With a short film vibe that carries through the entire 84-minute runtime, Fingers is a story that never takes itself seriously, though never cheats the viewer by sharing jokes between actor and audience. In that alone, there’s something endearing about this low budget effort—that breaking the third wall, smirking to the camera thing is a goddamned plague. And thank fuck for this one playing it straight with the audience; don’t know why it’s so tough for movies to stay in character when the stakes get absurd…I mean, this shouldn’t even be a consideration.
Anyway (woo-saw, woo-saw), Fingers is one part Brian Evenson’s Last Days, one part Todd Rigney’s Dancing on the Edge of a Blade, and one part The Greasy Strangler (and not just because this one features Michael St. Michaels as well). There’s off-beat serial crime. There’s a ridiculous doctor. The gore makeup really works. There’s a wonderfully outrageous woman who is afraid and disgusted by anything bodily abnormal, she’s so, so, so horrible it’s fascinating to watch her evolve into an insane butterfly. The juxtaposition between successful psychiatric help in overcoming fear and the murder of a man is played wonderfully.
