Vampire Circus

An small village somewhere in Europe, where the villagers can't leave their small town. Because of the recent plague, then an mysterious group of circus people (Lead by Adrienne Corri) are coming to this village to bring happiness and joy to make them forgot the plague. But they are there to bring misery and murder instead. Since this carnival people are actually vampires (even the animals are vampires and could transforms to human begins!) getting their revenge of their master Count Mitterhaus (Robert Tayman) got staked in the heart 15 years ago. Which their master, they were killed by the villagers and now this vampires are trying to kill all the woman and children. So, their master could comeback to life. Directed by Robert Young (Splitting Heirs) made an fascinating vampire horror movie, despite its poor production values. But this movie has some light erotic moments and some arresting scenes as well. It is also amusing Tongue in Cheek as well. But the British cast are good here and actually well written also. But i felt, there's something missing in the movie. But it's satisfying enough and die-hard fans of the famous "Hammer" production will enjoy this. David Prowse, who plays "The Strongman" in the movie. Prowse is best known for playing "Darth Vader" in the suit in the original "Star Wars" trilogy. (*** ½/*****).

Fifteen years after staking Count Mitterhaus, the vampire that had been preying upon their children, the people of a remote European village suffer once again as a mysterious plague begins to claim their lives. With roadblocks in place to stop the disease from spreading, they are cut off from the outside world. When a gypsy circus somehow beats the quarantine to put on nightly shows at the village, the locals are happy that they have something to take their minds off the illness. But soon, the now-grown-up children of those who killed the Count begin to turn up dead, and the villagers start to suspect that the circus folk are somehow responsible. It eventually transpires that the creepy entertainers, some of whom are vampires, are out to seek revenge for Mitterhaus's death, and ultimately aim to raise the Count from his tomb. A better-than-average offering from Hammer studios, Vampire Circus offers all of their trademark elements—lush visuals, lavish sets and costumes, beautiful women, handsome heroes and Gothic atmosphere to spare—plus quite a bit of blood and gore, and a generous amount of gratuitous nudity from several beautiful babes (although the stunning Lynne Frederick unfortunately remains fully clothed). Director Robert Young ensures that the film is effectively creepy from start to finish, paying special attention to the scenes featuring the bizarre circus folk, which prove to be genuinely freaky (the dwarf, with his evil grin and painted face, is particularly disturbing). Occasionally the film suffers from some poor special effects, and the odd spot of hammy acting, but this does not detract from one's enjoyment (on the contrary, they actually made the whole experience more fun for me). Best watched at night, with the curtains drawn, lights out, and accompanied by a big box of popcorn, this solidly entertaining vampire yarn is well worth checking out.

This is part of Hammer Films later output, when they finally figured out they could put nudity in their movies instead of just implied sexuality What you have is sort of a confused mess of a story where a bunch of villagers kill off their Vampire Count, who swears revenge before they blow up his castle. His human mistress goes off to find his cousin, and for some reason, she gave birth to two vampire twins who are fully grown 15 years later. (One of them played by Doctor Who's Lalla Ward.) So apparently, these villagers don't think anything is strange about a circus showing up and people mysteriously disappearing or dying in their midst. So some nudity, some gore, some nice Hammer stylistic visuals, but lacking the gravitas that Cushing and Christopher Lee usually brought to these things.

Hammer Films and the Rank Organisation bottomed out with this bloody awful vampire flick peddling death and disease in the 19th century. Residents of a plague-ridden town in Serbia, perhaps under the curse of a slain vampire speared 15 years ago, welcomes a caravan of kinky gypsy performers and their animals who have mysteriously pierced the blockade. Turns out these entertainers are relatives of the dead Count, and have arrived to exact his revenge on those who killed him as well as their children. Ugly-looking picture has acquired a following in the last few years, perhaps due to the casting of Dave (David) Prowse--Darth Vader from "Star Wars"--as a silent strongman. It has an unusual ambiance, but one that doesn't translate to either suspense or scares. * from ****

When the population of a small village decides to invade the castle of the Count Mitterhaus (Robert Tayman), who is a vampire that is killing the local children, the villagers and their families are cursed by him. His mistress escapes to the rage of the locals, hides the count's body in a cave and fifteen years later, she returns with a circus owned by the count's cousin and also vampire Emil (Anthony Higgings), to fulfill the count's prophecy and bring him back to life. "Vampire Circus" is a very reasonable vampire movie from Hammer. There are some nudity, the story is not bad, but John Moulder-Brown and Anthony Higgings are horrible and almost spoil the film. These two ham actors make many situations very funny with their movements, grimaces and expressions. Anyway, I am a fan of Hammer studios and I liked this very low-budget movie, which does not spare the children or other lead characters. There are also some attractive erotic scenes, such as the dance of the tiger-woman, or the initial scene of Count Mitterhaus and his lover in bed. My vote is six. Title (Brazil): "O Circo dos Vapiros"("The Vampires Circus")

This eminently watchable Hammer movie has barely a dull moment. that's different from the other films in the genre in more ways than one : (1) Unlike most other well-known bloodsuckers of the films who invariably 'turn' their young female victims regardless of whether they have seduced them or not(notably Dracula and Mircalla), Count Mitterhaus, the lead vampire does not get his cravings for 'blood and the flesh' mixed which is probably why he preys exclusively on young children. He,in fact, puts off feasting on the child's blood till he has finished having passionate sex with pretty Anna("one lust feeds the other"---his own words !).Of course, he might have his reasons --- one suspects he has been using Anna as a kind of 'female Renfield'. Apart from sleeping with him, she was to lure the unsuspecting children to the castle of her vampire lover. Sounds very human though definitely evil.One wonders if he has other plans for her in case she failed in her duty though... (2) While the other 'chief' vampires exude an aura of power and dangerous attractiveness ,Mitterhaus is rather plain, if not downright ugly. He clearly lacks the looks or the roguish charms to be attractive to women. It, therefore is a mystery why Anna fell for him and did his bidding--- he must have cast a spell on her using his supernatural powers or has impressed her with his sexual prowess or, both. He even fights the assorted villagers with a sword and a knife ---- that too makes him look more human than undead. His cousin,Emil is, however, a more true-to-type vampire. (3)The vampires have traditionally been assumed to be able to change into bats, wolves or rats, but the shape-shifters here seem to turn into almost any animal including a black panther which prowls the countryside at times. This adds an exotic touch. (4)Apart from the Count's tomb, graveyards or coffins are conspicuous by their absence. (5)Mitterhaus, in his dying breath, asks Anna to inform Emil of his death. Vampires, as a rule(as seen in the movies), use human agents only to contact other humans to get things done in the daytime without arousing anyone's suspicion. (6)Though the usual mix of bloodsucking and eroticism is there(sex was made an integral part of vampire flicks by the horror film-makers from the Continent and everyone else had to fall in line) the highly steamy sequences pass off quickly enough to keep up with the frenetic pace of the story. All things considered, a superbly entertaining film with some interesting points that gets better with subsequent viewing!

A woman leads a child into a vampire's home, and her husband rallies the villagers to finally do something about the vampire. They kills the vampire Count, but the vampire swears revenge. Years later, vampires are mostly forgotten as the village deals with a disease that has them shut off from the rest of the world by roadblocks that shoot at anyone trying to come in or out. A circus arrives "to take the coins from dead men's eyes." "The Circus of Nights! A hundred delights!" shouts the barker/clown little person. In the circus are male/female psychic twin vampire tumblers who turn into bats in their act (which curiously doesn't revive the villagers' concerns about vampires), a vampire tumbler who can turn into a panther who is the Count's cousin, a gypsy woman, a mute strongman, the little person, a tiger, a monkey, and perhaps a couple others. One act involves a * bald woman in feline body paint, an odd act for the mixed company with children in this period piece, I thought. There's also a mysterious tent called "The Mirror of Life." Not everyone in the circus is a vampire, but the humans are under the vampires' control. The villagers, of course, don't realize that there are vampires, but we the audience know since the Count mentioned it. Some people try to leave the town to get medical help, others try to flee but now have the vampires to contend with along with the roadblocks. The vampires prey on the villagers and try to revive the count. This is a fairly good vampire movie, typical Hammer fare with some nudity, blood and gore, nice colorful sets, and good acting. Nevertheless, it didn't really capture me, perhaps because the story was just too simple and predictable.

One of the much better Hammer movies, this keeps going really well until right before the end, when there is a rather lame chase/fight that looked as if it came out of the school playground. However, this starts in startling form with much blood and nudity, to say nothing of an even more startling child abduction/murder. An isolated village is suffering both from the plague and from 'sins of the fathers'. Basically a vampire is p***ed off that he was 'killed' and swears revenge. This is effected largely with the use of a visiting circus and gives the film a tremendous boost. People and animals turn into each other and a dance by the tiger/lady is, as they say, worth the price of admission alone. Super well paced sexy, bloody horror, complete with campy performance from, you know who, before he played Darth Vader.

... And you'll find a pretty good story in there It's interesting to note that just about everyone on this page enjoyed VAMPIRE CIRCUS . I can take or leave horror movies especially ones involving vampires because they're self limiting , ( I mean how scary is a person with false teeth ? ) and for much of this movie we're treated to some substandard production values typical of Hammer studios in the early 1970s , the circus arena is supposed to be in the open air but is obviously filmed on an interior film set , the editing and special effects are really poor , there's a sequence with villagers being thrashed to death with a rug ( Well that's what it looked like to me ) while the cast are very uneven with John Moulder-Brown as Anton being just about the most unlikely hero I've ever seen in a horror movie . Oh and there's plenty of scenes with people with false teeth like those ones you buy at a joke shop But... ...despite all this VAMPIRE CIRCUS is a very entertaining horror movie . I don't know if it's because I've seen too many smart ass post modernist American horror flicks recently but a story featuring a Central European village being cut off from the outside world because of plague and its inhabitants being killed one by one by a bunch of vengeful vampires appeals to me more than a self referrential story set in 21st century America . In fact many of the killings are paedophillic murders so this gives the movie a disturbingly adult strength in what could easily be dismissed as a silly movie

By about 1970, the fortunes of Hammer Studios were bleak. Despite a long string of cool horror films, the studio was deeply in debt and appeared ready to fold unless something happened..and fast. So what did they do to try to prevent the inevitable? They sexed up the films! As a result, the previously gory but innocent films were soon peppered with lots of very gratuitous nudity in the hope that these nudie monster films would attract a wider audience. In actuality, my assumption is that it did the opposite and the studio closed its doors soon after this change. Perhaps they should have just considered diversifying into some other genres. Regardless, it's all academic now. I mentioned all this because "Vampire Circus" is one of the best examples of this new Hammer film--one with lots of boobies and a distinctly adult flair. So despite this is it worth seeing? Read on... The film begins with a long-haired and hip looking male vampire killing a child as his naked girlfriend watches and enjoys the bloodshed. Soon, however, villagers attack and the vampire has his heart pierced with the 'ol wooden stake. The nasty girlfriend remains alive and the dying vampire gives her some instructions and his heart-broken love runs off in response to his request. My question is this....WHY, if she loved him so, didn't she just pull the stake out and bring him back to life?!?! I mean, I've seen this in several other vampire movies...and you'd think she'd give it a try!! However, violating previous vampire movie lore is certainly NOT unusual--and it happens all the time (such as sparkly daytime vampires who drink animal blood in "Twilight"). In the next scene, a traveling circus troop arrives in same small town. After you see them perform the naked green tiger dance (in which an almost completely naked green-painted skull-capped lady performs simulated sex acts on her male partner), you wonder why it wasn't titled "Vampire Sex Circus"! In fact, the whole monster and vampire angle of this film seems almost irrelevant to the circus and the film in its time was probably seen as a soft-core porno film (though by today's standards it's somewhat tame). I am not a total prude, but just felt the horror aspect was all but forgotten. Soon after, bad things naturally start to occur--with the villagers turning up dead--sometimes after having been torn apart by animals--complete with lots of red paint and some cheap looking corpses and mixed body parts. Apparently the old dead vampire is ticked and cousin and his company of sick friends are helping him exact his revenge. So what's the verdict? Is it worth seeing? Well, if you don't want to see a lot of skin, you should definitely skip this one. As for the rest, it certainly is not as good as the earlier Hammer films and seemed a bit disjoint. It's not a terrible film--just not among their better ones. It definitely falls in the category of "see this one if you've already seen the rest"! I have a few last observations. Perhaps the vampire boss was over-compensating in this film as his fangs were the longest I can recall having seen--even longer than Nosferatu's long buck-teeth. I guess this emphasis on length makes sense in a porno sort of film!! Also, the very young looking Dora was played by Lynne Frederick--last wife of Peter Sellers and later wife of David Frost. She had a rather brief film career and died very young due to substance abuse. Sad.