The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		3.0

The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie Review

The movie with no brain.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 24, 2015

As I watched The Thing With Two Heads, the goofily enjoyable “science fiction” horror film from 1972, I mused if star Ray Milland, who is tethered to “Rosey” Grier for much of the film in what must have been a series of compromising positions, ever thought to himself, “For crying out loud, I’m an Academy Award winner! Amputate me from this piece of garbage!” Milland evidently had no problem with science fiction or at least quasi-horror, as evidenced by Panic In Year Zero, which he not only starred in but also directed, and even Roger Corman’s X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes. But here in The Thing With Two Heads Milland is literally stuck to the side of Grier’s visage in a patently hilarious attempt at “special effects” while also being forced to recite a litany of racist claptrap just for good measure. That Oscar for The Lost Weekend must have seemed awfully long ago during this film’s shoot.

Dr. Maxwell Kirshner (Ray Milland) is a world famous surgeon and guiding force behind a transplant institute bearing his name. Kirshner’s medical career has been brought up short, at least with regard to operating on people, by aggressive arthritis which has gnarled his hands, and sad to say, his crippling is only one of his health issues, something that makes his mortality ever present in his mind. Kirshner isn’t one to take these maladies lying down, and has already begun a series of experiments in his institute that he hopes will offer a better alternative than physical therapy or ointments. He’s shown the latest development in his quest to rid himself of his malady, and it’s the rather unexpected sight of an ape with two heads. The second head has been appended to the ape’s body at Kirshner’s behest, and it’s Kirshner’s plan to surgically remove the original head and let the second head assume control of the ape’s body. A little inductive reasoning will probably clue most in to Kirshner’s real plan here—he of course wants to transplant his head onto a healthy human body and assume control of it.

Because things always go awry in films like this, there’s an initial interstitial sequence with the two headed ape getting loose out in the general populace. But even that catastrophe pales in comparison to the next trauma, which is the fact that Kirshner’s best laid plans quickly go to hell in a handbasket, and his medical team is forced to improvise by getting a death row inmate named Jack Moss (Rosey Grier) to provide the body (unwittingly) for the experiment. Oh, did we forget to mention—Moss is (obviously) black and Kirshner is an old school racist.

We’ve already seen Kirshner’s less politically correct proclivities with regard to an African American doctor named Fred Williams (Don Marshall) who ostensibly comes to work for the institute, but the gloves really come off once Kirshner awakens to find himself grafted onto a hulking black guy, and a convict, to boot! Meanwhile, Moss is out to use whatever window of time he’s been granted to prove his innocence, though that pesky Caucasian noggin sticking out of his left shoulder keeps trying to make sure he (Moss) is sedated, in order to hurry along Kirshner’s ultimate control of the body.

The Thing With Two Heads is rather oddly structured, at least for a supposedly “routine” American International horror flick. The titular character isn’t even revealed until about a third of the way through the film, with the opening act spending a somewhat tedious amount of time setting up the premise and dealing with the (admittedly hilarious) hijinks of the escaped two headed gorilla. After Kirshner and Moss are joined in unholy matrimony (or something like that), the film then cartwheels into a purely lunatic and cartoonish series of chase sequences, including a completely over the top segment where a seemingly inexhaustible supply of cop cars go to their crash and burn demise. That silliness is followed by yet another chase—this time on dirt bikes.

While the opening act of The Thing With Two Heads seems to suggest that the film is going to play things in a straight (albeit decidedly lo-fi) manner, there actually turns out to be a surprising amount of humor on display once Moss and Kirshner are a “team.” There are a few great one liners sprinkled into the mix, and not necessarily limited to Kirshner’s somewhat problematic racist rants. When Moss’ girlfriend Lila (Chelsea Brown) sees him for the first time (with Kirshner “in attendance”), her reaction is more or less “you get yourself into the craziest s***!” These little bons mots give The Thing With Two Heads just enough self-deprecating, winking comedy to overcome some otherwise serious deficits in logic and visual presentation.

The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Thing With Two Heads is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Olive Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. Elements are in okay condition, though there are the usual signs of age related wear and tear, including small blemishes, nicks, and both white and black flecks. Colors have faded slightly but noticeably, with skin tones edging toward brown at times and blue skies appearing just slightly pale. Clarity is generally quite commendable, especially in the many outdoor sequences, though sharpness is somewhat variable at times. Grain is natural looking and resolves organically. There are no issues with image instability or compression artifacts.

The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Thing With Two Heads features an at times surprisingly boisterous sounding lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono mix. While dialogue and the film's score (by Robert A. Ragland) are rendered accurately and with no major problems, it's in the longer chase sequences that things really kick into high gear, with quite effective lower end effects and nice clarity and precision despite a sometimes fairly noisy ambience. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range quite wide for such a lo-fi affair.

The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

There are no supplements of any kind on this Blu-ray disc.

The Thing With Two Heads Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Make no mistake about it, The Thing With Two Heads is a pretty bad movie. But it's also a lot of fun, especially for those who don't mind a few racist rants and the decidedly hilarious sight of Ray Milland and Rosey Grier in very close proximity to each other. Campy and hyperbolic to the "n"th degree, The Thing With Two Heads is the kind of film they don't make anymore, which is probably a good thing. For cineastes with "discerning" tastes, The Thing With Two Heads comes Recommended.