Body Parts (1991)

Some things I liked some I did not.

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Psychologist Bill (Jeff Fahey) interviews a convicted killer and goes home to his wife Karen (Kim Delaney) discussing his wants and desires. The next day while in traffic, a tire breaks off a car's axle and Bill immediately stops his car to avoid the accident. Unfortunately, the truck ignores the ensuing chaos and crashes into Bill's bumper. Bill crashes through the rear window. At the hospital, Dr. Agatha Webb (Lindsay Duncan) gives Bill an arm transplantation. Everything seems to be going fine during rehabilitation until Bill suffers hallucinations. Jeff Fahey carries "Body Parts" all the way to the inane finale. The first act meanders, the second act is okay, but the third act is completely off-the-rails. Impressive stunt work, creative murders, and an insane car chase await the unexpected viewer.Corny dialogue plagues the screen. Suspension of disbelief would be an understatement for this film. Essentially, "Body Parts" rips off "The Hands of Orlac."

The somewhat ludicrous idea of a transplant patient being controlled by their new limb dates back as far as F.W. Murnau's 1924 expressionist classic The Hands of Orlac, in which a pianist who loses his hands in an accident is given transplants from the body of a recently executed murderer with disastrous results.In Body Parts, Eric Red's 1991 take on this macabre tale, several people receive replacement limbs from convicted killer Charley Fletcher, but it is prison psychologist Bill Chrushank (Jeff Fahey) who first begins to suspect that there is something not quite right when his new right arm exhibits uncharacteristic behaviour, hitting his son and throttling his wife (Kim Delaney) while she sleeps.Bill is understandably shocked when he eventually discovers the identity of his arm's original owner, and demands that his surgeon Dr. Agatha Webb (Lindsay Duncan) remove the troublesome appendage, but she refuses, unwilling to undo her groundbreaking work. Meanwhile, Fletcher, whose head has been attached to a new body by the clearly deranged Webb, is running around savagely tearing his transplanted extremities from their new owners.The concept might be extremely well worn, providing the basis for more than a handful of horrors over the years, but Eric Red manages to bring new life to the 'evil transplanted limb' idea by acknowledging its sheer silliness and simply running with it. It takes a while to get into the swing of things, but once Fletcher starts to reclaim his lost body parts, the fun really begins, with Red serving up some great gore and outlandish plot developments.The film's most preposterous moment comes as Bill is sitting in a police car: Fletcher drives alongside, slaps handcuffs on Bill's wrist and tries to pull his arm off by quickly accelerating away. Fortunately, Detective Sawchuck (Zakes Mokae) is in the driving seat and miraculously keeps up with Fletcher's vehicle as it careens headlong through oncoming traffic while Bill desperately tries to remove the cuffs. It's an extremely dumb sequence, but well executed and hugely entertaining.In a glorious Grand Guignol-style finale, Bill confronts the mad doctor and Fletcher in a laboratory where the convict's reclaimed severed limbs and bloody torso are now suspended in a tank of liquid. In a marvellously splattery and absurdly grotesque finish, a desperate battle breaks out, during which Bill wrests a shotgun from Fletcher and proceeds to blow the crap out of anything that twitches, finally destroying the killer's connection with his arm in the process.7.5 out of 10, rounded up to 8 for IMDb.

The film is enjoyable and is good fun.The main character loses his arm in an accident, and gets a replacement from a dubious source leading to all sorts of macabre events, and the play includes having a mad scientist/doctor.What I like about this picture is that even though the story spirals into absurdity and is preposterous, all the lead actors take themselves and the story very seriously making the movie even more hilarious. Everyone gives full throttle performances which keeps the viewer nicely entertained!I wonder if we have or will get a body Parts II?! Worthy of a solid:7/10

This is more or less a 90's film version of the famous and often retold tale "The Hands of Orloc". Normally that would worry me, as I'm generally speaking not a big fan of the 90's when it comes to horror and I don't really like seeing classic horror stories ruined by this decade, but for some reason I had a fairly good feeling about this one. Perhaps because co-writer/director Eric Red proved already that he knows a thing or two about creating suspense and atmosphere with his previous achievements "The Hitcher" and "Near Dark". Or maybe because the only truly great version of the tale was "Mad Love" starring Peter Lorre and that movie is already over 70 years of age. "Body Parts" is a reasonably good thriller with a handful of memorable suspense-laden moments and gooey Grand Guignol effects; particularly near the end. The film starts at out somewhat as a serious toned medical drama, but gradually escalates into an outrageous mad scientist horror flick. When family man and criminology shrink Bill Crushank gets involved in a dramatic car accident, his wife Karen has very little time to decide whether or not Dr. Agatha Webb is allowed to try her groundbreaking method of transplanting a donor arm on Bill. The operation is a success and Bill can slowly pick up his career and family life again, until suddenly the donor arm begins to develop a sinister behavior on its own. Bill discovers he got the arm from an executed serial killer and fears that he inherited his murderous tendencies with it. Nobody believes Bill, not even the other patients who received donor parts from the same serial killer, at least not under some murders occur. The first half hour is talkative; the middle section is mainly tense and mysterious (with as a highlight a unique and adrenalin-rushing car chase) and the climax is grotesque and gory with a few very delirious twists. Eric Red's direction is surefooted enough and, although Jeff Fahey definitely isn't bad in the lead role, the show is obviously stolen by an overacting Brad Dourif. 90's B-movie queen Kim Delaney is underused as Fahey's devoted wife. Masterful score by Loek Dikker.