Synopsis

A reporter, Saleh, finds himself stuck in a kampong after his tyre of his MG was punctured by a strange keris, (with the bones of a hand attached). Within his short stay in the pekan kecil, he finds out that when there is a full moon, a man will disappear from the village.. He meets the beautiful and mysterious Cik Putih, sister to the mechanic Jongkidin, and is immediately smitten. At the same time, rumours abound (quietly) in the village of a pontianak who was killing their men for their blood. This is told to him inadvertently by Mahinder Singh, who quickly disappears after spilling the beans. Cik Rogayah and her parents, worried that she will never find a husband at the rate men were disappearing in the village, set their eyes on Saleh. Rogayah wants him to save her from her lounge singing life (actually her parents want her to be saved, she quite enjoys singing in the Jubilee Park), but Saleh is not so interested as Cik Putih’s beauty and strength has his heart captured.

Doreen Chua, the owner of the Jubilee Park advises Saleh to quickly leave whilst he still can, after mistakenly accusing him as a member of “tangan merah”. Ever more intrigued, Saleh decides to stay a while longer in the kampong to find out what exactly has transpired. He blames it on his journalistic integrity. More and more men disappear. Saleh is beaten up and sent off on a train. Making him even more resolute that he shall solve the mystery of the missing men. Jongkidin disappears next, and Cik Putih tells Saleh to forget that he has ever set foot in this town, as she too has fallen in love with him. What else? Saleh wants to find Jongkidin and marry cik Putih. Only to be captured by the real Tangan Merah, Kolonel Che Guevera, using his trusted sergeant, Fuad, the shape changer (well, he can’t actually change shapes but is a master of disguise, using only Dulux paint as his camouflage apparatus). The Kolonel’s army of eight are pleased at their capture of 4 persons so far to replace those whom they think they have lost to the British army.

Saleh manages to escape and when the communists are captured, the Kolonel refuses to say that he has captured all the missing people, and indeed there are some more missing people – only Jongkidin and Joki Ismadi are found amongst the people kidnapped. But then people start disappearing again….. starting from Cik Rogayah…. Who has been kidnapping them? What is the secret of the village that Saleh still does not know about?