even the worst of them are entertaining in a strange way. I'll say that the production got good value on its minuscule budget. It gets hilarious at times though.

Ah, the era when the atom became a major inspiration for B movie plots. Edward Cahn's "Creature with the Atom Brain" was one of the neatest results, focusing on an exiled gangster who hires a German scientist to figure out how to implant chips in people's brains and make them go kill his enemies.

Yes, at this point people still had a lot to learn about atomic energy and radiation (check out the suits that the gangster and scientist wear), but the point is to luxuriate in the sheer silliness of the movie's concept. Admittedly, the housewife is very much a pre-feminist caricature, but we shouldn't expect any differently in one of these movies. As a whole, the movie is a very fun experience.

In conclusion, don't let your doll out of your sight!

Despite the title there's actually a whole army of barrel-chested atomic zombies staggering about in business suit wearing vacant expressions with mechanical voices settling old scores under the direction of a crew-cut mobster who watches it all on TV and gloats. They might be impervious to bullets but it doesn't stop them from bleeding; their blood is radioactive and like their footprints and fingerprints glow in the dark.

Richard Denning plays a pipe-smoking police scientist rejoicing in the name Chet Walker who hits the nail right on the end when he exasperatedly says "And I used to think Scrabble was tough!"

The very ordinariness of the setting makes the zombies look even weirder by comparison, and the brief use of a subjective camera is highly effective.

Edward L. Cahn directed this wacky Science Fiction thriller that stars Richard Denning as police doctor Chet Walker, hot on the trail of a gangster who is using an ex-Nazi scientist in his reanimating experiments to resurrect his dead thugs in order to take over the city. Fortunately, the process involved leaves a trail of radiation in its wake, making it easy for the authorities to pinpoint their exact location, which leads to a climatic battle of the living good guys against the bad dead... Silly film produced by Sam Katzman has no originality or credibility at all, though it is innocuous enough to be a guilty pleasure for some viewers!

I saw Creature With The Atom Brain when I was 11 years old. To this day, no horror film has scared me more. The opening credits are shown over a view of one of the creatures lumbering through the woods with the accompanying sound of a beating heart. At the final credit we get a closeup view of the creature's face complete with the telltale stitches across his forehead. The carnage has begun I guess it was that these seemingly unstoppable creatures looked so ordinary, except for their awkward gait and gruesome stitches, that made them seem so scary. I had to walk (run) by some woods in the dark on the way home from this movie and I was quite convinced that one of these guys was going to stroll out from among the trees and break me in half just as the first creature, Karl 'Killer" Davis, did to his gangster victim in the opening scene. Nobody should enter his garage without checking to either side of the garage door to make sure one of the creatures isn't lurking there waiting to rip the steering wheel from your car before throttling you with one hand. This was not a high tech movie nor was it overly bloody, but the threat of bodies raised from the dead being able to bend the bars on a window as if they were well done noodles and take multiple gunshots without noticing was more than enough to scare the pants of of an 11 year old. Once the creature had you zeroed in, there was no hope.

A vengeful mobster (Michael Granger) uses remote-controlled, atomic-powered zombies to wreak vengeance on the people who brought him to justice years earlier. Even by the standards of fifties budget sci-fi films, the 'science' in the film makes no sense (but is typical for the era in that radiation can do anything required by the plot). The atomic 'rays' (from a radium source hidden in the villains' secret lab) not only provide the undead with some kind of 'life-force' but renders them incredibly strong and impervious to bullets. For no apparent reason, the creatures speak in the voice of the gangster remotely controlling them (until the plot requires otherwise), and despite having no memories, are capable of driving a car. Also typical for the era, the hero (Richard Denning) manages to figure everything out, including exactly where in the secret lab the radium is stored. The script/story (from genre regular Curt Siodmak) is pretty sloppy and full of holes/inconsistences (after warning police about the dangers of radium, the hero just throws it out the window), the production values are low (although the use of squibs in the shooting scenes is unusual the budget/genre), and the acting uninspired. The film has the look of a condensed 1940's serial, with lots of detectives and reporters in fedoras, some last-minute escapes, and a climatic fist fight before the villain's predictable comeuppance. Could have been an entertaining, if far-fetched, sci-fi/horror-mystery if a bit more thought had been given to the script/plot, but as is, 'The Creature with the Atom Brain' is just a shoddy time-killer for genre fans.