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30 out of 31 people found the following comment useful :-
Please wait for the authorized HD DVD later in 2008, 24 January 2006
10/10
Author: cardifilm from Los Angeles, CA

Horror High was stolen from the filmmakers thru a device know as a "Hollywood" contract. As the star and one of the filmmakers, I would very much like to see Mark Tensor in court. Horror High Ltd. has not seen one penny from Crown International and it's ring of crooks, and the connection to Rhino (a subsidy of Warners) is ridiculous as well. Crown and Rhino have no rights what so ever to this film or other films in the Horrible Horrors 1 & 2 collections. I urge you to wait for the new transfer that is being made from the directors cut off of the original 1st answer print from the original a/b roll neg. There will be extras and interviews, commentary, and an in-depth statement about Crown International and Mark Tensor's Hollywood thievery and a visit from Veron (after drinking the potion) to Mark Tensor's lair . - Pat Cardi AKA Vernon Potts

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8 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Pure Nostalgia, 5 November 2000
Author: BaronBl00d (baronbl00d@aol.com) from NC

Like many of the other reviewers, I remembered bits and pieces of this film from my adolescent years(ok maybe 11-13). I finally tracked down a copy and the film came back to me as I watched it. The guinea pig killed with broken glass and squealing, the English teacher with the paper cutter, the merciless jocks, and so on rushed to my brain and brought back that late evening in the 70s when I saw this film for the first time. The film is by no means great or even good, yet something in it makes it so memorable to those of us writing here. I am not sure what that quality is - maybe we see ourselves in this protagonist in small pieces. I don't want to get too psychological here, but it must be something about the film. The film is about a young man picked on by all who loves biology and the experiments he has been working on all summer. Everyone at this school..and I mean everyone except a young girl that admires the young man for his intellect...is cruel, sadistic, and totally uncharacteristic of what you would find in teachers and the like. He experiences one shocking mistreatment after another, until forced to drink a serum he has been working on, becomes a Hyde-like character that avenges himself for all the wrongs redressed towards him by all his enemies. The film is very cheaply made...very dark in most places, and it is very gory for its time, which also might explain why it is memorable. I liked the film, defects notwithstanding.

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8 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
It's Pat! Cardi, that is..., 21 October 2001
Author: altamont from New London, CT

Like many impressionable adolescents within late-night or Saturday-afternoon viewing range of WOR (Channel 9) or WPIX (Channel 11) in the mid to late seventies, I developed an early affection for this, the perfect adolescent horror clunker. Yes, the papercutter. Yes, the acid vat. Yes, the cleats. And hell yes... Mister Mumps. Whatever Pat Cardi's shortcomings as an actor, he made a convincing tortured high-school Jeckyll & Hyde. I never found it particularly terrifying except perhaps for that hideous ballad in the background as Vernon rides his bike to school, but it's far more compelling in a (relatively) innocently creepy way than the slicker and more cynically formulaic eighties slasher flicks that followed. Like 'Plan 9' and 'Silent Night, Bloody Night' (both big in the 9/11 universe, and endlessly repeated since the broadcast rights must have been cheap... thank Jah I came of age before the infomercial era), it rightly belongs to the Cinema of Obsession, all the more convincingly when you're 16 and watching it for the fifth time at 2:45am.

There's something to be said for a teen revenge flick that could have plausibly been written and directed by a pimply adolescent.

Reading some of the other comments reminded me that this was also one of the films that made me realize that my early tastes in cult film weren't nearly so obscure as I thought. I remember being flabbergasted as a junior in high school circa 1979 to meet a fairly cute, well-adjusted girl from another school who had seen it three or four times

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6 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
An intriguing exploration of the dark side of the human psyche, 15 January 2002
10/10
Author: glump from london, england

Twisted Brain is a low budget film with a lot to say about the human condition. A young latter-day Dr. Jekyll, Vernon Potts is brilliantly portrayed by Pat Cardi. Pushed to the breaking point, Potts lashes out against everyday injustices, prejudices and petty torments. The screenplay is witty, sophisticated and disturbing.

This is a film you will not soon forget. Director Stouffer gets a big thumbs up here. (The paper cutter scene is delicious!)

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7 out of 8 people found the following comment useful :-
Get Up, Get Dressed, It's The Return of the Repressed!, 11 January 2004
10/10
Author: roddmatsui from los angeles

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

THINGS ONE CAN POTENTIALLY LEARN FROM WATCHING "TWISTED BRAIN":

1. Your schoolmates are evil. 2. Your English teacher and your gym coach are both evil. 3. The school janitor is equally evil, and will beat you viciously with a broom handle if he suspects you did something to his cat. 4. Nothing is fair, and only in the pain of loss can you understand or know the good things in life.

Oh yes, all you fans are not mistaken, and you're not imagining things: This is a truly memorable, haunting, shocking piece of film that will stick with you years after you have seen it, and if you were lucky enough to catch it on late night TV as a kid in the 70's or 80's, the memories may be with you forever. Abused, misunderstood, never-wanted-to-hurt-anyone schoolkid Vernon Potts gets endlessly tortured by EVERYONE at his high school, invents a Mr. Hyde potion in science class, is forced to drink it by an evil, sadistic janitor ("What'd yew do to mah CAT, boy???"), and transforms into some kind of horrible monster. The "transformed" Vernon then takes revenge on his tormentors (which ones? I'd say ALL of them) in some unusually violent scenes. There's plenty of bright red 70's Karo syrup blood to be had by all.

As unsubtle as the story is, there is something very real and poignant about it. No one was ever treated THIS badly in school (the abuse is taken to beyond-cartoonish extremes) but this movie nonetheless evokes the quality of real cruelty that lives in people. Vernon's crazed revenge feels dramatically correct as he stomps, slices, slams and crushes everyone who ever crossed him, and of course he is blasted to smithereens at the end. Like most good monsters, he's just gotta go down for the horrible things he's done, yet his demise is most assuredly tragic. The girl who understood him (before he became all hairy and fangy) weeps. If you don't feel your heart sink at the end of this film, I suggest that perhaps there is something wrong with you--terribly, horribly WRONG with you!! Don't you have a heart, man??

Featuring an absolutely amazing early 70's rock music score, lots of groovy keyboards and electric guitar. The music alone is worth the price of admission!

Discuss it with just about anyone who has seen it, be they friend or bitter enemy of yours, and they will nod their head and agree: "Yeah, I felt sorry for Vernon!"

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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
Twisted Brain Revival!, 19 November 2001
Author: hvalencia from CT, USA

I am so pleased to see so many people have seen this movie....of course...late night on Elvira or Grimsley. My sister and I used to laugh hysterically at this. I mean with a name like Vernon Potts..you're going to get picked on! We used to say lines from this movie...we knew it word for word!

So now we are in the DVD age and I am looking to replace the really bad and really old VHS copy I made from one of our late night viewings! I need to add this one to my collection.

But on to the film......Everything about it shows the start of teen horror flicks. These guys pioneered the "outcast teenager". This is Carrie, Prom Night......all the horror flicks of the eighties.

I especially like the drawn out interogation of Vernon by the detective. The delays in response, as if they are reading from cue cards, is hysterical.

I really am pleased, like the rest of you, to know that I am not the only one who watched this movie and remembered it all these years.

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4 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
left me disturbed and upset....., 18 December 2000
Author: jamie from chicago, il

I am amazed so many people saw this film in the same situation (younger,late night on network tv,during the early to mid seventies,,) I thought i was the only person to have been moved by it. I am not saying i thought it was bad or good, but memorable in a sad disturbing way.... I remember feeling really bad at the end of film with the sad song played during vernon's death.....tragic....

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4 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
VERNON...PAPER CUTTER...ACID BATH...The COACH DESERVED IT!!!!, 11 August 1999
Author: Lance-29 from Minneapolis, MN-USA

What can I say, my friend Jason H. was able to scare me by simply walking pigeon-toed towards me and repeating..."Vernon, VERNON...TWISTED BRAIN!!!!" I saw this on 'Son-of-Chill Theater' when I was about in 1st grade. Christ it's no friggin' wonder why I was scared to go to bed alone, and coincidentally why I was so mean to nerds who did poorly in science! It was a great movie, although I'm afraid to let memory mix with reality by actually seeing it!! The Face Stomping scene was brutal, but it was weird how I still felt sorry for the 'Twisted Geek'.~Lance

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4 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
A late night tv classic, 26 June 1999
Author: Scott from Columbus, Ohio

Jason Atwood does'nt know what he's talking about! Lots of people would agree that this is a very good movie. (about the scenes being too dark,I could see them fine,has'nt he heard of a brightness dial!) I do admit that most of the people who like this film think of what they thought of it when they saw it as kids on late night tv. I see movies on video store shelves all the time that are totally stupid and I can't say that about this one. This was the goriest movie I could find on network tv. A guys face melting off after being dipped in acid,and a guy getting brutally stomped to death with steel baseball cleets are a few things to look for in this movie! The acting is'nt too bad either,you kind of get to feel bad for the main character,its cool to see him get his revenge. (even though he does go a little overboard) I'd like to see this movie make a comeback! If anybody else remembers this movie,write a review,I'd like to see what you think.

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5 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Nostalgia for me too, 18 June 2004
10/10
Author: mdavidsnyder from Bethlehem, Pa

This is definitely one of those films that I clearly remember watching on Saturday afternoon creature double feature here on the East Coast. Man I miss those days when whacked out old flicks from the 60's & 70's played then or late late nights.

This film left such an impression that I sought out a copy of the film when I attended a convention and own it alongside the deathmaster, Dracula Vs frankenstein, squirm & the incredible two headed transplant...now i just gotta find encounters with the unknown..

If you like bad cheapo horror from the 70's...watch this film find it own it LOVE IT

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