Product Details

• Actors: Vic Perrin, Bob Johnson, Ben Wright, Robert Culp, Robert Duvall
• Format: Black & White, HiFi Sound, NTSC
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
• VHS Release Date: September 26, 1995
• Run Time: 51 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6301978811
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #285,967 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An example of literate sci-fi on television, February 8, 2003

By 

Reginald D. Garrard "the G-man" (Camilla, GA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Outer Limits: Sixth Finger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

"The Outer Limits", like "The Twilight Zone" before it, introduced literate storytelling to a genre that had been looked at as "kiddy fare". Each week, with few exceptions, the landmark show would take viewers on an excursion through alien landscapes or otherworldly encouters; however, humanity's strengths and weaknesses were gloriously portrayed in the well-crafted scripts and brilliant performances of the guest actors.

In "Sixth Finger", David McCallum is a village "doofus" that becomes the pawn of an experiment by scientist Edward Mulhare. The experiment results in McCallum's character becoming an evolutionary freak.

The effects may be dated, but the story is so powerful, as is the fine acting by McCallum, Mulhare, and Jill Haworth (Mrs. McCallum)that one can overlook the then-state-of-the-art technology.

Fans of the genre should note that Janos Prohoska is the "actor" in the monkey suit. He appears in several other episodes of the series as well as the classic "Bewitched" episode "Allergic to Macedonian Dodo Birds".

Now, who said you can't LEARN anything from Amazon[.com]?

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Still great after all these years!, January 1, 2001

By 

Lee Hartsfeld (Central Ohio, United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Outer Limits: Sixth Finger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

David McCallum is superb in this classic episode of the original "Outer Limits" TV series. I believe this was the first in the series to begin with a "teaser" (a strategically selected scene from the epsiode), and I remember being jolted out of my seat by it back in 1963. The episode clip involves a large-domed McCallum in his final phase of induced evolution staring down two motorcycle cops and saying, "Your ignorance makes me ill and angry!" One psychokinetic zap later, one of the officers is on the ground. The brief scene speeds by with the noise and force of a freight train, and I'm not sure I ever recovered from it.

Not that I would want to! Possibly the best episode of this outstanding series.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Avoiding the mad part of the scientist, it is worth watching, March 23, 2005

By 

Charles Ashbacher (Marion, Iowa United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Outer Limits: Sixth Finger [VHS] (VHS Tape)

The plot of this show has been used so many times that it is tedious to watch, although it was much more original when it was made. A brilliant scientist, fortunately not of the mad variety, has found a way to accelerate the path of evolution. By subjecting a specimen to certain wavelengths, he can change them into the form that they would have if they were born thousands or millions of years in the past or in the future.
The professor lives in a small village in England where the primary industry is coal mining. A young woman of limited intelligence delivers fresh bread to him and notes how a primate that the professor has is capable of doing many things. She asks if she could be made more intelligent and after he samples her blood, tells her no. She has a male friend who mines coal but is disenchanted and wants more. He is very intelligent and understands that he could do much more. He volunteers and is turned into an advanced human with a larger brain, pointed ears and a sixth finger on each hand.
He has many powers and as time goes on, he continues to gain in cranial capacity and capability. He learns quickly, but as he learns he grows to despise the rest of humanity. After deciding that the village must be destroyed, he sets out to do so. As he is engaged in a confrontation with two police officers, he realizes what he is doing and goes back to the lab. His goal is to be accelerated so far into the future that his existence will become pure thought. However, his lady friend sets the machine back so that he is returned to normal. They fall into each other's arms and it is over. The presumption is that he will go back to the mines and they live "happily ever after."
David McCallum is appropriate as the brooding advanced man and Edward Mulhare is superb at the scientist who is carrying out the experiments and is genuinely concerned about the consequences. So many people are in the position of living in a dead end existence, they know that they could do better but have little hope of actually doing it. If the professor had been played as a fanatic, or if the villagers had destroyed the McCallum character a la Frankenstein, the episode would have been awful. Not the best episode, but by avoiding many of the obvious pitfalls, I give it four stars, giving it the benefit of my thinking back to the early sixties when it was made.