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Disjointed horror film that was made from a heist film that was cut apart and had new scenes added. It has something to do about a zombified people going around killing. The original film was a crime caper film about a jewel heist. Watching the film for the first time in years, and for the first time without commercials I found it to be an absolute disaster area of a film. Its awful. Its films like this that make me hate Al Adamson films because they are such patchwork messes with new and old footage mingling freely. After listening to the commentary on the DVD I have to temper my criticism of the film since its clear that the scenes from the original heist film were actually really good. Had that film been released (it couldn't get released because it had no stars) I'm pretty certain that it would have had a nice reputation and Adamson might have gone on not to be a hack. The trouble was that Adamson was willing to sell his film short and shoot and reshoot and cut apart the heist film. Producer Sam Sherman who does the commentary takes the blame for ruining the film with the re-cuts and rewrites. The film as it stands now seems to be about four films blended together, which is about right since the heist, the cops, the zombie and what ever else all seem to be in different films made at different times. Sherman in his commentary said the film plays better with commercials and he ain't kidding. Watching this on TV you can blame the station for hacking it up, however seeing it sans commercials you realize what a nightmare it is. Awful

"Blood of Ghastly Horror" first began life as an unreleased Al Adamson heist feature from 1964 titled "Echo of Terror," then with new footage of go-go dancers and a brutal stabbing slipped out from Hemisphere Pictures in 1965 as "Psycho A-Go-Go" (not to be confused with "Two Tickets to Terror," in reality a rerelease title for 1961's "Half Way to Hell"). Adamson shot new footage of John Carradine in 1966, resulting in a second release, as "Fiend with the Electronic Brain," playing in selected Southern states as early as Dec 1967, courtesy David L. Hewitt's American General Pictures. By 1969, still more footage was shot, with Kent Taylor and Regina Carrol (Mrs. Al Adamson), and still later Tommy Kirk, resulting in what producer Samuel M. Sherman accurately described as an 'interesting editing exercise.' The finished (?) product was issued in 1972 by Sherman's Independent-International Pictures Corporation, simultaneously playing on television under yet another new title, "Man with the Synthetic Brain." Only a devotee of outright schlock could really appreciate what remains, provided they possess the knowledge of its convoluted backstory. We begin with a zombie-like creature named Akro (Richard Smedley) committing several murders, switching gears to a police investigation conducted by Sgt. Cross (Tommy Kirk), relating the background on Dr. Howard Vanard (John Carradine, entering at the 17 minute mark), who had implanted an 'artificial brain component' into almost dead Vietnam veteran Joe Corey (Roy Morton). He succeeded in saving Corey's life, but turned him into a homicidal maniac, later avenging himself on the remorseful Vanard by strapping him into his own device and electrocuting him (at the 37 minutes mark). Sgt. Cross now follows the trail of Dr. Elton Corey (Kent Taylor), father of the dead Joe Corey, who uses his voodoo powers to create the hideous Akro, seeking vengeance now against Dr. Vanard's daughter Susan (Regina Carrol), with most of the final half hour consisting of the original unissued heist footage, and Joe Corey's high altitude pursuit of stolen diamonds. As a director, Al Adamson displays a casual disregard for narrative competence, coupled with an inability to even focus the camera in the right direction, often leaving the performers off screen as they spoke. John Carradine is the biggest name in the cast, and is accorded top billing over Kent Taylor, who only enters at the halfway point, once Carradine's bespectacled scientist bites the dust. Tommy Kirk is the other veteran actor, not what one would expect for a solemn police sergeant, but as the only actor to work with both Al Adamson and Larry Buchanan ("Mars Needs Women," "It's Alive!"), deserves a measure of respect for surviving such highs and lows in a screen career soon to fade. "Blood of Ghastly Horror" is undeniably a bad film, but "Horror of the Blood Monsters" reached a new low even for Al Adamson. Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater aired this film once, July 23 1977, paired with second feature "The Black Cat" (1941).

[Also released as: "The Fiend with the Atom Brain", "Fiend with the Electronic Brain", "The Love Maniac", "The Man with the Synthetic Brain", and "Psycho A Go-Go"].

The Film that Wouldn't Die: a movie which has endured more surgical alterations than the Frankenstein monster. Each version has been equally monstrous, but the history of this movie is a real hoot. Behold:

In 1965 Al Adamson produced and directed a very low budget quickie called "Psycho A Go-Go", in which an ex-soldier is turned into a zombie-slave-killer by criminals who implant a device in his brain. The film was a big flop.

Four years later Adamson tried to jazz it up by adding new scenes and giving it a new title: "Fiend with the Electronic Brain". This new version was also a big flop.

In 1971 Adamson decided the film needed more new scenes, and this time he got Kent Taylor ("The Day Mars Invaded Earth") and John Carradine to help out. Even better, Adamson persuaded his sexy wife, Regina Carrol, to play Carradine's daughter. Best of all, he got Tommy Kirk ("Mars Needs Women", "Village of the Giants") to play a police detective who investigates the murders. To celebrate the film's big upgrade, he retitled it again: "The Man with the Synthetic Brain". Even with these well-known stars and nifty new title, the film was still a big flop.

So Adamson waited awhile, gave the film another new title, "Blood of Ghastly Horror", and re-re-re-released it. Naturally the film was a big flop again because it was the same terrible movie that had flopped the last time.

Is that the end of Adamson's Indestructible Movie? Definitely not -- in fact, this isn't even the entire middle of this remarkable film's history. At various times the movie has also been released under the title's "The Man with the Atomic Brain" and (get this) "The Love Maniac".

Maybe the next reincarnation of this unkillable film will be disguised by a really tricky title -- like "War and Peace" or "The Eleven O'clock News". Good heavens, what if we just walked into some theater and found ourselves trapped into watching . . . "X: The Unknown Movie"!

Al Adamson might just have been the worst film director in history. I truly think that his films are at least as bad as Ed Wood's and both men finished up their careers making porno flicks. This film, made in the pre-porno days, manages to perhaps be the worse excuse for a film Adamson ever made--even worse than Dracula VS. FRANKENSTEIN!! That's because this master of the super-super cheap drive-in film found a way to make this film even cheaper and cheesier than the rest--he took apart an older film he made (PSYCHO A GO-GO) and pieced it together with some new scenes to make an entirely new film!!

The original film, PSYCHO A GO-GO was actually one of Adamson's best films (though its current rating of 2.0 is hardly stellar). It was about a jewel robbery gone bad and particularly focused on a psychotic killer within the gang and his evil deeds.

Now, the same guy who was killed at the end of PSYCHO A GO-GO is back as a zombie re-animated by John Carradine with an electronic brain! And, it's up to Tommy Kirk and a bunch of other no-talents to unravel the mystery (about the murders, not why they agreed to be in this pile of bilge).

Much of the film makes no sense at all and it's all quite confusing and stupid--with very large chunks of the old film re-used haphazardly. Apparently none of this was important to Adamson. What was important, it seems, is managing to make a new film for $5.78. The only people who could enjoy this dull mess are bad movie freaks like myself who occasionally enjoy laughing at horrid films. And this one has it all--very bad acting, the director's stripper wife making yet another gratuitous appearance in one of his films, non-existent writing and terrible direction (with quite a few out of focus and poorly framed shots).

Only because this movie hasn't graced MST3K, has it not received attention as the worst of all time. I saw this film over 20 years ago and still remember it as the worst ever - without having seen it since. And yes, I have seen "Plan 9" and "Robot Monster" and a number of the films shown on MST3K, like "Manos, The Hands of Fate" and "The Puma Man."

This film, which I saw as "The Man With The Synthetic Brain," is truly terrible. A crime film which becomes a mad scientist film, which becomes a chase film, and ends up as a zombie movie!

I saw this on TV, and when coming back from commercial breaks, I frequently thought that I was watching a different film entirely. Both in plot and cinematography, it's like a film pieced together from ill-fitting parts of other films. A Frankenstein of films - at least in the method by which it seems to have been made.

The dialogue is horrible and most of it unnecessary. A typical line: "I flew in.....on a plane!" That would be opposed to flying cross country by flapping his arms. I'm glad they explained that one, I'd have been lost otherwise.

The best part (or worst)? The ending with a Witch Doctor / Scientist shown wearing a Witch Doctor mask and a lab coat. Why a lab coat? Why not?! The lab coat would protect his delicate mix of monkey brains, goat lips, fish heads and guano from suit lint. The suit lint would ruin everything!

Only see this film if you love bad films. Anyone looking for even a below average B-quality movie would be very disappointed by "Blood of Ghastly Horror."

• SCG

p.s. Who gave this movie a "10?" Were they confused by one of the 300 titles used to repackage this bomb? Then again I note that there were two "10" votes and two writing credits on the film. I sense a conspiracy. Someone get Mulder and Scully on this.

You really get 2 bad films for the price of one.Its obvious the producers put 2 turkeys together to get one dead fish. If you see this film you may never go back to the video store again,feeling cheated and ripped off.

Al Adamson was a next-generation Ed Wood who directed many movies in the history of bad cinema, such as DRACULA VS. FRANKENSTEIN, SATAN'S SADISTS, THE FEMALE BUNCH, and lots more. Not too surprisingly, you may have noticed Regina Carroll appearing in almost every one of his films. I believe the public hasn't taken Al Adamson's name in widespread recognition too seriously, but then again, Ed Wood bounced back into popularity due to the highly-praised 1994 movie about his life and career. But enough said....

Whatever you'd like to name this picture is totally beyond me! Don't complain about thinking this is a horror film, because it's not. This is a fine piece of work by a respectable genius who made something look like a collage, which complicates everything in the movie's framework. The first thing you see are zombies attacking a woman. Next comes a scene that resembles 007. Later on, a stupid mad scientist and a 10-minute long mom & daughter mountain chase makes you wonder what the hell Al Adamson was doing in making a HORROR movie! Yucksters will definitely enjoy this and his other weird films, but they usually lack the spirit of famously familiar Ed Wood material, however they are a little more modern considering they were released during the early years of the anti-social generation. BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR is okay, but Al's other movies are probably much better than what I saw.

Don't ask me how I did it, but even though this is technically a botched and splicey patchwork of a movie, I had a good time with it. It's poorly made to be sure, but somehow it's also mesmerizing in its ineptness at the same time. It helps going in to know the history...

It was directed by drive-in movie maestro Al Adamson (of "Dracula vs. Frankenstein" fame), who originally planned a straight jewelry heist picture in 1964 until meeting up with producer/mentor Sam Sherman who persuaded him to gradually add new scenes and ideas specifically for the horror/sci-fi television market in the early '70s. It was finally sold to TV with the lucrative title of MAN WITH THE SYNTHETIC BRAIN, but Sherman thought it could be milked further, so the movie was also played at theaters where it became known as BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR.

Ultimately emerging as connected pieces of different half-baked incarnations (one of these was even called PSYCHO A-GO-GO before the music was eliminated), the movie begins with a zombified maniac running around town strangling people. Through flashbacks within other flashbacks we're treated to a background story of how a Vietnam vet named Joe Corey was wounded and then "helped" by a wacky scientist named Dr. Vanard (the always welcome John Carradine) who planted some sort of mechanism inside Corey's head and unintentionally turned him into a murderer with a taste for jewel robbing (which is how the old 1964 heist footage managed to get utilized). But this man-made killer's got an angry dad who's also a scientist and is even nuttier than Dr. Vanard. He's out to even the score for what was done to his victimized son, and that includes making a mummified and whimpering she-monster out of Vanard's sexy daughter (Regina Carrol, director Adamson's wife).

This isn't a film for most audiences, but anyone who revels in idiotic or badly made exploitation films of the '60s and '70s would want to get a load of this concoction. You've got to hand it to Sam Sherman and Al Adamson, in any case... they knew how to have fun and freak out audiences. The current DVD available by Troma is badly framed, however... this cuts out some widescreen and results in an unfortunate pan/scan affair. But it's unlikely at the time of this writing that there's any better source material. * out of ****

Three people whose careers saw better days star in Psycho A Go Go. John Carradine, Kent Taylor, and Tommy Kirk are the stars and the rest of the cast of this monstrosity are a bunch of never wases. Carradine plays a scientist who puts an electronic pulse in the brain of a wounded Vietnam vet who becomes a psychotic killer. Taylor is another scientist and Kirk the homicide cop assigned to catch this deranged killer.

It's sad to see someone like Kent Taylor in this stuff, he had a respectable career in some decent roles in B pictures. Like so many when the studio system collapsed he took work where he found it. Carradine just didn't care, he would sign for anything at this point of his life. And we all know how Walt Disney had Tommy Kirk blackballed with the major studios because he discovered he was gay. This was all he could get.

This one doesn't even have the saving grace of an overacted Carradine performance, no special moment like he had like in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance with that spread eagle oratory. He just took the money and ran. Hopefully all their checks cleared. There ain't a spark of anything in the three dull faced stars.

You name it, it's bad, acting, direction, camera work.

Skip this one if at all possible.

I watched this Z-grade excuse for a "movie" under its title "The Man with the Synthetic Brain", but I can assure that any form of brain activity is the absolute last thing you should expect to find here. Now I am aware that one shouldn't anticipate much when selecting a movie directed by the notoriously incompetent director Al Adamson (his other "highlights" include 'Blood of Dracula's Castle', 'Satan's Sadists' and 'Brain of Blood') but this worthless excuse for a motion picture is literally insufferable. The first 3 minutes are the only ones worth mentioning, actually. During this falsely promising intro, we witness a Frankenstein-type monster savagely strangling no less than five people. What an awesome opener, you'd think … but then Adamson suddenly opted for a completely retarded and incoherent narrative structure, involving long & confusing flashbacks and unrelated sub plots. Don't even ask to summarize the concept, as it quickly got so boring and uninteresting that I lost all attention. Apart from during the intro, there's absolutely no other action or bloodshed, the acting performances are almost painful to observe and not one of the dialogs makes a slight bit of sense. John Carradine looks really fatigue in his umpteenth role as unstable scientist (and cause of all horror) and Adamson's direction totally lacks style and inspiration. Even horror fanatics that have a weakness for 'so-bad-it's-good' cinema shouldn't view this dud, as it's too terrible.

Like horror has blood. A tossed salad of scenes whose relationship makes only a klutzy kind of sense. Combine this with the worst directing, photography, sound effects, and music imaginable and you have some idea what you're in for. Night scenes too dark to see the characters. A woman screams but no sound comes out -- they forgot to add it. A zombie wraps his arm around someone and they scream and fall dead to the ground. A man being shot grabs his chest before the gun goes off. Or how about the score -- a psychotic killer is chasing a woman and her child with intent to kill, accompanied by swinging jazz. This chase scene incidentally is most of the movie, or seems like it, killer running, woman and child running, killer, woman, on and on ... Zombies and mad scientist plot elements are stuck onto it with spit and string. To say this is a cheesy horror film is to be generous. Someone said it had never been used on MST3K -- that's probably because they'd be putting more work into ridiculing it than the filmmakers did in making it.

Blood of Ghastly Horror: what does that even mean? It's just a bunch of random horror-related words clumsily strung together to sound scary. Still, it's quite apt, since this film from director Al Adamson makes very little sense whatsoever, being the third incarnation of a movie that originally started life as Psycho A-Go-Go in 1965. Not happy with his first cut, Adamson went back to the editing room, adding new footage featuring John Carradine as a mad scientist and releasing it as The Fiend with the Electronic Brain. Still not content, he added more new footage, and gave it the title Blood of Ghastly Horror. No wonder the story is so scrappy.

Carradine plays a mad scientist (for a change), Dr. Vanard, who uses a special electronic implant to repair the damaged brain of Vietnam veteran Joe Corey (Roy Morton), but alters the man's personality in the process. Corey, now a violent psychopath, joins a gang of thieves who rob a jewellery store but lose their haul whilst escaping, the bag of valuables landing on the back of a pickup truck owned by David Clarke (Kirk Duncan). Corey tries to track down the jewels, using whatever means necessary.

Meanwhile Corey's father Elton (Kent Taylor) seeks revenge on Dr. Vanard for his son's condition, using a Haitian zombie named Akro as his instrument of death.

All of this is shoddily thrown together with little concern for narrative cohesion, the resultant mess a colossal bore that gives credence to that old adage 'If at first you don't succeed, just give up'.

Strange movie with no real plot. There are zombies and jewlery hold up men and a mad scientist who lab is literally set up in an office toilet!.

None of it is good.

The writing is atrocious.

The only think I found interesting are the street scenes of 1967 Los Angeles. And the fact that people still smoked indorrs back then.

It's a step above Ed Wood and that's not saying much.

A well-meaning scientist's attempt to aid the recovery of a war vet by implanting a device in his damaged brain is highly successful... apart from the unfortunate side-effect of turning his patient into a psychotic killer. The complex flashback-within-flashback structure of Blood of Ghastly Horror isn't a creative decision on the part of infamous schlock director Al Adamson, but his attempt to make one movie out of two. The result is exactly the kind of near-incomprehensible mess you'd expect, but at least it's never boring and there's some neat cinematography from Vilmos Zsigmond. The crime story, which culminates in a really quite good extended chase scene, is far better than the horror movie into which it's spliced.

A true mishmash of a movie, "Blood of Ghastly Horror" is an affair that was fudged with repeatedly over a period of several years. As its associate producer Sam Sherman says, you could fall asleep while watching, and wake up thinking that you're watching a different movie. It moves from sci-fi / "zombie" tale to serial killer feature to heist film to chase picture, and is just barely coherent.

It deals with, more or less, a character named Joe Corey (Roy Morton), who was given a new lease on life by a typical Mad Scientist, Dr. Vanard (John Carradine), who implanted an electronic device in his brain. However, this turns Joe into a homicidal madman. Some time later, Joes' father, Dr. Elton Corey (Kent Taylor) seeks revenge with the help of his own special serum.

Always reliable veterans Carradine and Taylor give the proceedings their best shot, but "Blood of Ghastly Horror" may be tough to stick with even for dedicated schlock lovers such as this viewer. Once Carradine is gone from the story, things degenerate into a not especially riveting pursuit through snowy mountains. Producer & director Al Adamson could usually give his low budget efforts some entertainment value, but this one is more along the lines of just plain bad, rather than so bad that it's funny.

Among the illustrious thespians filling out the supporting cast are Tommy Kirk (who sure came a long way since his days at Disney) as a detective, and Adamsons' wife, actress & dancer Regina Carrol, as Carradines' inquisitive daughter.

There are indications that the original heist film might have been okay. However, the end result is a mess that's only entertaining in spurts.

Four out of 10.

First, there was Psycho a Go Go. It was your basic 'heist gone wrong' flick where criminals dump some jewels in a man's truck, the daughter finds them and the crooks invade the home, while the daughter and mom are away on vacation. The worst criminal, Joe Corey tracks them down and harasses them. There was nothing supernatural about it.

Then, there was Fiend with the Electronic Brain. It's basically the same movie, but with a few added scenes with John Carradine as Dr. Vanard, who now has the story of being the one who operated on Joe to make him evil.

Now, we come to Blood of Ghastly Horror, which is the craziest weirdest one of the 'trilogy' I suppose this could be viewed as a sequel to Fiend With the Electronic Brain, but that would be pushing it. This time, there is a lot more new footage, and even has a brainless zombie, under the control of mad doctor, Dr. Elton Corey, who is the father to Joe, the psycho from Psycho a Go Go. He wants revenge for his son's death, so he sends Akro, his zombie minion out into the night to do his dirty work.

Two detectives, Cross and Grimaldi are looking into the case, and reminisce about archive footage from the other two films. They interview Susan Vanard, daughter to the doctor who operated on Joe. Dr. Elton wants to kidnap and transform her into his newest zombie. Will he succeed?

Out of the three films of the same thing, I gotta say this one was my favorite, mostly because of the zombie creature, Akro, who just randomly kills like 5 people at the beginning of the film. His makeup is pretty bad and cheesy, but that's what makes it great. If you love silly trashy grindhouse flicks, you'll love BLOOD OF GHASTLY HORROR!!!

First they filmed a crime drama. Then they decided to make it into some sort of sci-fi flick, by adding footage which explains the criminal's behaviour in terms of a synthetic brain place in the head of a soldier. Then they decide to wrap this with some incredibly trashy low-budget early 70s zombie monster footage.

Blood of Ghastly Horror (1972)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

Drive-in master Al Adamson strikes back once again with another mix and match film. Apparently in 1964 Adamson finished a police thriller but it couldn't be sold so he and producer Sam Sherman started filming new scenes to try and make it better. Five or six films were eventually "made" but this one here is the one that finally sold and apparently made a profit. Considering there are five or more movies on display here it's pretty hard to follow any story but it involves scientists (John Carradine) doing brain work on a killer who eventually goes out and kills. Make sense? Well the movie certainly doesn't. The Carradine footage is obviously the most recent thing filmed for the movie and he does have a few campy moments, which earn a few laughs but I'm really not sure what his footage has to do with too much of the film. The cop footage seems to come from Adamson's Psycho a Go-Go, which is also pretty bad but this film does have its charm because it moves at a nice speed and you really can't believe your eyes with what you're watching. Tommy Kirk and Kent Taylor are also scattered around the film and what they're doing exactly is anyone's guess. This is certainly an important film if one wants to see this type of drive-in fluff but others should stay far away.