#Manos: the hands of fate

[astralbondpro]

Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) Dir. Harold P. Warren

[amatesura]

Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966) | dir. Harold P. Warren

[my-t4t-romance]

one of the downsides of watching mst3k is the agony of seeing a shitty movie with a FANTASTIC soundtrack and knowing you probably can't find the music online

[doraemonmon]

Manos: The Hands of Fate 1966

[moviesandmania]

MANOS: THE HANDS OF FATE Reviews and free on YouTube

‘It’s shocking. It’s beyond your imagination’ Manos: The Hands of Fate is a 1966 American horror film written, directed, produced by and starring Harold P. Warren. It is sometimes deemed to be one of the worst films ever made. The movie is infamous for its technical deficiencies, especially its significant editing and continuity flaws; its soundtrack and visuals not being synchronised; tedious…

[schlock-luster-video]

On May 6, 2011, Manos: The Hands of Fate was screened on Elvira’s Movie Macabre.

Here's some new Master art to mark the occasion!

[hopanessromtic]

Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966)

[nerds-yearbook]

On August 16, 2012, Rifftrax hosted their 6th simulcast live event featuring "Manos: The Hands of Fate", which was first made famous by MST3K (Mystery Science Theater 3000). They also riffed the shorts Welcome Back, Norman and At Your Fingertips: Cylinders as well as screened an old commercial for Prune Juice. ("Rifftrax Live: Manos: The Hands of Fate", Movie Event)

[vfdinthewild]

"Terrifying Pet Store Rat: The Master's 'demon dog' is clearly just a very friendly Doberman."

-From the tv tropes entry for Manos: The Hands of Fate

Submitted by @lunarhobbits!

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Manos: The Hands of Fate (Warren, 1966)

Like most people, I'd first "seen" Manos: The Hands of Fate through Mystery Science Theatre 3000, where among other things, the boys chided the movie for its endless driving scenes. Watching the movie proper, they're not exactly wrong, as there are plenty of driving scenes, which go on for far longer than they might "need" to. But I think that's part of the movie's charm. The early sections have the effect of watching somebody's home movies that they took on vacation, only there's something a little off about them, and that offness comes into focus as the movie progresses and the plot kicks in. I'm probably being a bit generous here, but I did enjoy watching these scenes, not just because the scenery looked nice enough, but because they allowed the movie to establish certain rhythms, only to upend them soon after. I watched this on a pretty nice transfer, which was certainly conducive to such pleasures. Say what you will about MST3K (I don't have the same history with them as some others, but I think they at least understand the movies they're making fun of and are actually clever and funny, unlike much of their YouTube progeny), but it's unlikely that this would be available in such a nice looking copy were it not for them showcasing the movie.

The closest comparison to this I can think of are the slashers of Ray Dennis Steckler, particularly Blood Shack, another movie that isn't terribly long but feels a lot longer and where we're stuck in the desert heat in one location and not a lot happens. The difference, if you can squint hard enough, is that Steckler seems to know how a conventional movie is supposed to move and has a basic understanding of craft, and what he "struggles" with is finding enough material to fill the runtime. (A good chunk of the movie is set at the rodeo, and we get to hang out with a pony named Peanuts.) The movie settles into a nice, sunburnt, zonked out, heat stroke vibe, sporadically interrupted by bursts of bloodletting to meet genre demands. Manos in contrast is a lot more unwieldy, shots framed with a tenuous grasp of symmetry and screen composition, arrythmically bringing each one to a close and knocking us into the next one. The movie jerks forward on its wobbly legs, as if it were about to tip over at any moment. If you graphed both movies, Blood Shack would be a relatively flattened curve, while Manos would be much choppier, like the output of a polygraph test.

That wobbliness is matched by its most memorable performance, John Reynolds as the satyr Torgo, who wobbles about on his bowed legs (the result of a rig he built himself) and delivers his lines like he'd been drinking heavily instead of memorizing his dialogue and seems to remember it a word at a time. (Apparently he was using LSD quite heavily during the production, which might explain things.) It's not a "good" performance, but it certainly makes an impact. And there's Tom Neyman as the Master, whose wives immediately start bickering and wrestling once he revives them. (I am not a polygamist, but I suspect the secret to a successful polygamist marriage is for not just you to get along with your spouses, but for your spouses to get along with each other. The latter does not seem to be the case here.) The wives all wear flowy white robes, which is a sure sign of quality cinema in my book. And there's the couple who seemingly makes out for several hours at the side of the road, and the cute dogs, to which the movie cuts whenever the energy level threatens to sag (so with some frequency). If the movie suffers in one key respect compared to Blood Shack, is that it lacks a sympathetic presence like Carolyn Brandt to ground the proceedings. The heroes here don't make much of an impact compared to the weirdness around them.

Manos was directed by insurance salesman Harold P. Warren, a first-time filmmaker who made the movie over a bit with Stirlling Silliphant, Oscar-winning screenwriter and student of Bruce Lee. Warren's film isn't polished by any measure, but the result is far stranger, like an transmission of an alien's approximation of a human movie, whose signal threatens to give out at any given moment. It's not "scary" by any real measure, but it creates its own off-kilter atmosphere that I enjoyed spending time in.

[wormsinfilm]

Worms (not) in film: Manos: The Hands of Fate [1966]

This movie takes place in a desert, so understandably there are no worms. There's not really anything else worth seeing either.

0/10, no worms!!!!!

[acorn4848]

Idk if anyone did this before but

[healed1337]

Hilariously Bad Movies 8 - Manos: The Hands of Fate

Sorry for this post being a few days later than normal. I had a busy weekend. Even in the realm of bad movies, there are very few that can easily be compared to Manos: The Hands of Fate. Very few people involved with this movie are known for anything else. Writer/director/producer Harold P. Warren made a bet with Academy Award Winning writer, Stirling Dale Sillphant (he won it for “In the Heat…

[haveyouseenthishorrormovie]

SUMMARY: A family gets lost on the road and stumbles upon a hidden, underground, devil-worshiping cult led by the fearsome Master and his servant Torgo.

[mst3kgifs]

Look, it's lined. I got inside pockets; I got a little special one for my Mentos. It's even got a cotton panel!

[schlock-luster-video]

On May 6, 2011, Manos: The Hands of Fate was screened at Elvira's Movie Macabre.