aka Nightmare Concert
aka Un gatto nel cervello

Director: Lucio Fulci

Cast: Lucio Fulci, Robert Egon, Brett Halsey, Paul Muller, Maurice Poli,

Grindhouse Releasing / All Regions / Unrated  / 1.66:1 Anamorphic Widescreen / ENGLISH: Dolby Digital Stereo, ITALIAN: Dolby Digital Stereo / 93 minutes

Disc Extras: New High Definition Anamorphic Digital Restoration of the Uncensored Director’s Cut / Interview with Lucio Fulci and star Brett Halsey / Lucio Fulci’s Heroic Appearance at the 1996 NYC Fangoria Weekend of Horrors / Original Italian Theatrical Trailer / Gallery of Stills and Poster Art / Liner Notes by Antonella Fulci, Horror Novelist David J. Schow and Eli Roth

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Lucio Fulci is a legend of horror filmmaking. I’ll say that as fact. He’s best known for his classics like Zombie 2, City of the Living Dead, House by the Cemetery, and The Beyond. Considering how great these movies are, it’s a real shame the last part of Fulci’s career was a very inconsistent mess. If you’ve seen some of these films, like Touch of Death, Aenigma, Zombie 3, or Sodoma’s Ghost, you get a clear idea of the dip in quality. That’s not to say there weren’t shining moments of gory and macabre madness here and there. For someone who hasn’t seen this later batch of Fulci films, Cat in the Brain is the great place to start.

Lucio Fulci, playing himself, has been having trouble shooting his horror films lately. He’s so stressed and over-tired, he’s seeing random gross things, or people getting killed –most of which are from actual scenes from his old movies. So troubled by these visions, he goes to a local psychiatrist for help. This psychiatrist turns out to be a serial killer with a pallet for slicing and dicing his victims. So the doctor puts Fulci under a psychosis, and the poor horror director thinks he’s the one committing the doctor’s murders. This isn’t high art like you’d experience from an early Fulci giallo, but instead, it’s straight up cheese.

I don’t see any damn cat.

The movie’s not perfect. Fulci walks from scene to scene witnessing the juicier moments of his lower grade movies. It pans to the old movie scene, then back to Fulci in a different frame cringing, then back to the movie scene, then back to Fulci again with another expression on his face. The camera trick doesn’t fool anybody. And the plot between the crazy psychiatrist and Fulci could’ve been expanded, but it’s secondary to the main star, that being the gooey stuff. Despite the plot and execution flaws, Cat in the Brain delivers enough grizzly deaths to fill ten slop troughs. And don’t forget the generous addition of breasts and female flesh to get the blood pumping. True Fulci fans, and even the fair weather fans, will want to give this Italian horror flick a chance.

Grindhouse Releasing unleashed a true Deluxe Edition of Cat in the Brain. The bevy of extras alone is worth the purchase, especially for Lucio Fulci’s appearance at Fangoria’s Weekend of Horrors in New York City. The transfer and audio have been vastly improved over previous editions, though the way the film was made, it doesn’t allow for superior restoration. The liner notes are informative and cool, giving the entire DVD package a true deluxe status. Fulci lives on in style thanks to Grindhouse Releasing.