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Circus Of Fear
[Blue Underground]
1966; color
Directed by John Moxey
Starring: Christopher Lee, Leo Genn, Suzy Kendall, Margaret Lee & Klaus Kinski
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I guess I wasn't paying too much attention when I looked at this DVD the first time; I thought Circus Of Fear was about a circus. A "sinister" circus that employs a disfigured lion tamer. (Played by Christopher Lee.) Sadly, it is not. Or rather, it is. It's just, apparently, sinister circuses who employ horribly charred mutants are a bit less salacious than you may imagine. (Moreso if you've seen other movies on the Blue Underground imprint.) Or maybe I'm just jaded from years and years of watching grindhouse movies and expect every non-mainstream film to feature sex and violence, with occasional bouts of sexual violence and / or violent sex. Either way, this features none of those things. It's not a horror movie either, as I guess some people have guessed from the Christopher Lee angle and the title. It's a thriller based on an Edgar Wallace novel. If you've read any of his books, or seen movies based on them, they usually kick off with one event that kicks off a series of events, whose goal is to solve a seemingly obvious puzzle, featuring a lot of red herrings and convoluted plotlines. This one is no different. The first portion of the film details a brazen and well orchestrated armored car heist - staged in part on London's famous Tower Bridge for maximum effect. It's well orchestrated-ness almost falls apart when one of the crooks makes an unplanned move and shoots one of the guards as he's trying to escape; but that only serves to derail the greater plan by forcing the offender to report to an undisclosed location with a suitcase of money and deliver said ill gotten gains to an unseen higher-up in the organization. (And, you know, they had to work the circus aspect in there somehow, right? Otherwise it would have been called Empty Warehouse Of Fear, which isn't very catchy.) Once the guy arrives at his destination the story begins to get a little disjointed, offering up the expected array of off-screen activity and dead end clues, peppered with the expected array of quirky carny characters (including the prerequisite midget with an attitude), two sexy bodysuit-clad blondes (Margaret Lee & Suzy Kendall), and one ferocious feline. (There are other large cats in the circus but only Sheba, a lioness I believe, is aggressive towards sexy bodysuit-clad blondes.) Also of note is the brief appearance of Klaus Kinski, as a sleazy criminal whose interests include lurking in the shadows, mumbling, smoking cigarettes and collecting debts. At any rate, eventually the storyline begins snaking it's way to the climactic "reveal" where we learn who the killer is. (I thought it was the midget. I was wrong.) While this wasn't exactly what I was expecting, or even close, it still held my attention for the most part.
—Bunny
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