A Rudimentary Thinking Man's Thriller

BRAINSTORM (1983)

Reviewed by Jerry Saravia

What I remembered most about "Brainstorm" when I first saw it back in the 1980's on good old cable were the images of a car's point-of-view as it flew off the main road towards the mountain side. I also recall images of a man having sex with a woman, again from his point-of-view. These images were recorded in 70mm and, on video in the 80's, much of the image size was lost as was the impact. Nowadays, on Blu Ray and DVD, we can get the widescreen version we all richly deserve. Now as for the storytelling basics, "Brainstorm" is often stunning to look at yet dramatically inert and it shortchanges its initial ideas in favor of a rudimentary thriller format.

The idea is remarkable: a sophisticated technological headset allows one to view and record another person's sensations, visually and emotionally. There is something else it can do - it can directly tap into past emotional memories of said individual wearing the headset. The institute behind this amazing discovery has two brainiac scientists, Michael (Christopher Walken) and chain-smoking Lillian (Louise Fletcher). The head of the institute behind this research (Cliff Robertson) has other ideas on how to use this device, for military application of course and quite possibly brainwashing.

"Brainstorm" is shot on two different ratios, so that whenever we enter someone's subconscious via the headset, the film switches from 35mm to 70mm and it is richly detailed and amazing to behold. There is also a terrific montage of when Michael first met his estranged wife (Natalie Wood, sadly her last role and underused) as they talk about inventors like the Wright Brothers, their marriage, their happier times. At first, "Brainstorm" evolves with a sure hand as we discover what other facets lurk beneath such an inventive device - in the wrong hands, it can obviously be used for dastardly purposes. In another instance, without revealing who the character is, it can be used to record someone's death and thus the person viewing such a recording can suffer the same deadly symptoms unless they quickly switch off the controls. This is such an intriguing idea for a movie that unfortunately such mind-blowing concepts are never fully explored. "Brainstorm" decides to become a race-against-time thriller with the scientists against the powers-that-be and all emotional attachment to the characters and to the powerful device and its implications are shoved aside. It is about good scientists vs. a villainous military command - why resort to scenes of archaic robots running amok and computers destroying an institute while the bad guys are unable to enter the facilities?

I liked "Brainstorm" for the most part yet, during its concluding third act, there is a shaky abruptness and a hasty resolution that give us so little to contemplate (though the final scenes that show an almost death-like paralysis of one character is quite emotionally stirring). "Brainstorm" doesn't want to deal with the ethics and morality of such a scientific breakthrough - it assumes that the set up is enough along with some minor thrills. Intriguing to be sure but could have been so much more.