The Demons in My Head (1996 Video) User Reviews

Dire misguided Australian science fiction horror comedy

[Bloodwank · 2/10 · 12 February 2012]

Should have been prepared I guess. After some 5 odd years as a fan of Australian horror, digging everything I saw from the big guns to the barely seen, finally I come across two in a row that I don't get along with. The Demons in My Head is especially unfortunate, since it actually has a pretty interesting story and some potential. Essentially it uses the standard narrative of a good hearted man driven down a bad path by his frustrations and failures, but weds this to the rather inspired lunacy of a gateway to other dimensions residing within a helmet found inside a meteorite, a gateway capable of transporting matter through mind. This could have been an at least semi inspired science fiction parable, but writer/director Neil Johnson sadly uses his science fiction and horror elements as little more than dressing for a sexual comedy, sexual comedy which barely raises a chuckle and fails even harder at being sexy. The characters of this leaden piece are Travis, who lusts after his blonde housemate (who isn't interested) and later transfers his affections to a religious weirdo (also blonde) who similarly isn't interested. And all the while Travis has to fend off the advances of his snarky gay stereotype other housemate Regis, Travis not being gay. And he also has to contend with the possibility of all his possessions getting repossessed. As comic set-ups go it isn't too bad at base, but the writing makes a self obsessed dimwit of every character with several of them shrill to boot and the sub-Neighbours standard acting does nothing to shade or endear any of them, resulting in an embarrassing morass for much of the film. The forays into genre territory are laughably cheap in a bad way, the effects mostly of a standard that recalls TV programming for the under-5's spawned from producers who assume their audience just won't care. Towards the end there are one or two short but nicely bloody gore shots but its too little too late and the startlingly asinine ultimate resolution to the tale discolors pretty much every meagre bright spot of the rest of the film. I'll give the film a little credit for sheer WTF value, but overall its terrible and only masochists should consider watching it. 2/10.

Catacomb of Creepshows #2 (of 50): or Man-o-man was this movie bad

[movieman_kev · 2/10 · 22 September 2012]

Poor SOB Travis seems to be having no luck in life, not financially nor romantically. One day a strange meteorite crashes in his backyard wherein he, along with help from two devoutly religious neighbors, finds cryptic writings on a headband from a fabled space race. Said headband lets Travis make objects appear out of thin air.

I have no clue what I just saw, a comedy that isn't funny, a horror film that isn't scary, or perhaps a sci-fi flick that is hackneyed and needlessly convoluted. I haven't the foggiest. What I do know is that if the first film in the Catacomb 50-movie box-set, "Addiction" gave me a false sense of hope with how good it was, than this one brought me back to the stark reality that the following 48 films might be a true test of endurance. Doubly a shame as my curiosity was piqued by the Writer/director's numerous collaborations with Man-O-War (an amazingly great band)

Eye Candy: Amber Allum gets topless

Genesis 6:4

[nogodnomasters · 4/10 · 22 April 2019]

The movie has its moments of genius and some very sad moments too. The opening credits seemed to have been very well done with the appearance that this would be a first rate horror movie, but the credit technique didn't match the film. One of the problems with the credits is that it had only 2 names (or so it seemed) that of Neil Johnson and Jane Rowland. The SF special effects were great, the horror special effects were stinkers.

The movie is based on pop pseudo-science popularized by "The 12th Planet" (that guy is actually still around pushing this nonsense). In this film, the ancient Nephilim send a meteor to earth with a device inside that does a lot of tele-creating/ transporting stuff. The movie spends excessive amount of time with characters. There are 3 people who share a house. Travis Brown is a regular guy. Regis is a gay guy who wants Travis. Travis wants Marcia, a model who lives there also. Marcia would rather date Travis' HS rival. There is also a Christian couple involved, one of which is a guy whose stutter was overdone until it was stupid.

Better than most Brain Damaged films and it would be interesting to see what Neil could do with a budget. Certainly this is better than Peter Jackson's first film.

F-bomb, sex, nudity?

Horrifying Shirts!

[junk-monkey · 1/10 · 13 December 2005]

"This is a frightening movie because of the extraordinary directing skills of Neil Johnson." writes another reviewer of this movie. mobile-8 from Australia, I would take a flier and say that "Mobile-8" is almost certainly connected with this movie somehow may even be "Award Winning Director" Neil Johnson himself - who, in addition to directing and writing this movie, is also credited with being an actor (Long-Haired Nephilim), executive producer, producer, film editor, post-production supervisor, production manager, props, foley artist, sound mixer, pyrotechnician, visual effects, music supervisor,and on-line editor.

So we know who to blame.

This is a cheaply made not very good film with a couple of almost nice moments but boy does it go on! The first half of the movie is just talk talk talk. Endless not very good dialogue with some really dodgy editing. Talking head shot after talking head shot - and it's not as if they were saying anything interesting or funny either. Then, as our "hero" gets to grips with the matter-transmitting doohickey from outer space he found in his back garden, we get some demon types popping up and chewing on people's bellies and our hero meets the Wisest Man in The Universe (sorry, I just told you the best joke in the whole movie) and the movie sort of ends. And none to soon. In the meantime we do get to see some really horrible shirts - The shirts the two male leads wear in this flick are horrible - I mean real fashion disasters. We also get to laugh at a fat Christian with a stutter. Oh what fun.

I bought this movie only because I saw it had won an award at the Whitby Film Festival. I've been to Whitby. I never knew it had a film festival - come to that I didn't remember it having a cinema, but apparently it does. The "Film Festival" though, there's a mystery. The only awards I can find on the web that were ever issued by this mysterious festival were awarded to this film. Awards that curiously aren't listed in the IMDb...

Now here's a neat idea for a movie! - free to anyone who wants it: make up your own film festival in a country half way round the world and give yourself a bunch of awards...

Travis Brown may have had "the worst week of his life..." but I've just had the worst 85 minutes of my week watching it.

Just exactly what was this movie trying to be?

[TheLittleSongbird · 1/10 · 12 February 2013]

I don't hate low-budget movies, nor do I watch a movie trying to hate it. There are some entertaining movies even on a low-budget, and I always try and judge a film fairly regardless of others' opinions or the reputation of its company or director. These in mind and despite its interesting idea, I just couldn't bring myself to like The Demons in My Mind. As I've said the concept is interesting and there is some decent if not great gore, but even they are not enough to salvage the movie. Visually, it is an eyesore. Now I knew it was going to be low-budget and when effort is made I try to be lenient. But here, the editing is just all over the place, the green filter is incredibly distracting(I can see why they did it but it was just done badly) and the special effects are enough to make even Ed Wood, if he was alive, turn down. It fares even worse from a written quality standpoint. The script is a joke, humourless, padded out and even with jargon that I imagine that even the writers were confused by. The characters are stereotypical, now that is not a problem if the character is well written or likable, instead the characters are obnoxious and we learn little about them. The acting does nothing to help, in fact the actors just couldn't do anything with what they were given, some try but others look as though they wanted to go home. In the directing, like in To Become One there is an attempt to do something innovative but in the end not only does it distract from the storytelling but it further cheapens the movie itself. But my main issue with The Demons in My Head was that the story didn't seem to know what it wanted to be. There seemed to be a hybrid of horror, comedy and sci-fi. The problem wasn't having more than one genre going on at once, I've seen that being done in movies very effectively. The problem was how these genres were executed, there are not many movies around that manage to make a mess of doing a movie this way, but The Demons in My Head did it. The horror elements had no suspense and just looked unconvincing as well, the comedy just wasn't funny due to bad dialogue and non-existent comic timing and the sci-fi elements were just muddled. The pacing was fairly strong to begin with, but very quickly as all the flaws kicked in meandered into tedium. All in all, seemed interesting but in the end it was cheap, poorly written and acted and just didn't seem to have any idea what it wanted to be. 1/10 Bethany Cox

Pretty decent, actually

[whammy666 · 5/10 · 14 January 2006]

I got this movie at FYE for a measly 3 bucks. Sounded interesting and I figured, what have I got to lose, other than 3 bucks. So anyway, this movie is basically about this sweet guy named Travis and his roommate Regis. So Travis gets dumped, a meteor crashes in his backyard, he finds a crown and demons come. Sound simple enough? The gore in the movie is okay, we see some intestines and stuff. Also, the subplot between Regis and Travis is quite interesting and hilarious at the same time. THis movie actually does have lots of good camera angles, and a good use of color and black and white fused together. The acting isn't great, but isn't bad. The DVD I got is kind of screwy and wont work on one of my DVD players, I don't know if it is just my DVD or all of them. The "Other Trailers" section doesn't work for me, I should return it but the movie works so it is all good. IMO, worth a watch.

This film really got to me.

[johnjj · 10/10 · 21 January 2005]

I thought it would be a standard gore fest, but it got me in strange way. There was a little gore in it, but the concepts here were far more fascinating. If I was a younger man, I think I would have easily related to this film in a life-changing way. Travis is a character in the film who is having problems dealing with his identity and sexuality. The way it is portrayed here is not in a shallow fashion, but in an in-depth personal way that exposes some of our deepest most thoughts. I preferred the character drama to all the gore and effects at the end, because it is so far reaching. The same team (and some of the same actors) who appeared here also were in their second film, To Become One. Strangely, the films don't resemble each other in theme or style. This film really touched me. Watch it again and again!!!

Scary, intriguing, disturbing and highly entertaining

[mobile-8 · 9/10 · 17 February 2005]

This is a frightening movie because of the extraordinary directing skills of Neil Johnson. His superb vision enhances the surrealism and brings tension levels to virtually unbearable levels. The Demons In My Head works symbolically on many levels, but is basically about human shortcomings and the way they can be exploited by unconscious forces combined with weakness of will. I couldn't stop watching. This is a clever little film and a powerful example of how great a movie can be even with limited resources when superb writers, directors, actors, and others work at the top of their craft. All this is complemented by great lighting, interesting camera angles. Highly recommended!

what is it with the trailer?

[Cenobitehell · 1 March 2006]

in the trailer there and loads of deleted scenes does anyone know if there was actually a version made with the scenes in? or were they done just for the trailer? from what i can gather they are.

1) alternate meteor over the house, this one has flames behind it.

2) different alien planet scene, this one is green instead of red and has a city instead of a large moon.

3) shot of alien probe flying to earth 4) shot of large arrow shaped spacecraft crashing, or something.

5) multiple shots of spacecraft docking in stations and orbiting the earth.

6) inside view of a ship. showing the viewing screen or something. displaying the four main characters in circular bubble-type screens.

7) the green alien city showing a red flare or probe being launched NOTHING LIKE ANY OF THESE SCIENCE FICTION STYLE SCENES ARE IN THE MOVIE?!!! anyone know anything? Email me if you do . please [e-mail] (btw, i loved this movie!)

Surprised me!!

[jhilsum · 10/10 · 8 November 2006]

This is an amazing film, especially being a low budget. It left me thinking for days. I liked it more the second time through. Thecharacters really have depth. The story is based around the passage from the bible in Genesis that speaks of the Nephilim, who are fallen angels. The makeup on the nephilim is quite remarkable. I know a bit about makeup and it looks like they glued latex to the entire body of the actor. This would've taken hours (10 maybe) to do. The only character that did not appeal to me was the Marcia, but then she turned out to be not what I expected at the end. There is a British actor in this called David Vallon who makes a different appearance in the director's next film, To Become One. The special effects are not bad either. This film was done a few years ago so the clothing is a little dated. Soon it will become retro and cool I expect.