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The Beast with Five Fingers More at IMDbPro »
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| Index | 38 reviews in total |
20 out of 23 people found the following review useful:
PETER LORRE, VICTOR FRANCEN & J. CARROL NAISH WERE GREAT!, 14 March 2003
Author:
whpratt1 from United States
It is very easy to critize the plot or story line of this picture, however, Peter Lorre made this film into an all time great classic along with the great supporting skills of Victor Francen and J. Carrol Naish. Lorre made his own human hand into a monster with his great acting talents, telling us all that mental illness can cause many things to happen within our very souls. The piano music pounded in my ears throughout this picture and the black and white effect made it a great thriller. Police inspector J Carrol Naish gave a great final touch to the ending of this picture, he gave us all a BIG LAUGH!
18 out of 21 people found the following review useful:
Vintege horror at its very best, 14 November 2005
Author:
Chris Gaskin from Derby, England
The Beast with Five Fngers has to be one of the best classic horrors
ever made, along with The Haunting (1963).
A pianist is killed, possibly murdered after he falls down the stairs
in his creepy mansion. After his death, strange things start happening
including the piano playing on its own accord and the strange behaviour
of the secretary. Then murders start to take place and these turn out
to be the work of the pianist's severed hand, which haunts the mansion.
With creepy music by Max Steinor, a howling wind and windows slamming
open and shut, all these things make this movie very scary.
The excellent cast includes a creepy performance by Peter Lorre (Mad
Love, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea), Robert Alda, Andrea King and J
Carrol Naish (The Monster Maker).
This is a must for all horror fans. Excellent and scary.
Rating: 5 stars out of 5.
14 out of 18 people found the following review useful:
Most unique and unusual music in the movie., 20 June 2001
Author:
John Brousch (jbrouschsships) from United States of America
This movie should be much appreciated by anyone who plays, knows, or likes
classic piano music. The piano music played with one hand only is
amazing,
exciting and bewildering. It is obviously a soundtrack but I feel the
actor, and later on, the hand, do a wonderful job making the viewer
believe
that they are playing this fast tempo and highly complicated piece of
piano
music, possibly a concerto. I this movie to be overall a really great
horror film.
John Brousch
13 out of 17 people found the following review useful:
Wonderfully Suspenseful, 7 September 2003
Author:
David (Handlinghandel) from NY, NY
This movie has you on the edge of your seat. Its atmospheric direction is
brilliant.
The cast, too, is excellent: Andrea King, a damsel in distress but a little
icy and with kind of an edge (and a hairstyle resembling a headdress0;
Robert Alda as the wry romantic lead figure. And of course, Peter Lorre --
neurotic as ever (in roles he was cast in.)
It's scary and has superb music and gorgeous photography.
It does have two flaws: the illogical central conceit of a disembodied hand
and the obvious casting of Lorre. Yes, he is excellent, but wouldn't it be
nice to see him the hero occasionally, instead of the delusional, pathetic
villain?
11 out of 14 people found the following review useful:
Worthwhile (6.0-7.0/10.0), 18 April 2001
Author:
jplenton from cardiff, wales
The Beast With Five Fingers predates any other ‘disembodied' hand film I've
seen by a good twenty years. Such films include Dr. Terror's House Of
Horror, The Hand, Evil Dead II, Severed Ties, and the two Addam's Family
films and television series. This selection illustrates the gamut of horror
film quality, from the delightful Evil Dead II to the atrocious Severed
Ties. Happily, their precursor, The Beast With Five Fingers is ‘hands down'
one of the better entries in this sub-genre.
The Beast… is set in an Italian village, home of the successful pianist,
Francis Ingram, who resides in a sumptuous villa. Ingram is wheelchair
bound as his entire right side is paralysed, and is forced to play piano
using his single left hand. His style is suitably heavy and melancholic.
He is a haunted figure, heavily reliant on his young nurse to the point of
obsession, and fixated on his own death. Therefore, he summons his
companions to dinner to witness the signing of his will. Amongst them is
his personal secretary Hilary (Peter Lorre), a man with his own obsessions;
astrology and the occult. It is not long before the Grim Reaper arrives as
a belated dinner guest.
The film's most prominent actor is Peter Lorre. Lorre's career in horror
fare has seen a slight regression over the years, though not as profound as
some of his contemporaries such as Bela Lugosi and John Carradine. In the
Thirties, Lorre starred in Fritz Lang's classic M and the rather good Mad
Love. However, by the Sixties he was resigned to playing second fiddle to
Vincent Price in horror-comedies The Comedy Of Terrors and The Raven. These
two films are reasonable enough but eclipsed by his formative work. The
Beast… makes a fitting mid-point between these two eras.
Lorre is an engaging actor, his childlike physique and strange manner always
invoke some degree of viewer sympathy no matter how heinous his crimes (cf.
M). J. Carrol Naish who plays the affable police inspector (yep, never
heard of him before) is also notable but his more comedic moments do lessen
the film's impact.
The special effects used to animate the hand are impressive for their time,
although as the film is in b&w this helps mask its inadequacies somewhat.
The rubber hand in Dr. Terror's House Of Horror is pitiable in comparison,
and that was made twenty odd years later. The interplay between Lorre and
the hand as he alternatively soothes and struggles with it are reminiscent
of Ash's plight in Evil Dead II.
*spoliers*
The majority of the players seem primarily motivated by avarice. It is
somewhat surprising then that the final bodycount is so low. A modern
horror would have casually knocked off such ‘sinners' with glee. Perhaps,
this highlights a rift between ‘vintage' and modern horror. The vintage
film has a more human approach to its characters, although they do suffer in
terms of danger and scares, they do not die. The usual modern approach is
to emphasise the killings, the characters are just fodder for the killer's
and the audience's whimsy. Of course this reasoning parallels the change in
audience expectation and tolerance with time, and also what the changes the
filmmakers could get away with in terms of censorship and
‘decency'.
8 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
Lorre at his best!, 3 October 2002
Author:
funkyfry from Oakland CA
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
Solid gothic melodrama featuring a killer hand -- or is it only killing in the mind of Hilary (Lorre)? Robert Alda is good as a not very straight leading man (he makes his first appearance selling "new antiques" to gullible tourists) and King is adquate as his lover with a secret connection to Hilary. Interestingly, this connection/conspiracy remains a mystery to the police and her lover when the film ends. Siodmak has crafted both an excellent psycho-drama in gothic style, and also a perfect vehicle for Lorre's exquisite theatrics.
9 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
Old Fashioned SCARY Movie..., 12 November 2005
Author:
sagg928 from California
This is one of the scariest movies I ever saw. It really plays with
your mind. I admit that I first saw this movie as a kid int the back
seat of my parent's car at the drive-in, and FOR YEARS, I was very
afraid of the hand coming out from under sofas, beds and anywhere dark.
It connects with something deep in the subconscious as the hand is the
part of the body that does all things and in this movie it is a power
all unto itself.
The black and white film makes this movie a perfect expression of the
subconscious, fearful and malevolent. Definitely one that I hope would
eventually make it to DVD, and one to own if you're into the classics
of this genre.
8 out of 10 people found the following review useful:
More suspense than horror but a must-see for true fans of the genre., 26 August 2000
Author:
Wilbur-10 from London
Classic early horror with Lorre in superb eye-popping form. Film is set in
an Italian mansion where a wealthy pianist is close to death. When he
passes
away it turns out he has left everything in his will to his nurse, who
incurs the wrath of the grasping relatives who have arrived. The bickering
takes a sinister turn when the solicitor is strangled, seemingly by the
severed hand of the dead pianist.
Lorre plays the deranged librarian whose sightings of the hand send him
increasingly over the edge into madness. Despite the true horror potential
of the storyline, the film tends to play more like a murder mystery. Much
of
the atmosphere is wasted by the air of light-heartedness, particularly the
contrived slap-happy ending.
Misgivings aside, 'The Beast with Five Fingers' is still one of the genre
making horrors, and while not in the same league as the heavyweight films
of
the 1930's like 'Frankenstein', 'The Invisible Man' or 'Mad Love', still
rates serious attention.
Other severed hands featured in ' Dr Terror's House of Horrors, 'Evil Dead
II', and Oliver Stone's 'The Hand'.
9 out of 12 people found the following review useful:
Allusion or reality?, 29 October 2004
Author:
Michael O'Keefe from Muskogee OK
In a gloomy 1900s mansion in Italy a famed pianist(Victor Francen)lives with his devoted nurse(Andrea King) and his faithful secretary(Peter Lorre). The wheelchair bound pianist is only able to use one hand to play. An antique dealer(Robert Alda)adapts a piece of music to be played with one hand to dull the musician's bitterness. Francen dies after a rolling tumble down a staircase leaving his fortune to his nurse. A couple of upset relatives arrive protesting the will; but this moves to the back burner when murder and attempted murder is committed by the dead pianist's severed hand. Plus the hand likes to play the piano which adds to the terror. Lorre nails the hand in a box; and even throws it in a fire after confrontations with the disembodied member. Local Commissario Castanio(J. Carrol Naish)investigates this creepy mystery. Lorre is outstanding in a passive demented way. His wrestling with the severed hand is hilarious. Max Steiner is responsible for the haunting score. Great black and white from Warner Brothers.
5 out of 5 people found the following review useful:
The creeping hand..., 29 May 2003
Author:
eva25at from Vienna, Austria
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
(Contains spoilers)
Victor Francen, a very wealthy man, is unable to cope with the fact that his
stunted hand has robbed him of his greatest pleasure: piano-playing. He
feels nothing but contempt for the sycophants who beleaguer his house:
legacy-hunters and permanent resident Peter Lorre who "studies" in his
library - they all sponge on him. Imagine the indignation of his relatives
when his testament is opened and his nurse (Andrea King) is his sole
heiress! They contest the will and Lorre starts to fear the loss of "his"
precious books. But soon they realize that they have more to fear than just
the loss of their inheritance: Francen's hand displays its individual
existence, creeps through the house and strangles everybody unreasonable
enough to stay...
Why is everybody standing petrified while the hand is climbing their body?
Why don't they simply decamp? The film is neither as eerie as it should have
been, nor as funny. The part with the testament drags on, and the leading
man looks like a stage-villain with his beard. On the other hand, it has a
feeling for the 1890ies italian atmosphere and Peter Lorre plays with great
gusto. With his haircut he could replace Demi Moore in G.I. JANE every
minute and he enjoys himself when he casts a horoscope of his supporting
players and describes with glee the pangs of death that await them. But the
star of this film - Victor Francen's severed hand - needs some acting
lessons. Its performance is better than that of Michael Caine's hand in THE
HAND (1981, directed by Oliver Stone), but not as good as Conrad Veit's hand
in ORLACS HÄNDE (1924).
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