Die blaue Hand

Thankfully I haven't seen the re edited hatchet job that was released as The Bloody Dead that was culled from this movie. The ads on the video release did tout it as before Freddy in the Nightmare On Elm Street series.But this is another from the German krimis based on the works of Edgar Wallace.

What we have here is the old good twin/evil twin plot that has been done to death.Two brothers (played by the ever intense Klaus Kinski)are the center of a plot. One was convicted of murder and locked in the squirrel farm over his protestations of innocence.Conveniently the asylum is in the neighborhood of the family estate.

Freed by an unknown benefactor the twin flees to the family basement. Then a series of brutal killing via a spiked glove begin.Confusion abounds as the brothers bounce back and forth in cases of mistaken identity.As usual there is a fortune to be inherited as well, secret police agents and a mad doctor(is there any other kind?).

This by no means a great movie.It just happens to be rather unremarkable and somewhat predictable if you've seen enough movies in this genre.Hey, somebody has to sit through it so you don't have to.

See it only if you don't want to think strenuously.

Good acting and an exciting story with a good tempo. However, it shows the cliché, scary mental sanctuary.

Yes, that is right, I was trying to stay up late to watch this on the old Sammy Terry Terror Theater on Indianapolis/Bloomington channel 4, and fell asleep after about 15 mins. Therefore my recollection of it was as a boring movie, when in reality I was just tired. So I found a tape of it for $2 at the local swap meet and thought I'd give it a try since I liked all sorts of European giallo-styled films. What a great treat! Plenty of nice scary moments interspersed with humor and action. Not boring at all. Good performances all around, Kinski is superb. Now I know where Wes Craven got the knife-hand idea for Freddy K. One of the best things about these European horror films is that they actually have lengthy moments of suspense and dialog that aren't obscured by stupid, loud, obnoxious rock and pop music influenced noise like modern US horror films. They actually have soundtracks that enhance the mood rather than try to shock you with loud sudden blasts.

CREATURE WITH THE BLUE HAND is a suspenseful thriller full of mystery. Klaus Kinski plays a dual role as twins, one of whom might be a homicidal maniac. The titular killer actually has a blue hand to dispatch his victims. It comes complete with finger-knives!

This movie also contains an insane asylum, a castle with secret passages, and inhuman torture by both rats and snakes! Kinski is his usual, amazing self. He devours these sort of roles like so much candy!

WARNING: This film was rereleased under the title THE BLOODY DEAD, which includes a few added, non sequitur sequences of gory violence having nothing to do with the actual story. This unnecessary footage is tacky, silly, and insulting to anyone with a functioning brain...

(Blood splattered everywhere in the first scene, mopped up by the janitors?) Kinski escapes from an asylum and hides out at his family's nearby estate, and assumes the identity of his twin brother, just as a series of murders begin, committed by a man in a black cloak with an iron glove and razor fingers.

How is that, for contrived and convoluted? And quick: this was filmed in February and March 1967, and released already in West Germany in April 1967!

Almost the entire film is bound to the family estate, a setting which allows for plenty of surreal images and vivid colours and soft photography and cracks of lightning in the night, and a few well done stalking scenes, but also limits the film, and makes it feel like a photographed stage-play. A slow moving and somewhat dull stage-play, with an abrupt and dodgy ending.