#braindead1992

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Braindead (1992)

★★★★★ Rewatched 11 Oct 2025

Any horror fan can tell you that Peter Jackson’s Braindead (1992)—known internationally as Dead-Alive—is one of the goriest and funniest horror comedies ever made. But how many realize that it’s also one of the most layered and psychologically sophisticated?

Despite the controversial title change, Jackson always referred to this film as Braindead in interviews. Ironically, Dead-Alive arguably fits the story better. The infected are trapped in a state between life and death, and while some are more functional than others, they retain enough mental faculties not to qualify as “braindead.” Lionel’s mother, in particular (despite initially going feral) returns to her full mental capabilities after transforming from a zombie into a giant monster at the film’s climax, making Lionel’s confrontation with her that much more personal.

It’s in this aspect that the film moves beyond mere viscera and into richer territory. Much has been made of Jackson channeling Sam Raimi’s shtick, specifically Evil Dead II’s marriage of Three Stooges slapstick with Lucio Fulci-style splatter. But Braindead contains psychological depth that the Evil Dead movies don’t even attempt. Lionel’s relationship with his controlling, abusive mother is a textbook example of the Jungian “Devouring Mother” archetype. Carl Jung introduced archetypes as universal symbols within the collective unconscious. The “Devouring Mother” is the figure who smothers the child, preventing individuation, and destroys the child’s independence to preserve her own comfort.

In Braindead, Vera is that figure incarnate. Lionel is trapped in her service, emotionally bound, and prevented from seeking adult love with Paquita because of his mother’s jealousy and her expectation that he must fulfill the role his dead father once did. The flesh-eating zombie motif becomes a literalization of the term Jung coined to describe this particular toxic dynamic.

Lionel and Paquita begin in what seems to be a sweet ’50s-style romance (almost like Roman Holiday or Some Like It Hot) before Vera intrudes, shifting the film into Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?-style horror long before we see a single zombie. Vera’s appearance—her heavy makeup, as though trying to cling to lost youth—may even be a direct reference to Bette Davis’ most famous role.

Vera’s sabotage of Lionel’s relationships, her constant guilt-tripping, and the revelation that she murdered Lionel’s father (a childhood trauma he suppresses until the climax) all parallel the mother-son dynamic in Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960). In fact, it wouldn’t be a stretch to pitch Braindead as “Norman Bates versus The Evil Dead.” Yet, in a key contrast, Lionel ultimately breaks free of his mother’s control. When we meet Norman Bates, he’s long since been consumed by madness, whereas Lionel is still young enough to be saved by the love Paquita brings into his life.

If the flesh-eating zombie metaphor was too subtle a way of conveying the devouring mother theme, things become even more on the nose in the climax—but in the best possible way. In a pure body-horror spectacle, Lionel is literally swallowed into Vera’s womb, only to tear his way out clutching the nondenominational yet cross-like amulet Paquita’s family gave him earlier. Though her Romani culture is largely Catholic, and Lionel himself is shown to be religious throughout the film, he tosses the amulet aside afterward, perhaps suggesting he has moved beyond the need for parental figures—be they divine, human, or undead.

Given the emotionally incestuous dynamics beneath what, on the surface, plays like Looney Tunes with gore (complete with ACME products and frying-pan gags), it’s no surprise Peter Jackson followed it with Heavenly Creatures (1994). That film abandons Braindead’s comedy entirely, diving headfirst into its psychosexual undertones by telling the true story of two teenage lovers who murder one of their disapproving mothers.

While Braindead will always be celebrated for its lawnmower massacre and buckets of blood, it deserves recognition for weaving exuberant violence with genuine symbolic storytelling. It’s hardly surprising that this is the same filmmaker who would go on to direct The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001–2003). One could even argue Lionel’s implied rejection of faith at the end foreshadows Jackson’s own rejection of the Catholic subtext in Tolkien’s original text—but that’s a topic for another time.