Freaks (1932)

Freaks, the 1932 film by Tod Browing, is a masterpiece of cinema, all the more interesting because it featured actual circus sideshow performers in the film. It was considered a horror film at the time, and is still listed that way today.

From Metafilter:

Tod Browning's 1932 cinematic masterpiece Freaks tells the story of a close-knit group of circus sideshow workers who are wronged and take revenge. The film's use of real-life freaks so disturbed audiences that some ran screaming from theaters, distributors refused to handle the film, and it was banned in Britain for over 30 years.

Audience feedback at preview screenings and changes demanded by censors meant that 30 minutes of "repulsive elements" in the original cut were removed or replaced. A lengthy text prologue was hastily added and at least three different endings were tried, none completely satisfactory. Even with these changes, all designed to minimize the grotesque and disturbing impact of the film, audiences of the day did not accept it. MGM finally withdrew it at a loss of some $164,000.

Today, critics are more likely to praise the audacious aesthetic and philosophical lengths to which Browning goes to challenge the way we define beauty and abnormality or even parse it as a distorted symbol of the Hollywood studio system Browning worked under.

Freaks was (loosely) based on the short story Spurs by Tod Robbins.

Here is the whole film.



For a better quality image, the whole film (in sections) is also at YouTube:

Full movie: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (These Youtube links have noticeably better picture and sound quality than the Google Video version linked above; the Google Video version has the text prologue missing in Youtube version.)

Tags: Freaks, Tod Browning, circus, horror, films, culture, history, beauty, abnormality, Spurs, Tod Robbins