A 1963 low budget Sci-Fi Horror film directed and co-written by Herbert L. Strock, starring Peter Breck, Kent Taylor, and Rod Lauren.
Astronauts keep going crazy and blowing up on their way back to the ground, and scientists can't figure out why. The latest astronaut to fall to this mysterious syndrome manages to contact his scientist superiors just before doing himself in; he alternates between pleas to "push the red" Self-Destruct Mechanism and violent urges to "Kill! Kill!" Finally the "red" is pushed, the astronaut is blown to shards and the scientists are still stumped.
Meanwhile, in California, young med student Paul Lawrence is frolicking on the beach with his girlfriend when they happen upon the severed arm of the dead astronaut. Against his girl's wishes, Paul returns to the beach and takes the arm home with him (for what reason, we're not told). Soon, it becomes apparent to everyone (in the audience, at least) that whatever malediction had possessed the unfortunate astronaut still possesses the arm, which promptly goes on a killing spree (said spree resulting in a grand total of ONE death). Paul himself is a prime suspect in the murder, but the two scientists arrive with their own theories. Then the mysterious murderous force begins to infect Paul as well, and he attacks a Malt Shop owner and his own girlfriend. After realizing what he's doing, Paul takes the hand out to a junkyard with the intent of destroying it, and between a fever of over 100 and some hungry cats, the evil is defeated... er, handily.
For the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode see here.
This film contains examples of:
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Well, not exactly brainwashed, but similar. Definitely crazy though.
- Clear My Name: While Paul does attack a couple of people during his "infection", he is not responsible for the single successful on-screen murder.
- Creepy Shadowed Undereyes: The alien horror produces this effect in its hosts when it infects them.
- The End... Or Is It?: The bumbling ambulance drivers somehow manage to lose the killer hand in the film's closing seconds.
- Eldritch Abomination: Only implied; apparently it's some evil alien spirit or similar that takes over astronauts and turns them into krazy killers. It's also contagious.
- I Cannot Self-Terminate: Because my body is being controlled by an alien energy being. Push the red!
- Jurisdiction Friction: Invoked by the sheriff, but all the scientists want is the severed hand. And a little cooperation from the long arm of the law.
- Like an Old Married Couple: At one point Paul and his girl argue over whether she should have brought her swimsuit on their date; their friend suggests their love is indeed true; "You two sound like a married couple already!"
- Looks Like Cesare: Paul has the messy dark hair and Creepy Shadowed Undereyes of this trope after being possessed by the hand, which helps underscore how he's not in his right mind.
- Organ Autonomy / Evil Hand: The astronaut's severed arm, still possessed by the Eldritch Abomination, is capable of independent perambulation and attack.
- People Puppets: The astronaut in the first scene and, later, Paul.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: The sheriff is hesitant to arrest Paul until he can find some decisive evidence as he knows being arrested for murder, even if he's eventually acquitted, can tarnish his personal reputation for the rest of his life.
- The Scourge of God: The only victim of the killer hand (or any of its People Puppets) to actually die is the booze-and-pill-fueled landlady.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: Paul fights the old Malt Shop owner, they crash into the jukebox... Cue "The Bird's The Word
" by The Rivingtons. - Those Two Guys:
- The bumbling ambulance drivers.
- Also the two scientists, Peter Breck and Faux-Gordon.
- Too Dumb to Live:
- And why, pray tell, is Paul so dead-set on bringing that severed arm home with him? For Science!?
- Also the bumbling ambulance drivers (see The End... Or Is It?). Whilst transporting the boxed-up arm away, the one chides his buddy for having "no curiosity" and eventually goads him into opening up the box, which would have freed the Evil Hand... had it not somehow already escaped.
- Troll: Invoked; in an early scene, Paul's Swedish girlfriend notes playfully how she is soon to return home. After he has been accused of murder and is about to run away, she tries to snap him out of it by admitting that she had only been teasing him about going home.
