The Man with Two Brains

Not to be confused with The Man with Two Brians.

The Man with Two Brains
DVD cover
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)	June 3, 1983 (1983-06-03)
Running time	93 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Box office	$10,353,438

The Man with Two Brains is a 1983 American science fiction comedy film directed by Carl Reiner and starring Steve Martin and Kathleen Turner.

Written by Martin, Reiner and George Gipe, the film is a broad comedy, with Martin starring as Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr, a pioneering neurosurgeon with a cruel and unfaithful new wife, Dolores Benedict (Turner).

Plot

Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr (Steve Martin), a widowed brain surgeon renowned for inventing a method of 'Cranial Screwtop' brain surgery, saves the life of Dolores Benedict (Kathleen 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. However, trouble seems to begin right after he carries her over the threshold; Dolores torments Michael 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 voice by Sissy Spacek). Hfuhruhurr and the disembodied brain immediately fall in love. Eventually Dolores catches on to this when she spots him in a rowboat with Anne, and attempts to kill Anne, causing Michael to literally toss Dolores out of his house and into the mud, yelling that Dolores is out of his life and will never get a penny of his hard-earned millions. The convergence of a sudden rush of random murders and the possibility of brain transplantation causes Hfuhruhurr to speculate about how he might improve his lot in life. At first he consults with Dr. Necessiter on the basis his brain ought to be transplanted into a tank, but Necessiter informs him that brains in tanks do not actually survive for long, with Anne being his longest-lived brain to date-, and instead recommends transplanting the brain into a recently deceased woman.

As the good doctor searches for a female to kill so he can have the beloved brain implanted into a human body, he realizes that he is unable to kill. He professes this to the surgeon, who 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, Hfuhruhurr 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 with a squeaky voice to kill and take her body. However, after taking the hooker to her room, he realizes that if he were to do this, Anne would have a very high voice (same as the hooker's), thus Hfuhruhurr concludes that it is not worth the risk to murder her and leaves. Stepping into the elevator, 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, but is stopped by the Austrian Police, who thinks that Michael was drunk driving. Michael explains to the police that he was driving sober, but Dolores is passed out from being drunk. After Hfuhruhurr passes a sobriety test (which consists of wacky moves), the police are convinced Michael was driving sober and send him on his way. However, as he drives away Dolores' lifeless body flails, causing the police to correctly see that Benedict is not drunk, but dead, and promptly pursue Hfuhruhurr for murder. Hfuhruhurr makes it to the lab and Necessiter transfers Anne's consciousness to Benedict's body, which is viewed by the stunned policemen. However, in the process, Hfuhruhurr is electrically shocked by the equipment (part of which consists of an arcade cabinet powered by quarters) and falls into a coma.

Waking up six weeks later, back in his hometown, Hfuhruhurr finally meets up with Anne in Benedict's body. Anne reveals that her former body was that of a fat woman, and that she has gained considerable weight in her new body. However, Hfuhrhurr loves Anne for who she is, and takes no notice of her girth. They are married shortly thereafter, and reenact the previous over-the-threshold scene. The film ends with a request for the audience to report the whereabouts of Merv Griffin if they see him at large.

Cast

• Steve Martin as Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr
• Kathleen Turner as Dolores Benedict
• David Warner as Dr. Alfred Necessiter
• George Furth as Timon
• Peter Hobbs as Dr. Brandon
• Earl Boen as Dr. Felix Conrad
• Sissy Spacek (uncredited) as Voice of Anne Uumellmahaye

Reception

The Man with Two Brains currently holds a 70% 'fresh' rating on review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes.

In popular culture

• Dr Hfuhruhurr's so-called 'cranial screw-top' method of brain transplantation later inspired the name of the UK punk-pop band Cranial Screwtop.

External links

• The Man with Two Brains at the Internet Movie Database
• The Man with Two Brains at AllRovi
• The Man with Two Brains at Box Office Mojo
• The Man with Two Brains at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Man with Two Brains at Metacritic