Directed by Harold P. Warren
Starring Harold P. Warren, Diane Mahree, Jackie Neyman, Tom Neyman and John Reynolds
Mark this flick down in the "movies everyone needs to see before they die" list. Seriously. Manos is just so oddball, so unbelievably out-there and downright incomprehensible at times that it simply must be seen to be believed. The fact that it contains a half-man/half-goat with the most hauntingly soothing musical score accompanying his scenes also doesn't hurt in the least bit. Combined with a good two dozen moments and/or scenes that truly qualify as some of the best "WTF" stuff in cinematic history and you've got a real winner, actual quality of the film or not be damned.
This movie has a long, bloody history that I'll try to give the short, short version of. It was financed, directed, produced, written by and STARRED Hal Warren, El Paso fertilizer salesman who made a bet with a friend that he could make a horror film ultra-cheap and ultra-easy. How easy? He started outlining the script on the napkin at the restaurant where the bet was made. Hiring actors from local theater groups and a modeling agency, he hammered out a script involving a family being trapped by a polygamous, quasi-Satanic cult in the middle of the desert, rented his film equipment, and shot this movie. The complete story is much longer, involving the years that the finished film sat obscure and undiscovered before Mystery Science Theater 3000 came along and made it a cult phenomenon, but I think you get the gist. By this point, this IS a cult film, with a somewhat ironic but also very real fandom despite its badness. So, what exactly happens in this movie with such an interesting history?
Manos: The Hands of Fate is the very definition of "less is more." It's 74 minutes long, it has no opening title sequence, and its music is of the very piano-y mood-filled variety. Put very simply, it's the story of a family that takes a very wrong turn and finds something bad on the other side, only you've never seen any other movie that depicts the trope quite like this. Character-wise, we're given Warren himself as Michael, the father, with Dianne Mahree and Jackie Neyman as his wife Margaret and young daughter Debbie, respectively. Their acting skills, as can be expected, are quite suspect, with Mahree in particular coming across like Wendy Torrance -7000, but I digress. In search of a seemingly mythical "valley lodge," their wrong turn takes them to a creepy old farmhouse on the outskirts of anywhere lorded over by a strange-looking man named Torgo.
Let me tell you guys a little bit about Torgo. Played by John Reynolds, he's essentially supposed to be a satyr, as clearly evidenced by his herky-jerky walking style complete with horn-infused "creepy music." His speech pattern is also all over the place. Say what you want about Reynolds, but you can't say that he didn't dive into this role 1000%. As such, I've instantly got more respect for him than I do, say, Rooney Mara. A LARGE portion of the middle of Manos is given to Torgo, as it first simply seems that the guy is smitten with Margaret. We also see a strange, Night Gallery-esque painting of a moustached man with a demonic dog that Torgo helpfully informs both Michael and the audience is "the Master," the man who ACTUALLY takes care of the house.
After a creepy incident wherein Torgo attempts to seduce Margaret and tell her that the Master intends to make her another one of his wives, we are taken to the back of the house, where there are a bunch of women tied to wooden poles. Folks, I am not making this up. These would be those very eponymous "brides," as the Master - whoever the hell he is - is revealed to be a Pagan polygamist preacher. Whoa, alliteration alert. This is the beginning of a long night of decided non-horror as the Master eventually comes to life, and he is none too pleased with Torgo attempting to steal his newest wife.
This is a horror movie, but there isn't much in the way of horror. The body count is essentially non-existant. What Warren was trying to do with this movie was disturb audiences, and at that...I think he actually succeeds. It succeeds despite ANYTHING that the intellectual part of your mind can think about, but I defy anyone to watch this flick and not feel the slightest bit skeeved at the idea of a Satanic dude living in the middle of nowhere harvesting wives and (potentially) living forever. And one who has the ability to turn people into shriveling, burning husks with the use of his magical burning hand/wand. He can also hypnotize people, a plot device that becomes very important in the epic finale. Slight spoiler alert. Tom Neyman, the guy playing the Master, also dives completely into his role. He's like a silent film villain cranked up to a thousand, granting the movie tons of unintended comedy with his Freddie Mercury moustache and admittedly ridiculous Pagan get-up consisting of a black robe with red "hands" painted on. Oh, and he's got a fantastic evil laugh.
What else is there? Well, there is a bit of drama involved with the Master's wives, who argue about what to do with the recently captured females. One of them suggests that the young Debbie (who is MAYBE eight years old in this film) will eventually grow into a woman and be one of the new wives. One of the final images in the film shows this very thing, cranking the skeeviness factor up even further.
Tension-wise, what we've got from here on out is a game of stalling, and that's where a majority of just how crappy this movie is comes from, as the stakes of the movie are spelled out fairly early on - will Michael allow his wife and daughter to be possessions of the Master - and there's virtually nothing in the way of chases or good jump scenes from that point forward. A roller coaster, this movie is not.
Still, I CAN'T call Manos a total failure. This movie is frequently listed by a lot of internet geniuses as being one of the worst movies ever made, and I don't think it's even CLOSE to hitting that. I've seen Nail Gun Massacre, people, and that has this beat by a long shot. Is it good? Definitely not. Its gamut of bad qualities, from bad editing gaffes to bad acting to a very questionable scripting structure ensure to that. But it actually does hit on its aforementioned intended purposes to disturb, mainly with a combination of its grainy theater-print look and its soul-destroying piano score. I'll take a movie like this, an ultra-cheap movie with a simple intended purpose, than...well, pretty much any modern blockbuster, that boast budgets 737 times as large but are so passion-free that it makes bile rise into my throat. Thus, while this movie IS pretty bad, it's essential viewing for that comparison alone.
* 1/2 out of ****. If you're looking for a good horror movie that will scare and terrify you, don't look to this one. For a fun night on the couch with friends, few movies are better.
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