Review of Brainstorm

This excessively melodramatic thriller has everybody yelling over ridiculously bombastic music to the point where even extra-strength Tylenol can't help make sense of this mess. Starting off O.K. (with Jeffrey Hunter rescuing the allegedly suicidal Anne Francis from an on-coming train), it goes haywire once you meet her extremely cruel husband (Dana Andrews) whom this James Cain ripped off couple plot to kill with the intention of him getting an insanity plea. Toss in a subplot involving Hunter's scientific research, his therapy with the beautiful psychiatrist Viveca Lindfors, and Hunter's eventual sentencing to a mental institution, and the result is a curvy road map of a plot that runs out of gas long before it gets to its destination. Even if you make it to the end, you may have left it behind psychologically long before that.