Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966)

Update: Viewed again on 1/13/18, after reading skimming the user reviews and most of the critic reviews. The first viewing is the best because you have no idea what to expect. I pity the fool who sees the Mystery Science Theater nonsense, that ruins everything. The 2nd viewing was amazing. This 3rd viewing was more of a study of the film. 1) We have a solid plot, with solid dialogue. I did not notice any plot holes. 2) the scenes and camera angles were clearly set up. Critics complain that there are moments of long pause. Like when the family meets Torgo. I did not have a problem with this. They were all confused and uncomfortable, including Torgo. Also, the scene where Mike and his wife were examining the paining of the Master, long pauses, it was great. Then we see Torgo walking in, followed by his music. Great stuff. 3) The music was totally appropriate and great. 4) The characters were great. All distinct. We have the dumbass arrogant pushy clueless husband Mike. We have his super young and hot wife, and their little girl, and the girl's puppy. We meet the cop with the great dialogue, the make-out couple getting drunk which adds normalcy and comedy relief to the film. The Master is basically a Dracula undead cult figure without fangs or sucking blood waking up at night. This time around, I did not enjoy the actor's performance or dialogue this time around. But that's ok. We get to meet the Masters 6 wives, the fist and last, arguing what to do about the family, then getting into a catfight. The plot of the dumbass Mike getting the family lost and into the Masters house, then try to escape is fine. Torgo was molesting the Masters wives while they slept, then tries to make a pass at Mike's wife. This is all great stuff. The servant wanting his own piece of cake. The Master kills the deformed Torgo and the rebellious first wife, then replaces Torgo with Mike, and takes Mike's wife and daughter as part of his harem. Then we see another traveling due, two women also falling into the trap of the Master. Main problem with this film is the production. The acting, editing, dubbing, etc are subpar. I didn't have a problem with the story, music, or the cinematography. It's low budget, but it has all the elements of a decent film, just not produced with a high budget. Most people who hate this, or claim that it is THE WORST FILM OF ALL TIME are misguided, including the so called Professional Critics. The concentrate on Harold P. Warren being a fertilizer salesman with no talent that he made the film because of a bet. Or John Reynolds as Torgo was supposed to be a satyr wearing the prosthetics wrong and damaging his knees, needing painkillers, being addicted and killing himself. Or they criticize the dubbing. Fist, the dubbing was not that bad. Second, if you've watched enough foreign films you can forgive that. I believe if Warren had more money this film's production would have been more standard. First time viewers should see the original, not the joke version. There is a lot going on. Warren had a solid story. Hired attractive women. Memorable characters like Torgo, the Master and the wives. Some comedy with the makeout couple and cops. And unintentional comedy of the production. If you're done eating the candy crap that Hollywood produces without mistakes, take a look at this. It's a hard pill to swallow, but it's art. It's entertainment. Rating B, 7 stars, 10 for balance. I will also recommend: Scream Bloody Murder, Messiah of Evil, Footprints on the Moon - 1975, Last Man on Earth, White Zombie (best Lugosi movie), Don't Torture a Duckling (Lucia Fulci).Review from 1/6/18: This is my second viewing of this movie. First time in 2016, 2nd time yesterday 1/6/18. I did not see the Mystery Science 3000 nonsense. I've skimmed through the user reviews and now I'm reading the "Critic" reviews. Most hate it, and consider it one of the worst movies ever made, or THE WORST. Me, not. My suggestion to these LOSERS is to go watch the Farce Awakens, or any other new movie. I watched Citizen Kane a few months ago, and consider it an important piece that should probably be viewed at least once, but will not watch it again. But I will watch Manos. The name of the game is ENTERTAINMENT. That is what we get here. We have a husband, wife, little daughter and her puppy getting lost trying to get to a vacation spot. There are a few dynamic comedy scenes with a couple drinking and making out, and cops hassling them all. This all breaks up the horror scenes. Nothing wrong with that. The husband is an irritating loser, and the wife is useless but at least she notices there's something wrong. We meet Torgo, deformed twitching groundskeeper. Great stuff. Try to find this guy in a new movie. The husband forces Torgo let them stay there. The wife doesn't want to stay. The little girl's puppy runs outside and gets killed. The first victim. Torgo falls in love with the wife. Great scene. The Master and his wives wake up. The Masters allegiance to Manos is great. The scene with his wives arguing and the Master looks on in disbelief is comedy gold. We then get a civil war cat fight between the 6 wives, 3 or 3 rolling around on dirt. Great stuff. The Master tortures Torgo for disloyalty and destroys his hand, Torgo runs off into hell. One of the Masters wives is also tortured for disloyalty. The family tries to escape and then returns to the house. Mike the husband is a loser. Mike shoot the Master, but nothing happens. The Master is a demon. Next we see the wife and her daughter have now become the Masters new wives, and Mike the husband has taken the place of Torgo. Twilight Zone. People criticize the dubbing. I didn't have a problem with that. They criticize the acting. That is a problem. The acting sucks. Except for Torgo, he is an original. I understand the actor killed himself before the premier. I'm glad he was part of the movie. The Master was ok. All the actors did their jobs, nothing great. There was one major editing problem. When the family first discovered the Master sleeping, with his wives, we see Torgo molesting one of the Master's wives.This is a great movie. My rating is a B, or 7 stars. 10 stars given to balance all the LOSERS who do not understand art. I am surprised at the supposed critics out there who can give garbage like Farce Awakens high marks. Or even garbage like Star Trek, Search for Spock high marks. But Torgo the Hand of Manos gets no respect. This is a strange and twisted movie. In a world polluted with candy films I welcome Torgo the Hand of Manos. The worst film ever made is not Manos, it is Star Wars VII, The Farce Awakens. Copy/Paste, Garbage actors, comedy relief, Kills of Han Solo (never liked his character or actor, but still a fan favorite), Luke runs away (the hero is now a loser), Rey is Wonder Woman, Vader Lite. Recycle Bin. Original Star Wars was a good movie, not great. But Farce is the Worst Movie Ever Made because it destroys, not builds.

Take one look at this, preferably on MSTheater (trust me, you'll need the comic relief.) Usually when you hear the phrase 'worst movie ever made', you think of something like "Plan 9 From Outer Space" or other, better-known cine-hairballs. This will probably move to your number One spot---you have to see it to believe it.

This, one of the Bottom 3 films of all time, was screened last week in New York, where it likely made more money than in its original theatrical run. I spent about two-thirds of the film's run time shouting " What is this god-damned movie even about? " For its final third, I didn't care what it was about, I just wanted it to end. Seriously, I couldn't even tell you what genre this film could be classified as, nor could I tell you what the plot is about.Apparently, filmed in a matter of days, on a budget of only a few thousand dollars, and screened only a couple of times in El Paso ( where it was filmed ) , and then lost for decades, until its rediscovery by Mystery Science Theatre 3000, this is seriously one of the worst, most excruciatingly boring films ever made. It's barely even mockable, let alone reviewable. The music score consists of competing sax, and ivories being tickled in the most obtuse, out of place fashion, seemingly intended for some other movie, and it's used throughout almost every scene. Most times​ I've heard the title/ lead character's name spoken, it's MAN-os, but in the dialogue in the film, it's pronounced like MAH-nos. However his name is correctly pronounced, I kept waiting for his dog to bite him. No such luck.A middle aged nuclear family ( a grumpy old man in ridiculously over-sized trousers, his whiny, nagging wife, and their young daughter, who serves absolutely no purpose in the plot of film ) are driving in the desert ( for the first nine minutes of this movie ) and lose their way. They babble about the weather, are stopped about a broken taillight by a cop with nothing else to do, who later hassles a young couple kissing in a parked car ( and the visible guy holding the clapperboard ) on the roadside. The female half of this couple is clearly bored, as she repeatedly delivers her lines while looking directly into the camera. Was this nine minutes long scene really necessary in setting up the plot of this movie? The family comes across some type of home, inhabited by Torgo, a 25 years old man in old age make-up ( because that always works so well ) , hobbling around, who repeats almost every line of dialogue twice. After their car won't start, they're stuck in this desert overnight, where slightly weird, but mostly just interminably boring, things happen. Torgo tells them " The Master " is dead, but eventually, a hidden, sort of Satanic-looking room is found, where " The Master " is shown apparently alive after all. He's a John Astin lookalike in black robe with red hands, acting grandiose, in front of a group of women, who do little more than sit around and talk for several scenes, before a catfight erupts. The family from the first half disappears for most of this second half, while the John Astin clone and his six wives do ... stuff, ... possibly killing Torgo, because yeah, sure, of course they do. The kissing couple appear again, at night. It looks like they're parked next to a gas station, judging by the lighting equipment reflected on their car. About an hour in, it's revealed the father from the first half has a gun... ( ! ) He's been armed for this entire time? He shoots ( shoots at? ) The Master, then for some reason, a lesbian couple is introduced in the last scene, and it appears as though the entire plot is starting again, as this pair of girls get lost, with writer/ director/ producer/ star Harold Warren standing in for Torgo. A lame joke in the closing credits reads, " The end? "Yes, it is mercifully the end. " Our sincere thanks to the city & county of El Paso for their cooperation " I bet they just LOVE having their name attached to this one.I then shouted at the screen, " What? " It even has 666 in its url!

This truly is one of the worst movies that I have ever seen in my life. I don't think that I would be able to say that it is the worst since there were a lot of real duds that I have seen. But this is still probably like in the bottom like ten or five movies that I have seen. But that won't really make any sense if I don't explain why that is the problem. Well first off the whole thing with Torgo was just so over the top that I don't think that you could really be able to go on and call it a good performance. And the whole walking thing made the problem even worse than it already was. And many people would go on and try to call this the best part of this darn movie. Which is nothing more than a sign of how bad this movie is really. I can't be able to watch a single moment with the so called master and take him seriously. He is basically the play boy of horror. A old man who has a bunch of younger wives and it even gets to the point in which he marries a six year old girl at the end of the movie. Who in real life is actually his daughter which makes it even worse to watch.One thing I will say in the defense of this movie though was that the budget and making of this movie was so poor that they had no choice but to use a camera that only could lead to 34 seconds of footage being recorded in each session or else it wouldn't record anything over. Since the movie is like 74 minutes, that is like a good one hundred twenty sessions that they had to record. Overall, this movie has a terrible plot that makes no sense, a bunch of horrible acting, a ending that is beyond every definition of awful and just makes me a little bit sick to even go on and think about it at all. I know that I probably over blow it when I say that, but is the truth. Nothing about this film could be classified as good and the only thing I could say to defend it was based off of a technical issue more than anything else. I would say only watch this if you want to see one of the worst movies of all time.