(1981)
Director: Romano Scavolini
Writer: Romano Scavolini
It took me quite a while to get around to this review of Nightmare In A Damaged Brain (more often simply referred to as Nightmare). The reason was that after my first viewing of the film, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. So I let the film roll around in my head a bit, and I re-watched it the other night. And I am still not sure what to write. The movie is not bad, not in the least. The special effects work (supposedly by Tom Savini, though he contested it and had his name removed from the film) is fairly impressive, and the cinematography is quite good as well. The film as a whole however, is just extraordinarily average. Every plot twist can be seen from a mile away, and you're never quite sure whether to be scared of our psychopathic antagonist or just feel sorry for him. Although, I have to admit that I would love to see an eyebrow-off between this guy and Eric Freeman from Silent Night, Deadly Night Pt. 2.
Nightmare gained most of it's notoriety as a video nasty due to the fact that the film's U.K. distributor, David Grant was sentenced to 18 months in prison (of which he served 6) for refusing to edit out a one second gore sequence. As far as I know, he's the only person to actually serve jail time during the whole video nasty era. Although I'm not really sure that it was worth it for Nightmare, you've got to admire a guy that sticks by his guns like that. All in all, I would say that I enjoyed Nightmare. Sure, it's an exceedingly average slasher, but in a world full of frustrating and irritating slashers that's not necessarily a bad thing. What it sets out to do, it does, and quite well.
Enjoyabilty: 6 out of 12 beers
Quality: 6 out of 10 skulls
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