Seeing Hands is a 1943 short film (ten minutes) directed by Gunther von Fritsch.
It is the inspirational true story of one Benjamin Helwig—and it's also a World War II propaganda film. The story starts out in the depths of The Great Depression. Ben's widowed mother, unable to provide for him, puts him in a children's home. The home seems to be a pretty good place, as Ben has fun playing baseball and goofing around with his new buddies. However, tragedy strikes one day when Ben, playing catcher in a baseball game, is struck in the head by the batter's backswing. He is blinded.
Since this is the 1930s he and his mom do not sue the school into the ground for failing to take elementary safety precautions like making the kids wear catcher's masks. Instead, young Ben rebuilds his life. His mother brings him model airplanes, and Ben finds that he can build them just as well as he could back when he had his vision. He learns Braille. Ben grows up to become a skilled woodworker, making cabinets and other ornate furniture despite his complete blindness. Eventually his skills are put to use in a war manufacturing plant where he makes airplane parts.
George "Spanky" McFarland of the Our Gang comedies appears in one of his last film roles, as another boy at the children's home.
Tropes:
- Based on a True Story: The opening titles proclaim this film to be "A True Story", as opposed to Smith's usual comedy shorts.
- The Cameo: There's Spanky from Our Gang as one of the other boys playing with Ben in the home.
- Canine Companion: Adult Benny, the armaments worker, has a seeing-eye dog. The dog helps his master not just as a guide dog, but also by doing stuff like picking up tools that Ben drops from his work table.
- Celebrity Paradox: As George McFarland is squirted with water, the narrator says "Fatty" (ugh) "felt like a fugitive from an "Our Gang" comedy." So Spanky has an identical twin?
- Face Framed in Shadow: In a shot that oddly plays more like a horror movie, the screen goes from pitch darkness to the upper half of Ben's face lit up, as Smith's narration finishes his inspirational story.
- Impairment Shot: The picture blurs out and goes black to demonstrate Ben's loss of sight.
- Initiation Ceremony: The boys at the home do a silly one where you climb blindfolded into a wooden model car, which is rigged to squirt you in the face with water when you hit the horn.
- Inspirationally Disadvantaged: A man blinded as a child becomes a precision woodworker and wartime armaments worker.
- Match Cut: From young Ben shaking headmaster John Downan's hand, to grownup Ben doing the same when he revisits the home.
- Narrator: Pete Smith as always, narrating the story in lieu of dialogue. He adopts a more earnest tone here than the sarcasm of his comedy shorts.
- Orphanage of Love: Technically it isn't an orphanage, as some of the boys have parents, but it plays out the same. The home takes good care of its kids, except for not providing them with catcher's masks.
- Title Drop: As the film shows Ben learning Braille, the narration says "Soon Benny was calling these his 'seeing hands'".
