This film features Hitler’s head in a jar.

Really, what more do you need to know.

Hitler’s head. In a jar.

The Fuhrer-bust is quite well done, considering the cheapness of the rest of the film. There’s one bit where has a bit of a rant, where they probably sat an actor in the boxes under the jar, but the rest of the time, it appears to be a basic animatronic that swivels its eyes and leers creepily.

At first, the film has nothing at all to do with Hitler’s head in a jar. A rather nasty nerve gas has been developed, and only one scientist knows the antidote. Rather than spread this information far and wide, he decides to keep it to himself for a while. No sooner has he told a bunch of Government types about this plan than he finds his younger daughter has been kidnapped. Rushing to her apartment, he and her fiancee are also captured.

The scientist’s eldest daughter and her husband are then accosted at gunpoint by a man who wants to take them to the country of Mandoras, where the scientist has been taken by latter-day Nazis. After the stranger is shot dead, the couple decide to follow his advice, and head to South America.

Mandoras consists of a Mexican town square set, some back roads and a ravine. The couple rotate through them all, meeting rebels, local politicians, an American oilman going along with the Nazis to get some prime oilwells and, finally, the Nazis themselves. All twelve of them. There’s a showdown, and Hitler’s head suffers a suitably gruesome end.

The film, also called They Saved Hitler’s Brain, doesn’t, and couldn’t, live up to the promise of Hitler’s head in a jar, but it has its own campy charm. I got it on the Gorehouse Greats DVD set, which is Region 1, so you’ll need a machine that can play it. It promises some more gems, so look out for more.