Give the wind enough time; it will wear away a mountain.
Riverdale, Illinois, a couple driving back to town see a flash of light. They investigate and find some dead animals. Then they find a cone shaped object. Its 50 feet high and 50 feet wide at the base. It is impervious to heat and acid. The origin and nature of the cone is unknown. There have also been some murders in the nearby town. A group from Washington led by Senator Walter K. Powers (Cornelius Keefe) and his assistant Dan Walker (Robert Ball) go to Illinois to investigate.
Powers wants to talk to the mayor but he has been missing. The mayor’s son Glen Cameron (Alan Jay Factor) brings them to the cone. At the cone are Dr. Paul Kettering (Ed Nelson), Alice Summers (Joanna Lee) the mayor’s secretary, Dr. Wyler (David Hughes) and Glen. Later they are informed that Mayor Cameron has returned. In his office the mayor becomes combatant. Someone notices a mark on his neck. The mayor pulls out a gun. A deputy shoots and kills the mayor. An autopsy reveals that the mark on the mayor’s neck is really a parasite that has injected a toxin into the mayor’s nervous system.
The sheriff (Greigh Phillips) drives back to the cone. On the way back he is attacked and a parasite is attached to his neck. In the lab Kettering is experimenting with the parasite. It attaches itself to his arm. Kettering burns it with a Bunsen burner to get it off. Wyler calls Kettering at the lab. They drive out to the metal cone. Along the way, they discover an abandoned electric company utility truck. Three groups are organized to look for any other metal objects. Kettering and Alice find the dead body of the utility truck driver. He has two puncture wounds on the back of his neck. People are starting to drop like flies.
Eventually they find that the cone is inhabited with parasite creatures that come from, not outer space, but deep in the Earth. From the Pleistocene Age. Their aim is to take over the world. The small band of unaffected people must come up with a way to stop this menace from below.
“The Brain Eaters” was released in 1958 and was directed by Bruno Ve Sota. Leonard Nimoy makes an appearance near the end of the movie as Professor Cole. It’s a short movie, only 61 minutes. Ed Nelson and Roger Corman are the producers. The creatures were made by Ed Nelson. They are basically wind-up toys covered with fur, with pipe cleaner antennae. Because of the cheesy looking monsters one late night camp movie host called the movie “Attack of the Bunny Slippers”. The movie takes some elements from Robert Heinlein’s “The Puppet Master”. Heinlein sued the movie makers. The suit was settled out of court. Corman maintained that he had never read “The Puppet Master”; however, once he did he agreed that there were obvious similarities. He agreed to a settlement of $5,000 and agreed to Heinlein’s demand not to credit him. Apparently Heinlein found the movie lacking.
It’s your basic 50’s schmaltz. It’s a similar concept to dozens of other movies “Night of the Creeps”, “Invaders from Mars”, “Slither”, even “Invasion of the Body Snatchers”. It is creatures taking over the minds of humans. Zombie-esque. The only difference is that these little fuzzy things are from underground. It’s harmless entertainment.