Rich and famous concert pianist Stephen Orlac flies to France to marry beautiful Louise Cochrane. In heavy fog, the small aircraft crashes. Next day newspapers run two headlines next to each other: the ruin of his hands, as well as the execution of the strangler Louis Vasseur. During recovery of his surgery, in Orlac's mind his hands aren't his own any longer, they are Vasseur's. A magician and conman, Nero, with his sexy Vietnamese assistant, try to blackmail Orlac and to that purpose devise plots that further push the pianist off his mind.