Brainstorm (1965)

Certainly, the movie is worth the watch.Insane or not Insane? That is the Question! What is the answer? (See my board post which answers that but contains spoilers there.) Well, you better take notes and watch carefully, because you might have to go back and re-watch a few scenes. Yeah, one of those nice suspense movies. :) The director here is in tune with the message, and will play with you using a tiny bit of Hitchcock like style, but it's a well crafted movie. Yes, there are some rough spots around the edges, but one should certainly watch it for the great story and pretty good acting by both the scientist and the women.Break out the popcorn and watch the end closely! Good movie for the time period. Still fits for today. Nicely directed.

By the time "Brainstorm" was made, both Jeffrey Hunter and Dana Andrews had descended into B films. "Brainstorm" was one of them, costarring '50s starlet Anne Francis. Directed by William Conrad, it's actually a good movie about an engineer who falls in love with the unhappy wife of a wealthy man (Andrews) and concocts a scheme to kill him and get away with it by faking insanity.Hunter is very good in this dramatic role - he was a far better actor than some of his contemporaries but due to his personal demons, he never fulfilled his early promise. It's a shame because he played this kind of angry, edgy role very well, belying his staggering good looks. He gets good support from Andrews, Francis, and Viveca Lindfors, who plays a psychiatrist.There is one scene that may be unintentionally funny - when Hunter is in the asylum, one of the inmates starts singing the beginning of a song over and over again. Hunter finally screams, "Either finish that song or SHUT UP!" Brainstorm is worth a watch, especially to see Hunter do a role deserving of his abilities, and one he no longer had an opportunity to play in A films.

What I found most interesting about this movie was the idea of Jeffrey Hunter's character feigning insanity. I wondered was he really faking or just deluded? Because, the idea of pretending to be insane to the nth degree sounds, well, insane. I thought the movie was well cast. However, Jeffrey Hunter steels every scene he is in as he seemed to revel in this role. It was good to see Jeffrey Hunter in a role he could sink his teeth into. He did a good job in communicating his desperation. It would have been nice to see him in more character roles. If you want to see Jeffrey Hunter in a role that is out of character then this is a movie worth checking out.

Like Raymond Burr, William Conrad started out in late-40s film noir as (no surprise) a heavy, and also ended up in series television ("Cannon"). But he also produced and directed both TV and some movies. His Brainstorm arrived in 1965, smack in the transition period from big old films made in the style of the studios to the newer kinds of filmmaking in the 1970s renaissance. It's an offbeat but interesting movie. The first third recalls Max Ophuls' Caught, the middle Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity, and conclusion Samuel Fuller's Shock Corridor. Jeff Hunter is a computer whiz working in some top-secret aerospace concern run by sinister mogul Dana Andrews. One night Hunter finds a car stalled on a railroad track with a woman (Anne Francis) passed out inside. He rescues her, and she turns out to be Andrews' wife, who was making a suicide attempt. Major complications ensue, with romantic involvement leading to attempts to "gaslight" Hunter which in turn engender a plot to murder Andrews. Viveca Lindfors turns up as an enigmatic psychoanalyst in this roiling plot that, in the spirit of the 60s, poses the question, "Is insanity contagious?"