Madmen of Mandoras (1963) / They Saved Hitler's Brain (1968)

Director: David Bradley

Writers: Steve Bennett, Peter Miles

Composer: Don Hulette

Starring: Walter Stocker, Audrey Caire, Carlos Rivas, John Holland, Marshall Reed, Scott Peters, Keith Dahle, Dani Lynn, Nestor Paiva, Pedro Regas, Bill Freed

More info: IMDb (Hitler) & IMDb (Mandoras)


Tagline: The most incredible plot to conquer the world!

Plot: Nazi madmen preserve Hitler's brain on a small tropical island until the time is right to resurrect him and, along with him, the Third Reich.

My rating: THEY SAVED HITLER'S BRAIN: 3/10
MADMEN OF MANDORAS: 4/10

Will I watch it again? No.

THEY SAVED HITLER'S BRAIN is a better title than the original...at least it's more exploitation-y.   MANDORAS is about an hour long; it's still slow and rather dull but it's only an hour long.  How do you make it worse?  Wait a few years and add 30 minutes of even worse acting and boring nonsense in front of it so you've got an hour and a half of something you can now sell to TV stations, that's how...but change the title to something more intriguing.  The plot is ludicrous but fun...as far as fun can take you considering the lazy pacing.  Thankfully there's lots of music to get us through it but that only goes so far.  The final twenty minutes is far more exciting than anything that came before it.  There's not nearly enough Hitler (or as one character refers to him as Mr. H) business to satisfy the TV title but at least he's there.  If you must watch this, fast forward to the ??? mark, skipping the incredibly sleep-inducing bits and get to where MADMEN starts properly.  You'll have more fun...at least in theory.  It looks like actor Bill Freed (Hitler) had a blast... Since this is in the public domain you can see it for free online and it's on countless DVDs.  I watched it from a BCI set called Drive-In Cult Classics Vol. 2.  They actually go the extra mile and give you more value for your dollars by having 8 movies on 4 double sided discs.  This film has 4 (fullscreen) trailers for films I've never even heard of which is surprising.  They're fun, though.  SECRET FILE HOLLYWOOD, DANGEROUS CHARTER, CATALINA CAPER and LITTLE LAURA & BIG JOHN (with Karen Black).  The flipside has MADMEN that you can play the film only or with the drive-in experience which begins with some drive-in promo stuff for the snack bar, etc., the film's trailer, the trailers for SECRET FILE HOLLYWOOD and THE HOSTAGE.  The the picture starts (74 minutes) then you're prompted to slap in disc 2 to continue the show.  AND you get a nifty and informative 7-page booklet with info on all 8 films! You can pick it up on Amazon for $7.55 and free shipping (for prime members) or used for even less (including shipping).