Vampire Circus is a 1971 British supernatural horror film directed by Robert Young from a screenplay by Judson Kinberg. It was produced by Wildburg Stark and Michael Carreras (who was uncredited) for Hammer Film Productions.
The movie stars Adrienne Corri (Madhouse), Thorley Walters (The Earth Dies Screaming; The Psychopath; Trog) Lynne Frederick (Schizo) and Anthony Higgins (billed as Anthony Corlan).
Plot:
Schoolmaster Albert Müller witnesses his wife Anna taking a little girl to the castle of vampire Count Mitterhaus, where the child is killed.
The villagers, led by Müller and the mayor, invade the castle and attack the Count, driving a wooden stake through his heart. With his dying breath, Mitterhaus curses the village, vowing that their children will die to give him back his life.
The villagers force Anna to run the gauntlet, after which she runs back to the castle, where the briefly-revived Count tells her to find his cousin Emil. Meanwhile, the villagers set the castle on fire.
Fifteen years later, the village is ravaged by the plague and blockaded by the authorities. The citizens fear that the pestilence may be due to the Count’s curse. A travelling circus, led by a dwarf and a gypsy woman, arrives in the village and the villagers appreciate the distraction from their troubles.
One of the artistes, Emil, is actually a vampire and Count Mitterhaus’s cousin. Emil and the gypsy woman go to the castle, where they find the Count’s staked body and reiterate the curse, that all who attacked his cousin and all their children must die…
Reviews:
“… one of the best Hammer horror films of them all […] John Moulder-Brown makes for a rather bland and uninteresting hero, but the rest of the cast is much better. The actors playing the villains put in particularly compelling performances. Adrienne Corri is convincingly forceful, and it never seems odd that this human woman should be able to dominate so thoroughly an entire pack of vampires.” 1000 Misspent Hours and Counting
“Hokum, maybe, but I challenge anyone not to enjoy it. Vampire Circus has stood the test of time – and today’s filmmakers could do worse than to take a look at it if they’re constructing a vampire tale of their own. It wears its crapness firmly on its sleeve, and adds a sense of crazy paced style sadly lacking in today’s turgid gore fests.” British Horror Films
“This was director Robert Young’s first feature; he would go on to helm efforts from Monty Python alum (Splitting Heirs, Fierce Creatures) and one can see the spirit they were attracted to: Vampire Circus is light on its toes and moves at a swift pace and refuses to take itself too seriously. What Young doesn’t bring is Terence Fisher’s sense of style, which would only make a film like this with its arcane setting even better. Oh well, he definitely makes up for it with energy and a tongue in cheek, lurid touch.” Daily Dead
“Less a standard Hammer monster melodrama than a surreal journey through dark fantasy (reminiscent of Jean Rollin‘s erotic vampire series), with an unexpected (but not entirely inappropriate) surplus of nudity and bloodletting. The film’s creepy highlights include the chilling extended prologue and scenes of vampire trapeze performers transforming into bats in mid-leap.” DVD Beaver
” …with a diverse style (at times the picture looks like an adult fairytale with European art film sensibilities) from the picture’s director, Robert Young, who was fairly new to features at the time, and an imaginative screenplay by Judson Kinberg (which adds a number of unique visual delights to the usual vampire lore) the film is a winner and one of Hammer’s finest.” DVD Drive-In
“An elegant and visually absorbing revenge tragedy – only two of the principal characters survive its gory unfolding – the film succeeds admirably on all levels; its pell-mell prologue is almost lengthy enough to function as a feature in itself.” Marcus Hearn, Alan Barnes, The Hammer Story
Buy: Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com | Amazon.ca
” …one of the company’s last great classics […] erotic, grotesque, chilling, bloody, suspenseful and loaded with doom and gloom atmosphere, this is the kind of experiment in terror that reinvigorates your love of the scary movie art form.” Pop Matters
Synapse Films Blu-ray + DVD combo features:
Featurette: The Bloodiest Show on Earth: Making Vampire Circus – An all-new documentary featuring interviews with writer/director Joe Dante, Hammer documentarian Ted Newsom, Video Watchdog editor/author Tim Lucas, author/film historian Philip Nutman, and actor David Prowse (32:39 in HD)
Featurette: Gallery of Grotesqueries: A Brief History of Circus Horrors – A retrospective on circus/carnival themed horror productions (15:07 in HD)
Featurette: Visiting the House of Hammer: Britain’s Legendary Horror Magazine – A retrospective on the popular British horror/comic publication featuring author Philip Nutman (9:48 in HD)
Vampire Circus: Interactive Comic Book- Featuring artwork by Brian Bolland (3:15 in HD)
Poster and Stills Gallery (1:58 in HD)
Original theatrical trailer (2:321 in HD)
Isolated Effects and Music score
DVD with same content/extras – in SD
Buy novelisation: Amazon.co.uk
Trailer 1080p HD:
Production:
Production began on August 9, 1971. First-time director Robert Young was unfamiliar with Hammer’s tight production schedules, and at one point used up some 500 feet of film stock while trying to get a tiger to sink its teeth into a fake human arm stuffed with pork (it finally bit after beef was substituted). When filming stretched from the scheduled six weeks into seven, the production was shut down and the footage was given to editor Peter Musgrave with instructions to make a finished film out of what he had.
Filming locations:
Black Park, Buckinghamshire, England
Fun facts:
Three of the cast – Laurence Payne, Adrienne Corri and Lalla Ward – would be reunited in the 1980 season of the British sci-fi/fantasy series Doctor Who in the serial The Leisure Hive.
