Moody films from far away

‘Creature With the Blue Hand: Special Edition’
Film Masters
$29.95 (Blu-ray), $19.95 (DVD)
173 minutes plus special features
Not rated

By Mark Voger, author
‘Zowie! The TV Superhero Craze in ’60s Pop Culture

German “krimi” films — oddball crime thrillers based on Edgar Wallace novels — make one wild sub-genre. Film Masters’ new release “Creature With the Blue Hand: Special Edition” spotlights a color krimi whose American title is a misnomer. There’s a blue hand alright, but no “creature” per se.

In what is being called a double feature of “Euro-Kinski” films, Film Masters has paired Alfred Vohrer‘s made-in-Germany “Blue Hand” with Antonio Margheriti‘s made-in-Italy “Web of the Spider” (1971). (Both films feature Klaus Kinski, the troubled German actor who specialized in troubled characters.) Only Vohrer’s film — loosely based on Wallace’s 1925 novel “Die Blaue Hand” — qualifies as a krimi. Wallace, a prolific genre-hopping author, was a household name in the early 20th century, but today is chiefly remembered for co-writing the story for “King Kong” (1932). Kinski played Edgar Allan Poe (at least in the English dub) in “Web of the Spider,” a remake of Margheriti’s earlier “Castle of Blood” (1964) starring horror icon Barbara Steele.

‘Creature With the Blue Hand’ (1967)

Like Boris Karloff in “The Black Room” and Bette Davis in “Dead Ringer,” Kinski plays twin siblings in “Creature With the Blue Hand.” One, Dave Emerson, is an asylum escapee convicted of murder, while the other, Richard Emerson, is a respectable (or so we’re led to believe) member of a wealthy family. Above, Dave is assessing his unshaven face prior to — how’d you guess? — assuming his brother’s identity. But is Dave the robed, hooded figure with the metallic blue “claw” glove who stalks victims from the shadows?

Krimis are not lacking in humor. Much of “Creature With the Blue Hand” is set at the asylum, at which cell doors are equipped with handy-dandy peep holes. A running gag in “Blue Hand” has a stripper (Uschi Mood) doing her thing each time someone happens to look through her peep hole. Logically, this must mean she is in a constant state of stripping. It doesn’t make sense, but not everything in this film does.

The asylum is run by the evil Dr. Mangrove (Carl Lange), who wears a monocle — the international acoutrement of mad doctors and mad dictators. (Mangrove is a little of both.) Here he is with Myrna (Diana Korner), a member of the Emerson family who he drugs and wrongly imprisons.

Four years before Daniel Mann‘s horror hit “Willard” unleashed hundreds of rats on squirming audiences, “Blue Hand” presented live rats and snakes. Poor Korner got very close to the creatures, and her panic doesn’t seem like acting. Pleasant dreams.

You might call the above shot of the brothers Emerson a “spoiler.” But honestly, there are so many red herrings, twist endings, and twists upon twists, that even when the end credits roll, you’re not certain “Creature With the Blue Hand” is over.

Say, that’s a pretty good Kinski head someone created. It was obviously achieved with a life mask. Did Don Post fly to Germany and stick straws in Kinski’s nostrils?

‘Web of the Spider’ (1971)

In the image above, Kinksi looks like a tortured soul from the 19th century, while Anthony Franciosa looks like he just walked off the set of “The Name of the Game.” Even his haircut is an anachronism.

In the setup, Poe agrees to meet American reporter Alan Foster (Franciosa) at a London pub. Poe grouses to Lord Blackwood (Enrico Osterman), another pubgoer: “He’s been following me around like a hound for an interview. What he’s going to write about, I have no idea. He’s probably going to talk badly about me.” When Alan questions Poe’s recurring use of madness as a theme for his stories, Blackwood bets Alan 10 pounds he’s too afraid to spend the night in his unoccupied castle. Alan ill-advisedly accepts the wager.

Once inside the castle, Alan is surprised to learn he is not alone. He meets the hauntingly beautiful Elisabeth Blackwood-Dollister (Michelle Mercier), sister of Lord Blackwood. When Alan first sees Elisabeth’s face through a sheer curtain, he thinks she is one of the many framed portraits hanging on the castle walls. (It’s a good bit of stagecraft.)

That night, Elisabeth enters Alan’s bedroom, and they have a drink. She notices he is reading a book by a Dr. Camus, who writes about “metaphysical medicine.” When Elisabeth throws herself at Alan, he takes the bait — the second bad decision he has made this day. Once she seduces him, the camera pans the room toward the fireplace, settling upon the flames. Ooh, symbolism!

Dr. Camus (Peter Carsten) materializes, or maybe it’s his ghost. Camus shows Alan a vision of the past, a fancy ball filled with dancing guests in their finest clothes. Elisabeth is there … she is married … but a crazy guy in the window demands to see her … bad things happen … Alan witnesses the whole sordid mess.

It all leads to a lesbian love scene (between Mercier and Karin Field as Julia) and three stabbing murders, all in one night in one bedroom. “Web of the Spider” was released one year after Hammer Films’ “The Vampire Lovers,” which also presented a sex scene between women. This became a micro trend of the horror films of the period.

Film Masters’ release features a bonus film, “The Bloody Dead” (1987), which is basically “Creature With the Blue Hand” recut with added contemporary American footage to insert more gore, with commentary by producer Samuel M. Sherman of Independent-International Pictures, which brought these films to our shores. There are also short docs about Wallace’s career and young Kinski honing his craft in krimi from Rialto Film; plus commentary, trailers, and a 24-page booklet with two thoughtful essays.