My take: The acting of Conrad Veidt alone makes this a film you must watch. He displays his emotions with the slightest movements of his hands and eyes, and, as a result, you are drawn right into the story.
The Hands of Orlac is the fifth movie listed in Studies in Terror, and it is the first that I am certain I will watch again. It follows the tragic story of Paul Orlac (played by Conrad Veidt), a pianist who is injured in a train crash. Unable to save his hands, the surgeon replaces them with the hands of a recently executed murderer.
Conrad Veidt as Paul Orlac in The Hands of Orlac.
When Orlac awakens and discovers the origin of his new hands, he is filled with despair and fear. He begins to believe that his hands are driven to murder and other nefarious acts. Watching Veidt’s Orlac, you puzzle over whether it is all in his mind or if his hands do have some evil purpose.
This movie was incredibly fun to watch. With Studies in Terror next to me, it didn’t take me too long to realize who I was watching: Conrad Veidt played Cesare in the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Ivan the Terrible in Waxworks. Suddenly a theme emerges, and that theme made watching Conrad Veidt’s latest work all the better.
The strong emotions he portrayed as the troubled somnambulist Cesare shine through in The Hands of Orlac. Watching his expressions, you are drawn into his tale and can sympathize with the horror and pain Orlac is feeling.
I would definitely recommend this film to fans of horror, especially if you have watched the previous films I’ve blogged about from Studies in Terror.
Here is The Hands of Orlac on youtube:
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