10 Body Horror Movies That Went Too Far

9. Brain Damage

Cabin Fever
Palisades Entertainment

Frank Henenlotter is a cult favourite filmmaker with a major penchant for body horror. Henenlotter himself may have described his style as exploitation cinema rather than horror, but it's hard to argue against the body horror tag when your filmography includes the likes of Brain Damage, Frankenhooker and the twisted madness of the Basket Case trilogy.

To single out the New Yorker's 1988 Brain Damage, it's a picture based around a brain-consuming parasite that charms its hosts into bringing them fresh victims - all by corrupting those potential victims with a mind-altering hallucinogenic drug.

In terms of the most haunting scene of this Henenlotter offering, it has to be seeing Rick Heart's Brian trying to pull his own brain out of his head through his ear - with poor Brian yanking on his grey matter like it was a pulley rope.

Frankenhooker still stands up as Frank Henenlotter's finest hour, yet Brain Damage similarly holds up as the director's most demented and gruesome film to date. Then again, the Basket Case trilogy does have some utterly bizarre shenanigans at play, too...

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.