Freaks (1932)

Cautiously Recommended

USA

Feature Film

Director: Tod Browning

Writer: Tod Robbins

Cinematographer: Merritt B. Gerstad

Cast: Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, Roscoe Ates, Henry Victor, Harry Earles, Daisy Earles, Rose Dione, Daisy Hilton, Violet Hilton

A circus dwarf falls for a hideously manipulative trapeze artist, who toys with him mercilessly until she finds out about his recent inheritance, at which point she contrives to marry and subsequently poison him; but she doesn’t take into account his fellow freaks, who’ll surely not take it lying down, in Browning’s generally poorly acted and fairly predictable if occasionally, scarily brilliant sort-of horror film, which is perhaps most notable for its use of actual freakshow performers. Iain.Stott