u/BillyWilkins1982

In The Beast With Five Fingers from 1946 a seemingly severed hand decides to fight a few wrongs after the death of its owner, or does it?

In today's episode of the show we are looking at how slasher villains often reflect elements of the beast inside trope as well as why the 1940s was so obsessed with the idea of normal people who turn into killers and don't seem to remember any of it.

We are also looking at how this phantom hand influences later slasher films like Friday the 13th

Within slasher horror there is a long history of slasher villains seeing a hallucination of some sort that causes them to go on a rampage for Jason that was his mother, for Norman Bates it was also his mother however the earliest form of this out of body incitement came from the film the Beast with five fingers from 1946.

In which the disembodied hand of a dead man is seemingly killing people after his death, later it is revealed that in fact the hand is leading a different man to kill as he is seeing it in hallucinated form.

Have you seen The Beast with five fingers?

A disembodied hand begins to kill people after a famous piano players will is messed with. However, there is far more too it than that, and the hand itself becomes both a symbolic and literal tool of murder.

In today's episode we discuss the idea of the beast inside with regards to proto slashers as well as the idea of killers being lead to kill by hallucination looking at you Mrs Voorhees.

This is certainly one of the strangest 40's era proto slasher film. Have you seen it?

In this forgotten gem, a seemingly disembodied hand takes a bloody revenge on people after they start to destroy their will post death.

What is strange about this film is just how easily people believe that story, there is far more here than meets the eye and we explore in our recent episode.

In terms of the broader conversation on the proto slasher we talk about the idea of seeing other people or in this case hands and the idea of these disembodied characters actually being metaphors for the beast inside.

After the death of a famous piano player and the fallout over his will, people begin to drop like flies. The killer? Seemingly a disembodied hand belonging to none other than the late master himself.

In our most recent episode we explore this film as well as the idea of turning normal people into killers and where is the line between knowing you're a monster and truly having a dark side that takes over and having no knowledge of it.

We are also bringing light to yet another forgotten horror gem

A severed hand returns post death in order to enact it's master's bloody revenge, or does it?

Learn about the history of people being driven to kill by things they cannot see from disembodied parents to hands.

Also we discuss the implications of WW2 on the horror of the 40s, particularly the focus on normal people becoming killers.

Have you seen the Beast With Five Fingers and if so what did you think of it.

Join us for the discussion in our latest episode

The Spiral Staircase is a film about a man who kills disabled people and who targets the young mute carer of his mother, this film establishes a lot of what would become classic in slasher films, from voyeurism to the connection between victim and killer, and of course the targeting of groups.

In many ways due to the year of release there are elements of the Nazi's wartime evils in the killers motives he targets disabled people as they are lesser. In this reading the film is subconscious or perhaps deliberately talking about the horrors of the Holocaust making it a very interesting time capsule and all the more horrific.

It could be argued to be one of the first slasher films though we wouldn't say that we stay it was still in the proto slasher domain but it does have a lot of the DNA that would go on to create the genre.

Before Psycho began the lust/killer tension it was in the Spiral Staircase

Before Halloween would do the connection between killer and victim it was in the Spiral Staircase

Before Pepping Tom would bring in the voyeuristic angle to the slasher it was there in The Spiral Staircase

Other central aspects to 80s horror films such as the idea of the killer thinking they are righteous, the idea of targeting a group of people and the idea of the mixed motive killer all played out in The Spiral Staircase.

It is the film that originated a lot of what we would all come to love about 80s slasher films

So the Spiral Staircase is about a young mute woman who works as a live in carer for a rich old woman in her mansion, the woman lives with her son and step son. The step son is a serial killer who targets disabled people viewing them as lesser, as such he targets the mute carer.

There is a strange sexual element as well as the killer both seems to watch her with lust as well as thinking she is lesser than.

A lot of the classic slasher formula is well on display in this film from 1945 you have the targeting of a specific group of people, the voyeurism and of course the deep connection between victim and killer.

This is an incredibly important film for slasher fans, have you seen it?

This 1945 film explores the monstrosity of a man who thinks that the disabled are lesser than and targets them, he set his sights on the live in nurse to his sick mother who is a mute woman.

The man believes he is righteous as later killers in slasher cinema often do but he is in fact a monster targeting the most vulnerable in society.

The film is incredibly important when you're talking about the proto slasher and the idea of inspiring the later wave of slasher films in the late 70s and 80s, through things such as specific victim targeting, as well as the belief that what they are doing is right and the connection between slasher and victim.

Have you seen this film? Did you like it? And what do you think of it's influence on later slasher films?

A man targets the most vulnerable in society, the disabled out of a belief that they are lesser than, his ultimate target the mute carer for his seriously ill step mother. As the film progresses the obsession he has with her turns into a need to kill her.

This film does a lot for the proto slasher and what would later become Slasher film, it creates the idea of a killer who wrongly thinks they are righteous, it gives a strong example of a killer who targets a group of people for a specific reasons and it creates the connection between slasher villain and final girl.

The film coming out so close to WW2 wherein the Nazi's also targeted the disabled and thought they were lesser than, gives this film a deeply unsettling edge throughout and makes the killer into a true monster.

Come and find out the story of Albert Warren and learn how he was brought to justice, as well as how the Spiral Staircase influenced later slasher films.

Very much the beginnings of targeted killings in horror and of the idea of slasher thinking that by killing they are being righteous in some way.

The film follows a young mute woman living as live in help to an old rich woman who lives with her son and step son, little does anyone know the step son is a deranged killer who targets disabled people out of an evil belief they are lesser.

As the girl is hunted over the course of the film you see the deeply personal connection between final girl and slasher that would later become so important.

In our recent episode we explore the film Hangover Square (1945)

A celebrated pianist turns into a murderous villain each time he hears a discordant musical note. What begins as seemingly random acts of violent happening under the guise of amnesia, quickly starts to look far more underlying.

In terms of our meta conversation on the proto-slasher we also discuss the idea of music and it's link to killers, with regard to diegetic and non-diegetic music use

John Harvey Bone is a world respected pianist however if he hears an off note he descends into an amnesia fueled murder spree.

As time goes by questions are asked about just what Bone can and can't remember.

Explore his story as well as discussing the role of digetic and non digetic music within slasher films in our new episode.

Long before we had the motif that showed us when Jason was about to arrive and kill a teen, we had Hangover Square a film about a pianist who kills people when he hears a discordant note.

The use of music in slasher films is vital to understand the identity of the film itself from Halloween, to Friday the 13th music plays a massive and outsized if under appreciated role in the sub-genre.

Come and see where it all started

In this Jekyll and Hyde esque story a pianist is driven to murder when he hears discordant music. These fits are covered by fits of amnesia.

In many ways this film is very important to the broader cause of slasher films as it introduces the diegetic and non digetic arguments for later slasher villains motifs.

In our episode we go through both of these topics.

A man driven to killing by the sound of a discordant note. Who is George Harvey Bone and how long has he been killing for with seemingly no memory of it, and is he as much a victim as he claims or does he really harbour murderous intent.

In our new episode we do a deep dive of the killer within this forgotten 1945 masterpiece that has a very special factor with regard to development of later slashers motifs.

Georgie Harvey Bone is a musician who is sent to madness by a discordant musical note, turning him into a brutal murderer seemingly with no memory of it.

What causes his murderous ways, and why is it linked to discordant notes?

And how does the arrival or a northern young woman change everything completely? That is what we aim to find out in today's episode.

In our new episode:

A celebrated pianist turns into a murderous villain each time he hears a discordant musical note. What begins as seemingly random acts of violent happening under the guise of amnesia, quickly starts to look far more underlying.

In terms of our meta conversation on the proto-slasher we also discuss the idea of music and it's link to killers, with regard to diegetic and non-diegetic music use

When bodies become a trade murder becomes big business. In steps John Grey the focus of this week's episode, a 'resurrection man' a body snatcher by another name. Grey digs up bodies for his employer at the medical college, and when he can't find a body he makes one.

Based on the Robert Louis Stevenson short story.

We continue our conversation on the supernatural killer with this film being the first time we get a killer disappearance ala Michael Myers.