Hi,
First of all, I would like to tell you that I LOVE your site!!! I visit on a daily basis and rejoice in reading what scared the shit out of other people when they were little. I have, thankfully, been able to nail down all the stuff that affected me at a tender age except for the one I'm about to describe. I'm curious to know if you or your readers can help me discover the name of this movie.
This was in the mid ‘70s, so I was about 6 or 7 years old. It was Halloween night, my favorite holiday, but I had the flu so I couldn't go out trick or treating. Instead, I lay on the couch at home watching horror movies that were airing on our local station. This one film I watched terrified me, but I don't know the name of it. Here's what I remember:
It was a Frankenstein's monster film. I'm pretty certain it was a HAMMER HORROR film from the ‘60s or early ‘70s. I think PETER CUSHING was in it, but I can't be sure. Anyway, some mad scientist has an aquarium filled with water in his lab. In that tank is a man's severed arm. For some reason, he takes the arm out of the tank and shows it to another man. The scientist instructs that man to touch the arm, but the other man is afraid to. After a bit of prodding, the man finally touches the arm and suddenly the hand of the arm comes alive, grabs the man's wrist, and won't let go!
I have always been creeped out by still-moving severed limbs, or elongated limbs (ala Freddy Krueger's arms stretching across the alley in A.N.O.E.S.), and this movie scared the crap out of me. My mom made me turn it off so I never got to finish watching, and I've never seen this film again. Please help if you can.
Thank you,
Kiddofunk
UPDATE: NAME THAT TRAUMA SOLVED! Special thanks to Reader highacorns for realizing it was Frankenstein: The True Story (1973).
Probably 'The Curse of Frankenstein' (1957).
Or the Horror of Frankenstein (1970), which I think was a remake of Curse.
Got a thing for severed limbs? You're gonna want to see the episode of World Beyond (a one-shot thriller anthology) with "The Mud Monster". Maybe not the whole thing. Just this scene:
I'm pretty sure the film you're thinking of is Frankenstein: The True Story (1973). I just watched it a couple of weeks ago and there's a scene in it exactly like the one you described. Later in the movie, the amputated arm breaks out of the aquarium and starts pounding on the door to be let out. As it finger-drags itself across the floor, Dr. Frankenstein dissolves it with acid. (Sound familiar?) Frankenstein's mad scientist mentor was played by British actor David McCallum.
Highacorns nailed it!! That's the film! Thank you so much.
Oh my hell…….The Mud Monster. I have been looking for the name of that movie for years.