Escapement

After a film star is killed in a car crash, insurance investigator Jeff Keenan (Rod Cameron) is dispatched to get to the bottom of the death. Upon arrival in the south of France, Keenan discovers that others have died, and may be linked to his company's client. This might have something to do with a certain psychiatric clinic.

THE ELECTRONIC MONSTER has no "monsters" in the literal sense. Instead, it has psychiatrists / scientists messing around with the human brain in order to relieve patients of their anxiety. Oddly, this has something to do with implanting images of semi-erotic, modern dance routines!

Of course, this isn't a good idea, and leads to horrific results. In addition, a nefarious cabal is at work behind the scenes with an unsavory agenda.

This isn't a bad movie, and it's a shame it's been almost totally forgotten. The plot is interesting, and the movie could be remade. It's the sort of raw material that would make for a tremendous David Cronenberg film. Until then, it's enjoyable enough...

In Charles Eric Maine's excellent (for its day) novel, a scientist invents a mind-tape-recorder (helmet on the head, bazillion-track tape), hoping to use it for Good, like studying mental disorders. A movie mogul gets hold of it and soon billions of people waste their lives and their savings in tanks "experiencing" recorded porn or schmaltz (ultraslow replay intensifies the sensations). The scientist decides to take drastic measures, batters the mogul to death and plays the recording to the billions, hoping to scare them back to reality. Instead they die and the book ends as he's about to be sentenced for the death of the mogul, raising the ethical question of the collateral damage.

Bear in mind that when Maine wrote this, brain waves were novel, magnetic sound recording was only about a decade old and video recording was still in the future.

In the Z-grade film, the WHOLE story is ripped out (daren't offend Hollywood) and we're left with an ordinary quarter-inch reel-to-reel recorder and a squawking electronic soundtrack that has nothing to do with the action on screen. I've completely forgotten the new plot, but vaguely remember people in leotards writhing around some cheesy gauzes to hint at forbidden pleasures.

I'd give it an award for Worst Adaptation ever.

The Rod Cameron's fans will probably be deceived by this ridiculous movie which can only bring boredom at the worst and laugh at the best. I was bored, and not that amused. This is an awful film from a Monty Tully who has used us to better stuff. Monty Tully was a British B pictures provider, as were Vernon Sewell, Lance Comfort, all them made all kinds of plots, all kinds of genre, except westerns of course; mostly crime and dramas, some horror. No, really, this film is ridiculous, but because I am kind with movies, I will not say it is an insult to viewer's intelligence. You may try after all. It won't kill you.

1957's "The Electronic Monster" was a British programmer that didn't cross the Atlantic for three years (Columbia double billed it with either William Castle's "13 Ghosts" or Toho's "Battle in Outer Space"), its more accurate original title "Escapement" changed for something signifying more horror than science fiction (the shooting titles were "Zex, the Electronic Fiend," and "The Dream Machine"). It actually plays out as a murder mystery, from the pen of Charles Eric Maine (The Atomic Man"), under the direction of journeyman Montgomery Tully ("Invisible Creature," "Fog for A Killer," "The Terrornauts"), from the same Anglo Amalgamated company that would become infamous for color fright fests "Horrors of the Black Museum," Circus of Horrors," and "Peeping Tom." This black and white quickie can't help but pale in comparison to those three, using the typical format of importing Hollywood actors to play the leads, in this case Rod Cameron ("The Monster and the Girl") and Mary Murphy ("The Mad Magician"), not a surprise since both had already worked in England before (Cameron in "Passport to Treason," Murphy in "Finger of Guilt"). Cameron's rugged countenance (well suited to Westerns) seems out of place as a two fisted insurance investigator looking into the sudden death (suicide or murder) of a star actor who had just left a clinic near Cannes that specializes in relaxing patients with dream therapy as a form of 'escape from reality.' Once he starts making inquiries about the clinic we pretty much stay put, as the police surgeon supplies his own verdict on cause of death (cerebral thrombosis) as opposed to the actual cause, a short circuit of the brain due to a severe dose of brainwashing. The primary villain is quickly revealed to be the clinic owner (Peter Illing), his bizarre likeness shown in the electronically induced dreams (I could have done without the diaper-clad lads prancing about), apparently a former Nazi who is confident that the well paid local authorities won't bother him. A decent enough view if somewhat obvious, though some of the French accents render dialogue unintelligible.

I remember seeing The Electronic Monster as a lad way back when I was 11 years old and it was the second feature of a double bill. It had an interesting concept, but it was poorly executed.

Rod Cameron and Mary Murphy are a pair of Americans in the leads of this British production which is set in France. An American film star dies in a car crash and the autopsy showed he was dead before his car went out of control. Too much electric shock of the brain. Cameron is an insurance investigator employed by the film star's studio.

He discovers some other deaths of prominent people all had known the same femme fatale and all had extended stays at a 'resort'. Roberta Huby is our Mata Hari.

The resort is run by a rather cold and bloodless Peter Illing and the people are there for some kind of new psychotherapy. Dr. Meredith Edwards has investigated a kind of electric shock therapy which feeds certain erotic images into the brain and records. Kind of a Krell brain test. But Illing has seen the possibilities of mind control.

Illing is also engaged to another film star Mary Murphy who was once an item with Cameron. That's one major weakness of the movie there. He's so cold and bloodless, sinister but also a drip. What she saw in him I'll never know.

Interesting concept, but the execution was so lifeless and dull. Both the leads got a European vacation out of it so that might have been the reason they signed for The Electronic Monster.

Good a reason as any.