The Man with Two Brains
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| The Man with Two Brains | |
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| Directed by | Carl Reiner |
| Produced by | William E. McEuen David V. Picker |
| Written by | Steve Martin Carl Reiner George Gipe |
| Starring | Steve Martin Kathleen Turner |
| Music by | Joel Goldsmith |
| Cinematography | Michael Chapman |
| Editing by | Bud Molin |
| Distributed by | Warner Bros. |
| Release date(s) | 3 June 1983 |
| Running time | 93 min. |
| Country | U.S. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb profile | |
The Man with Two Brains is a 1983 U.S. film directed by Carl Reiner and starring Steve Martin and Kathleen Turner.
Written by Martin and George Gipe, the film is a broad comedy. Martin plays Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr, a pioneering neurosurgeon with a cruel and unfaithful new wife, Dolores Benedict (Kathleen Turner).
In 2000, readers of Total Film magazine voted The Man with Two Brains the 35th greatest comedy film of all time.
[edit] Plot
Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr (Martin), a widowed brain surgeon renowned for inventing a method of 'cranial screw-top' brain surgery, saves the life of Benedict (Turner), a gold-digging femme fatale who is accidentally run over by Hfuhruhurr when fleeing the scene of her latest husband's fatal coronary (which her malicious mind-games and scheming caused). As she recovers, Hfuhruhurr falls in love with her and they marry. She torments him by pretending to be too ill to consummate the marriage, driving him into a frenzy of frustration. On a honeymoon/business trip to a medical conference in Vienna, a city living in fear of the serial "Elevator Killer", Hfuhruhurr meets mad scientist Dr. Alfred Necessiter (David Warner), who has created a radical new technique enabling him to store living brains in liquid-filled jars.
After learning that his adored new wife is really "a cheap, vulgar slut," Hfuhruhurr discovers he can communicate telepathically with one of Necessiter's brains, that of Anne Uumellmahaye (uncredited but voiced by Sissy Spacek). Hfuhruhurr and the disembodied brain immediately fall in love. The confluence of a spate of random murders and the possibility of brain transplantation causes Hfuhruhurr to speculate about how he might improve his lot in life.
As the good doctor searches for a female to kill so he can have the beloved brain implanted into, he realizes that he is unable to kill. He professes this to the surgeon who is housing the brain in a jar of liquid. The surgeon tells Hfuhruhurr that as a last resort, he can implant the brain into a gorilla that he keeps in his laboratory. After giving this idea serious consideration for several seconds, Hufuhruhurr replies "I couldn't fuck a gorilla!"
Determined to find a body for Anne, Hfuhruhurr drives to the city center with a syringe filled with window cleaner, the substance used by the Elevator Killer to kill his victims, and selects a prostitute to kill to take the body of. However, after taking her to her room, he finds that he is unable to do the deed, and goes home empty-handed. Returning to his apartment, he finds that Benedict has just been murdered by the Elevator Killer, who turns out to be Merv Griffin. Hfuhruhurr hurriedly takes Benedict's body to Necessiter's lab while evading the Austrian Police, where he and Necessiter manage to transfer Anne's consciousness to Benedict's body. However, in the process, Hfuhruhurr is electrocuted by the equipment and falls into a coma.
Waking up six weeks later, back in his hometown, Hfuhruhurr finally meets up with Anne in Benedict's body, whereupon they are married shortly after. The film ends with a request for the audience to report the whereabouts of Merv Griffin if they see him at large.
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