from romance, to melodrama, to crime, and finally to horror. But unlike these films, which deal only tangentially with insanity, Brainstorm is primarily an exploration of that theme. "Brainstorm is undoubtedly the last of the truly great black-and-white films noirs," wrote Nicholas Christopher in his book, Somewhere in the Night: Film Noir and the American City (1997): It is unquestionably the most nihilistic film noir of either the classic or present-day cycle. ... Brainstorm is a film conceived and shot in the year following the Kennedy assassination, and its insistent references to madness, murder, mayhem, and conspiracy reflect the tenor of those times. ... [It] is the final, essential entry in that long line of films noirs that begins at the end of the Second World War. Reviewing Christopher's Somewhere in the Night, Michael Atkinson of The Village Voice wrote that "the book does evoke a few forgotten beauts, notably William Conrad's 1965 schizonoir Brainstorm. For Christopher, this truly nutty film 'is to other film noirs what Lobachevski's geometry—in which parallel lines eventually intersect—is to Euclid's,' and insofar as noir seems to reflect back what the viewer brings to it, he's not far off target." For the 2002 Sight & Sound poll of the top ten films of all time, critic Jack Stevenson included Brainstorm in his list. Home video releases In March 2009 Warner Bros. released Brainstorm on Region 1 DVD, as part of the Warner Archive Collection. See also List of American films of 1965 References External links 1965 films Warner Bros. films Films scored by George Duning Films directed by William Conrad 1965 drama films American black-and-white films American neo-noir films 1960s English-language films 1960s American films