The Psychotronic Man (1979) User Reviews

Cult Movie

[bizvid · 3/10 · 20 February 2005]

I actually know something about this film because the producer of the movie was my landlord at one point. The Psychotronic Man is a grade B movie that's true, but it is actually an important and noteworthy piece mostly because of its relationship to film history and several other oddities that surround it.

It was the first feature film made entirely in Chicago since the Essanay era before WW1. It was only able to be made after the death of Chicago's longest reigning mayor, who would not allow movies to be made anywhere in Chicago. It was also an independent feature film, made entirely outside any of the existing studio systems. It was shot completely on location and it used only local talent. Many of the centrally located automobile chase scenes and running gun battles were shot on the sly without the permission of any authorities because no film commission existed. Part of the movie featured a car chase in Lower Wacker Drive which is an odd funky piece of roadway under downtown Chicago. In the next year the Blues Brothers came out and featured a car chase in the exact same place.

It was produced, written, and starred in by an out of work actor named Peter Spelson who decided the best way to get into the movies was to go out and make one himself.

It is however probably most noted for its name. The term "Psychotronic" has come to be an almost generic term for grade B cult films. Google turns up 88,600 different references for the word, all of which come as a result of this movie.

It did well in Europe under various names but it played only once in Chicago where it was made on April, 23, 1980 at 7:00 P.M. in the now demolished Carnegie Theater.

Like many first efforts it is crude by comparison to the things that follow it, but it is truly one the beginnings the of modern American independent movie trend. In truth even Ed Wood had more help.

Indie horror flick let down by padding

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 17 January 2018]

THE PSYCHOTRONIC MAN is an indie horror flick that seems to have been made in order to rip-off PSYCHIC KILLER, the entertaining little video nasty wannabe. This one's a very cheap-looking film with muted colours and on-the-street camerawork; if you're familiar with the kinds of thrillers put out by Vinegar Syndrome then you'll know the look. An ordinary guy discovers a talent for killing people with his mental powers so he goes on a random killing spree while the cops hunt him down. It's not very gory or suspenseful, and the acting is as basic as you'd expect, but I did enjoy the first half of this movie. Sadly, the second half gets way too bogged down in silly slow motion action scenes which merely act as padding in order to get the running time up to the required length, but drag the pacing down to a snail's crawl in the process.

"Doctor, I need your help".

[lost-in-limbo · 4/10 · 12 September 2015]

How bizarre… It's anyone's guess what's truly going on here. Especially after watching the intro where the opening credits go on for a while. And I mean awhile. It was the title that caught my eye "Revenge of the Psychotronic Man". It screams "Hey, look at me"! Anyhow what I got myself into was something bug-eyed. Think of "The Incredible Melting Man", which was made a couple years earlier and the tone is similar, but without the graphic context. Still it wasn't as bad as I thought it might be, but you can see why it's virtually unknown. While being a penniless production, its clunky, dry and tawdry nature remains for most part rather entertaining. Why is it entertaining… because of just how unusual and surprisingly twisted it plays out? Even when it seems to concentrate on uneventful filler, there's something unnervingly atmospheric and random that makes it hypnotic. Even when some scenarios are risible (like the first death with the constant slow-motion) and long-winded (there's a lot of driving going on). Something which would hit you straight away would be the creepy score that overpowers many sequences and that of some oddball sound-effects like the ominous bell chimes that comes and goes. You get more of a rush from the music than the visual action. The direction is virtually non-existent, but the gritty location work of Chicago and the shadowy imagery gives it a bit of a moody edge. While the performances are on the stilted side, but durable enough and dialogues remain lacklustre. Bemusing low-grade horror Sci-fi.

a great "bad" film

[stephan16 · 1 July 2000]

I never expected to see a movie like this. A great "bad" film about a psychotronic barber who has looong drives in his car and kills/hurts people by touching his hair and looking all serious (this is something you do when you have THAT psychotronic disease). This has to be a movie that's better (and worse) than anything Ed Wood did, great "dumb" dialogue and wonderful bad actors. See it and you will have a whole new view on film-making..

This one is a real stinker

[bensonmum2 · 1/10 · 2 October 2018]

The quick pitch: An otherwise unremarkable barber goes for a long (very long) drive, has some sort of nightmare, and mysteriously develops psychotronic powers that give him the ability to kill people with his mind. The police aren't too happy when the bodies start piling-up, leading to one of the longest, dullest chases in screen history.

It's been awhile since I've watched a movie quite as bad as The Psychotronic Man. I don't hand out the dreaded "1" rating like candy. You have to earn it. But this one is a real stinker. As I've already alluded to, it's as dull as watching paint dry. Oh my God, I would have given just about anything for something to happen. I must have fallen asleep, woken up, and rewinded this abysmal film at least a half-dozen times. But what do you expect from a movie whose runtime (and I can't be bothered looking up the exact runtime) is filled with "exciting" things like watching a car drive slowly down a road, watching a doctor read papers and make notes, watching really bad dancing, or watching that damnable final chase that goes on forever. These events take up at least ¾ of the movie - I'm not exaggerating. Anyone who says they like this excruciating mess as more patience than I.

A deserved 1/10 from me.

Fear not, imdb-579 from Los Angeles! MST3K alums at RiffTrax have sent this one up!

[ChiefEngr · 1/10 · 22 September 2017]

Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy, (aka: Mike, Crow T Robot, and Tom Servo from MST3K) have done justice to this gem. Just released today (22-Sep-2017), and available at www.rifftrax.com.

It's nice to have people vocalizing all the inappropriate things that go through your mind while watching this train wreck!

Weird with a capital "W"

[Coventry · 4/10 · 13 December 2009]

Here's another great contender for my own personal award of "Most Demented Film I ever watched", but the least I can say is that it was very interesting. "The Pschotronic Man" begins with the longest and most unnerving opening credits ever, but they're quite sinister and atmospheric what with the really creepy music and odd color schemes and everything. This is one of them rare films that already make you feel uncomfortable before it even properly takes off. The slow-paced story introduces Rocky Foscoe; a barber with a few issues that may or may not be caused by the fact that he consumes his own hair shampoos and conditioner lotions. Rocky starts having strange visions, like himself flying around in a car and such similar tomfoolery, and he gradually becomes the world's first and only Psychotronic Man. Basically, this just means that he's an older, fatter and sleazier male version of "Carrie" who can inflict stuff only by using his overdeveloped willpower. At first, Rocky doesn't comprehend the powers that have been granted to him and even seeks professional help to make the unbearable headaches go away, but then he gradually learns how to control his skills and use it against the people he doesn't like, like his own wife who's in the way of his love affairs.

"The Psychotronic Man" is overall a pretty cool flick, but sadly director Jack M. Sell wasn't quite sure which narrative tone to maintain. Does this story require a dramatic, mysterious or exploitative tone? Or perhaps a combination of all three? This indecisive behavior leads to an illogical structure and uneven pacing, for example when a moody love-making sequence is immediately followed by an extremely violent murder vision. The film is also slow and uneventful. Especially considering the plot outline, they could have made this into a far more grotesque and trashy cult experiment; even bearing in mind the budgetary restrictions. The overlong chase sequence, for example, is the least spectacular one in the history of cinema. The cars just drive in straight lines and at snail pace, without tricky maneuvers or causing flamboyant accidents. Still, there's some greatness to find in this oddball production, like the creepy sound effects that are frequently repeated, including a church bell chiming and half the tune of Ennio Morricone's classic music for "Once upon a time in the West". I bet the composer of this film was the only person who had great fun on set.

Bizarre film, to say the least, but it did offer us the collective term for everything in cult, horror and trash cinema that is unique and indescribable. Psychotronic power!

Below the scale

[imdb-579 · 1/10 · 31 March 2005]

I could tear this piece of crap apart, frame by frame. But it's not worth the effort to do so. MST3K hasn't touched this, only because there's not much to work with.

It has no entertainment value, at all. I pity the people who made this movie, because it has got to reflect some part of their bland, disconnected, below-average life experiences. Apparently a man named Peter Spelson is mostly responsible for this crap.

No joy, no suspense, no horror, no pathos, no character development, no direction. Plenty of mustaches though. This thing is like a 70s porno without the sex.

Trigger warning: real dead bodies (?)

[Dan_Harkless · 2/10 · 20 January 2019]

This movie is so bad in every way, it's not even worth going into. Although I'm a bad movie aficionado, I'd never make it through this one without RiffTrax's comedic commentary. With their riffs, it's worth watching once, but I won't be returning to this one.

The main reason I wanted to review the film was to let people know that there's a scene in a med school where a roomful of students dissect what appear to be real human corpses! (Flayed and contorted into disturbing poses, no less, apparently to make dissection access easier and/or to dehumanize them.)

There's no way this no-budget '70s turkey had the makeup / props budget for those to not have been real. I'm surprised none of the other reviews mentioned this, and I was surprised the RiffTrax guys didn't give their audience a trigger warning beforehand, and instead merely said stuff like "Wow!" during the scene. Since I don't watch snuff films, this is the most disturbing thing I've ever seen in a movie.

a thorough no-no

[KDWms · 3/10 · 22 April 2003]

I would advise AGAINST watching this...there's better things to do with your time and/or money. If, for some reason, you ARE gonna be subjected to this, don't expect ANY elements of many sci-fi/horror films - no special effects; no gore; no sex - virtually no attempts. So, it's a no-no, all the way. Rigid acting; illogical continuity. The plot is simple: Rocky uses psychotronic ability to dispense with people; and the Chicago-area cops get onto his trail as a result. Psychotronic wasn't in MY dictionary, but I THINK that it means that he can WILL things to happen. I suspect that he WILLED a lot of time in his car. MY psychotronic powers must need a little work: This movie continued for quite a while after I WILLED it to end.

Chicago seemed tired last night

[BandSAboutMovies · 4/10 · 18 March 2021]

Psychotronics are a conspiracy theory that posits that "government agents make use of electromagnetic radiation (such as the microwave auditory effect), radar, and surveillance techniques to transmit sounds and thoughts into people's heads, affect people's bodies, and harass people."

This film uses that term and ended up inspiring Michael J. Weldon to create his magazine Psychotronic Video, which sought to discover and get the word out about movies that the mainstream ignored.

Chicago barber Rocky Foscoe - what a name! - has discovered that he has psychotronic powers that he uses to blast his wife and create enough of a problem that a SWAT team - and government agents that want to use him for their own dark agenda - have to be called in.

Produced completely out of the studio system, shot entirely in Chicago and self-financed, The Psychotronic Man is the very definition of a regional film. As a result, you can watch this secure in the knowledge that no matter how dangerous the stunts look or how great the downtown settings are filmed, they were all done with no permits.

Psychotronic Joy! Now out on DVD!

[dogstar7 · 10/10 · 16 September 2006]

Peter Spelson's "The Psychotronic Man" is a tour de force of naive post-intelligentsia film noire. Jack M. Sell directs seemingly endless, artlessly blocked scenes that draw the audience into a twilight mood of almost painful ennui. Truly, even before the opening title graphics crawled across the screen some seven minutes (significant?) into the first reel this reviewer craved the blissful relief of an untimely death before the next zoom-in close-up of Peter Spelson's heavily lidded psychotronic stare!

Spelson turns in an idiosyncratic performance as Rocky Foscoe, the barber who prefers his hair tonic to Segrams Seven. Spelson's Rocky is a tortured soul who has trouble putting together a simple sentence, much unlike the real-life erstwhile insurance agent turned one-time film actor who frankly has never been known to shut up! "The Psychotronic Man" can be favorably compared to the seminal works of Kurisawa or a young Hitchcock only if one suspends all rational thought and gives over to a delusional view of a world where a film such as this can be considered anything more than bong water worthy.

The great news is that for the first time an exclusively authorized, digitally enhanced 2 DVD set of "Psychotronic Man" is now available. This new set features production stills, the handwritten screenplay and the original music score, as well as a commentary track by the Psychotronic Man Himself: Writer/Producer/Star, Peter Spelson. Also included is a short documentary on the making of "Psychotronic Man". Caught on tape during the shooting of this documentary is the discovery of the actual original copies of the 35mm theatrical film that were used in this digital reproduction.

What is finally revealed in this new production is the story of Peter Spelson, a frustrated would-be film actor producing hokey late-night commercials for his own insurance agency. Peter finally concludes that if he ever wants to star in a feature film he would have to write and produce it himself. What Spelson found was a nascent Chicago film community eager to show off it's chops in anticipation of John Landis and "The Blues Brothers" production army who came to town a year later.

On the commentary track Spelson also tells how he begged, borrowed and sometimes appropriated with out proper authorization what he needed to complete his opus. Shooting of "The Psychotronic Man" went on despite the lack of any official local permits to stage car chases, fiery explosions and even late night shoot outs on Chicago's Michigan Avenue!

Featuring an insurance agent-turned-actor, a guerrilla film making style, authentic retro '70's soundtrack and a back-story that just won't die, the experience of "The Psychotronic Man" is truly a total greater than the sum of it's parts.

Interesting little no budget sci fi horror/thriller

[Bloodwank · 6/10 · 25 March 2011]

A barber drinks aftershave. A car explodes. Am I in heaven? Not quite, but not quite heaven still ain't such a bad place to be. The brainchild of multitasking visionaries Jack Sell (director, writer, cinematographer, producer) and Peter Spelson (writer, producer, leading man, background in insurance sales), The Psychotronic Man seems to have science fiction slasher intentions, but behind the scenes tussles grounded it in PG territory. This isn't such a bad thing though, in a curious way the lack of gore (a little bit of blood but nothing serious) prevents the film from ever getting cosy and for much of the first half as well as the final moments there's a dislocated feel to proceedings that contrasts well with the stark Chicago grit of the location. Dislocation is the best thing about this one, there aren't really any moments when it feels like an ordinary film. Repetitive soundtrack made mostly of weird noises and an ominous church bell, needless but rather cool helicopter shooting (something about lonely roadways rather evocative seen from up on high), freak outs made of clutching the hair and gurning intently to the aforementioned weird noises, its a heady brew. Regrettably the second half of the film deals more with the police on our titular villains tail and is taken up with a lengthy and fairly uninteresting chase scene, only enlivened by some fun tilted angles. Peter Spelson does a good job on the whole as the star, with a sub community theatre performance that ends up surprisingly convincing as a man with fried synapses. Sadly it isn't a very well written part, we learn nothing except that he is a sleazy loser grouch who cheats on his wife. One of the least sympathetic of psychic powered killers in cinema and I've seen a fair few, what's more I'm naturally disposed to like them. Of the rest of the cast Chris Carbis sports an Irish accent as the chief of police (don't really know why this stuck out for me), other roles seem to all be filled by locals of varying, mostly low level talents. They convince well enough though, this isn't a film that needed Olivier or anyone like that. On the whole I was well engaged by about half of this one and loosely for the rest. It isn't something I'd recommend to anyone other than weirdness connoisseurs (it being the film that led Michael Weldon to adopt the term psychotronic as a descriptor of cinematic style), but to those who have to see it (you know who you are) it should provide some pleasure. 6/10.

P.S. Peter Spelson's only other acting role was in the bonkers supernatural slasher gem Blood Beat. That one is an essential for weirdness fans, perhaps best watched in a double bill.

Good Badness #2: How to lose your mind and gain super-psychic abilities.

[Vomitron_G · 5/10 · 3 December 2009]

Stop experimenting with drugs, kids. Al you need is... a good mixture of shampoo & hair lotion. At least, according to this movie. A depressed barber starts drinking his own products and becomes... Psychotronic Man! The walls of his sanity come crumbling down also, but I guess that's just a minor side-effect.

Oh yes, this is a fairly inept film featuring lousy acting and a lot of filler-footage. Many scenes get padded with various songs and even a car chase manages to be too long and uneventful. But nevertheless, the look & feel of the film drips with vintage retro-ness, the soundtrack is cool and the whole film feels like a bad acid trip you can't get out of. It's actually a fun flick to watch, when in the right state of mind. Another way to watch this film, is by simply turning off the sound, and mixing your favorite late 70's & early 80's psychedelic rock tunes to it. The editor (Bill Reese) shows us this can be fun, as the car chase sequence already features cuts to the rhythm of a groovy soundtrack.

An out-of-the-ordinary, experimental piece of independent drivel. It really feels as unique as it looks inept. Lovers of obscure cult cinema should give it a watch. I watched about 13 films (which we expected to suck badly) in two days, and "The Psychotronic Man" was one of two that actually stood out or proved to be more memorable (and better) than most of the other ones.

Good Badness? Oh yes, even for half of the right reasons. 5/10 and 8/10

Solid gold white trash cheeze

[dfdresden · 6 November 2007]

Peter Spelson is Rocky Fosco, a Chicago city barber with a big quiff, sideburns and a pimp moustache. He drives around listening to crap country music and fixes his hair a lot. Spelson wrote and produced this very bad, no budget supernatural psychic killer flick with his pal Jack M. Sell (the guy responsible for the music, editing and mis-direction). Obviously made fer a coupla' bucks, our hairy barber is soon blacking out and dreaming he's in a flying car surrounded by smoke and disco lights. He tells his doctor (in a sequence that flashes back to the previous two minutes) and fixes his hair some more till the headaches go out of control and he drives around and fixes his hair. Then a farmer has a flashback and Rocky kills him by using his newly acquired Psychotronic powers (which involves him fixing his hair while staring intently). Duuuuh. It's rubbish, but absolutely brilliant rubbish and the type of loose brained ESP horror trash that won't quit getting crapper/better with each passing moment and it's just an ahead of it's time amateur Scanners (80) made by inept mental patients. It's genius I tells ya'. Solid gold white trash cheeze with wonky tunes, a little blood, disco dancing, the worlds slowest, dullest, longest car / foot chase and a title way cooler than it's content. Watch it twice!

Worst movie I have ever seen

[garrett-l · 1/10 · 10 June 2008]

I saw this movie in the early 80s on-board a Navy ship--we had little choice in our movie selections. I currently watch between 10-20 movies a week. To this day I haven't seen anything, even the legendary films of Ed Wood, that is as bad as this film. In one scene near the end of the film, there were close-ups of National Guard troops preparing their weapons. These were WW II era bolt action rifles. At a close up of one of the troops pulling back on the bolt to load the rifle you do not see anything going into the breach. And those eyes of the title character. I think the makeup was purchased from the nearest dollar store. This film is only recommended for those individuals who enjoy watching the worst films ever made.

How a hairdresser could be so boring?

[Superwonderscope · 1/10 · 16 December 2002]

... from the 90 mn of the Psychotronic Man, you easily have 30 mn of driving through the countryside with annoying bad country music.

That leaves, say, 60 mn of pure movie. Pure indeed.

This is not a movie. This is not an essay about a movie. This does not bear any resemblance with art or cheesy fun or anything connected with the movie business.

There are some movies which are so bad you can find them amusing, fun, easy to follow because of their badness... well, fascinating stuff. The only fascinating thing here is the will of the director to show us how good the psychotronic man is at driving a car. He is, definitely. He's the best to lead you on the way to total boredom.

This is probably one of the only movie in all movie history where a blank screen can be a better spectacle.

don't bother watching.... unless your really bored and want to laugh!!

[charl_9669 · 1/10 · 3 January 2005]

this has to be one of, if not the worst film that i have seen. the story line makes very little sense, as the only power he seems to have is to scare people so they some how accidentally die, and to make cars fly. there is only about 5 sound affects used, and they don't match what is happening in the film. most of the time is spent on useless shots, such as a minute zoom shot on a shirt lying on a road. the actors aren't up to much, most look like they don't know what to do next, and are reading off the sheet.. totally unbelievable. the only positive side is that it had my family laughing at how rubbish it was... so unless your a fan of films that are so bad that they make you laugh for that reason.... i would stay away from "the psychotronic man"

This is NOT a movie!!!

[TokyoGyaru · 1/10 · 24 January 2022]

It is so padded that if you cut all the padding out and just left the "plot"/"story," the "movie" would be about 20 minutes. And the non-filler is so incompetent in every way as to almost be offensive.

I watch a lot of bad movies and find some amusement in them, but this is next-level bad. This makes Plan 9 from Outer Space seem taut and sophisticated!

This isn't a movie. This is an endurance test! Zero stars!

P. S. The siren they love to have wail out of nowhere from time to time is one of the most annoying sounds committed to film.

Much better than you'd expect

[jamesmackiewicz · 5/10 · 26 November 2019]

I only saw this because it was given the Rifftrax (Mystery Science Theater) treatment. If you watch it "with the jokes", I'd give it eight stars.

As it stands, the movie is pretty fun. It shows a lot of the style and flair of the 1970's and has a hypnotic soundtrack.

The story of an average man having extraordinary problems plays out in an interesting way. The acting isn't bad as much as it's real. The characters are believable, just not charismatic.

A movie about pyschic powers more concerened with showing us cars driving.

[Aaron1375 · 3/10 · 5 April 2020]

One of those films I randomly found on Amazon Prime I decided to give it a go. From the date when the movie was made and the fact the main character had strange powers, I am guessing this is pretty much a Carrie ripoff which there were many. Some that were actually pretty good, The Fury, to this one which is really bad, Psychotronic Man. Obviously a very limited budget by the fact they could not get a decent lead, his hair was like a total joke, and the lack of the guy with psychic powers using said powers.

The film has a barber end his day early and proceed to drive and drive and drive to the point it is night outside and he pulls over to take a nap. He then experiences a dream where his car is flying through the air. He wakes up and goes home to a very nice home with a wife and two kids and just how much does a barber make in Chicago? Well, he has headaches and soon finds out he has powers, of which are never explained. I was thinking aliens or something, but no, no explanation forthcoming. Soon after a couple of kills we end up watching the longest car/foot chase made all the worse by the fact it is not remotely exciting and the guy with super powers uses said powers the minimal amount of times.

The movie was made tolerable as I watched the Rifftrax cut, which for those who do not know are the guys from the last three seasons of MST3K making fun of a movie only we get the entire film rather than the condensed version. It makes seeing a film like this more entertaining and they do a better job than that throwaway Netflix season of MST3K. The film is just very amateurish, which it may have been a student film, if so they did okay. However, just too much stuff does not work to be anything you can take seriously.

So, no, this film is not good and definitely not on the high end of the Carrie ripoff films. When making a film of this type, it is always best to use the powers more than a handful of times and especially use them during the last epic showdown. Unfortunately, this film was too busy padding their film with long drives to start the film and long boring chase scenes than showing us a man with monstrous powers, which is why one tends to watch a film like this in the first place!

frack

[fracks2007 · 19 December 2007]

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"This Guy Drives Like A Chicago Cab Driver!"...

[azathothpwiggins · 8 June 2021]

A barber named Rocky Foscoe (Peter Spleson) has a bizarre experience on his way home from work. After more unexplainable occurrences, Rocky becomes THE PSYCHOTRONIC MAN. He appears to be able to cause things to happen with his mind. Deaths ensue, and the police are baffled.

TPM is a super-low-budget horror film that isn't a total embarrassment. The "hovering car" scene is effective, though it's pretty obvious how it was achieved.

This movie contains one of the longest chase scenes ever filmed. It starts out as a car chase, resulting in a foot chase through what seems like the entire city of Chicago! Then, when it appears to finally be over, it starts up again!

Worth a watch, if for no other reason than to say that you've seen a movie called THE PSYCHOTRONIC MAN...