The 5000 Fingers of Dr. T
Directed by Roy Rowland
Written by Dr. Seuss and Allan Scott
1953/USA
Columbia Pictures Corporation/Stanley Kramer Productions
Repeat viewing/Netflix rental
[box] Dr. Terwilliker: This is my day! 5,000 little fingers, all playing together on my piano! Every finger obedient to the whim of me, the master! Every infinitesimal, microscopic piece of living tissue of those 5,000 little fingers, cringing and trembling and groveling before me! Before me, Dr. Terwilliker, as I raise my baton! We shall play… raise hands! We shall play the most beautiful piece ever written! I wrote it. Ten Happy Fingers! A one, and a two, and a three, and a play![/box]
This very odd little musical is growing on me.
As the movie begins, strange leotard-wearing men are chasing a young boy through a surreal landscape with colored butterfly nets. The boy is Bartholomew Collins (Tommy Rettig) who has fallen asleep, as he frequently does, while practicing on the piano. We are introduced to his piano teacher Dr. Terwiliker (Hans Conreid), his mother, and plumber August Zabladowski. All these people say that Bartholomew should practice even harder, though the plumber privately tells him that he thinks Dr. Terwilker is pulling the wool over his mother’s eyes.
Bartholomew starts playing once again and promptly falls asleep. His dream takes him to Dr. T’s piano school, an establishment complete with dungeons for recalcitrant students. Dr. T’s plan is to kidnap 500 boys and force them to practice nonstop forever on his gigantic piano.
Worse, Bartholomew’s mother has been hypnotized and is working as No. 2 in command of the school. The evil doctor plans to marry her once his concert takes place. The plumber is busy installing the sinks necessary for the school to pass inspection. Bartholomew enlists him as a reluctant ally to defeat Dr. T’s plans for both the boys and the mother. He gains a father in the process.
I can imagine that this movie was quite scary for little kids and it was a major flop. Dr. Seuss seems to have pinpointed all the anxieties common to children’s nightmares and gathered them together on celluloid. Nevertheless, some of the songs are quite good, Conreid is a gas, and the whole thing has a special look that you won’t see anywhere else. I enjoyed it far more on this viewing than the first time I saw it.
The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T was nominated for an Oscar for Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture.
Joe Dante on the film – Trailers from Hell
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xr5aePmuCLc
Clip
