When Michael Caine gets angry or acts tough, his mouth tightens up and his eyes become reptilian and menacing as if he is ready to hunt his prey. Such piercing eyes are really the focus, or should have been, for a peculiar and quite fascinating psychological horror film called "The Hand." I remember watching it on video back in 1982 and thought it was a primal, scary film. Today, I can say the film still works a nerve and makes you sweat a little. Caine is the lead star and his eyes say much more than some severed, crawling killer hand. The eyes have it, as far as I am concerned.
Successful cartoonist Jonathan Lansdale (Michael Caine) is having a nearly loveless marriage with his depressed wife (a powerfully understated Andrea Marcovicci) who wants to seek a new environment and a new life. They have a cute, curious child (adorably curly-haired Mara Hobel, memorable in "Mommie Dearest") who one day notices a severed lizard's tail moving on its own (the source novel is titled "The Lizard's Tail") and wonders how that can be. Jonathan is on a car trip to deliver comic-drawing proofs when a near-accident with a truck and another car causes his right hand to be severed. He receives a solid prosthetic hand but it doesn't help with his drawings one bit. After his agent secures another cartoonist to draw and ink Jonathan's ideas and his marriage is going downhill fast, Jonathan takes a job teaching in California. There he has a quick roll in the hay with a dynamic student (Annie McEnroe) who wants to keep it old-fashioned by, you know, "doing it on the bed." Meanwhile, the severed hand that Jonathan and his wife tried to find has a life of its own and starts offing people. One is a bum (Oliver Stone, no less, who also directed) who is also a hand amputee. There are others and it is clear that Jonathan through telepathy (!) and murmuring something in his sleep (and while he's awake) can command that severed hand to kill.
The ending is quite thrilling though it is perplexing as it leaves some questions about whether the hand is murderous or if Jonathan is actually killing people or is it both. In one highly dramatic scene, that special hand scribbles all over his proofs which causes Jonathan to lose his job which begs more questions - is this hand trying to help Jonathan or ruin his life? Call it a hand with pin-sized plot holes in it. Oliver Stone already knew how to direct his actors and also manages to create a creepy atmosphere utilizing the scenery of the country setting, though he never did another horror film (Stone completists will notice his early attempt to change color to black-and-white in a couple of scenes, which do precious little to explain if Jonathan has a gradual psychosis or not).
"The Hand" is never boring and Michael Caine has his incredible charm and steely, reptilian eyes which makes the film far more watchable than you might think. He is a master craftsman who makes the cast look good - that is a special gift. It's the eyes that sell it. The less of the hand that we see, the better. Why nobody ever cast Caine in a remake of "X - The Man With X-Ray Eyes" continues to baffle me.
