Absolutely Fantastic

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

After watching and loving the movie Mad Love which is a new adaptation of the story in this movie, I really wanted to see the original movie too. In Mad Love the doctor is the protagonist who is lusting after Ms Orlac, Orlac himself is there less important even less important than his wife. Orlacs Hände focuses clearly on the man in the title role (wonderfully played by Conrad Veidt who also played Cesare in Cabinet of Dr. Caligari) with Ms Orlac (Alexandra Sorina) in a good supporting role. The doctor's role is here minimal and not really that important to the story. More important roles are there for servant Regine (Carmen Cartellieri) and the bad guy Nera (Fritz Kortner). OK, the movie is slow, very slow in its movement, focusing on the dark atmosphere and expression by gestures and facial which was common for these German expressionist films. However I do think it is rewarding though when we see how the story and mystery around Orlac's hands unfolds to a surprising and really clever and satisfying end result. Very neat how they could do this with a minimal of dialog. Great performances from the full cast. I must say this one wins over Mad Love.

I much prefer watching the Peter Lorre remake, MAD LOVE ('35) which tells the same tale of the pianist who has his hands replaced by those of a murderer after an accident severs them. At least that version had some pace, some sense of cinematic flow and was not subjected to the wild silent screen acting that all but consumes THE HANDS OF ORLAC.Even a great actor like CONRAD VEIDT cannot save this one from looking absurd much of the time. The players all suffer from silent screen direction which means they hold their frantic poses for long stretches of time while the camera focuses only on them.Even the train wreck scene suffers from lengthy excesses before the camera even gets to the victim. You almost feel like saying, "C'mon, let's get to the point," before the scene is over.Frankly, I found it an insufferable silent film, a poorly paced example of German expressionism in a film full of shadows and static camera shots.

I've been looking for a DVD of THE HANDS OF ORLAC ever since I knew the film existed. Now it's finally here, and like most silent films it's a mixed bag. I find the image on the new KINO disc to be acceptable considering the problematic nature of the source material. There's a loss of definition in some scenes, but there are also moments of sharpness in the restored Murnau Foundation print. It's a shame we can never experience non-talking films the way 1920s audiences did, without washed-out contrasts, image-flickers, frame-jitters, dirt, and print damage. Even the best restorations don't look new.The plot concerns a concert pianist whose hands are smashed in a train wreck. A surgeon replaces them with the hands an executed criminal. Soon the pianist is obsessed with thoughts he might be a killer. The performances are generally excellent in the Expressionistic style. Conrad Veidt's exaggerated grimacing as his character Paul Orlac approaches madness is tempered by moments that are extremely moving.The score of mostly string music on the KINO disc is creepy and works well for a while, but is so monotonous over the entire length of an already ponderously paced film that I grew tired of it. This film cries out for music that varies its mood to fit what is happening on screen. Contrasts in the mood of the music would make the creepy parts seem even creepier. An optional score in a traditional style would have been nice. Nevertheless, the Gothic set design and shadow-infested cinematography by Gunther Krampf - particularly the scenes at Orlac's father's house - create the atmosphere we know and love in early horror films. These chiaroscuro light-and-shadow effects just cannot be achieved with color.However, to evoke fear without the modern cheats of gore and violence - to create what the Germans call "stimmung" (mood) - requires not only imaginative lighting and set design, but time. Unfortunately director Robert Weine spends too much time on the actors' very deliberate expressionistic movements at the expense of pacing.The ending is likewise unsatisfactory, although it does follow Maurice Renard's novel. I won't give too much away other than to say the ending undercuts an apparently fantastic element, yet makes the "logical" explanation seem almost as implausible. Nevertheless, the build-up to the resolution as well as Veidt's engrossing performance makes this a worthwhile, if uninspired, film.

One of the real classics of Expressionism -- even the Americans think so, to judge from the fact that they've remade it (badly) several times. To be sure, the premise won't stand examination (but then, it's horror), and a modern viewer may find it hard to adjust to the actors' Expressionist grimacing. However, the movie is consistently suspenseful due to its heavy dark atmosphere and communication of mental torment. The fear of one's own body is a dynamite theme if it's as well presented as it is here.