El circo del terror

While the plot/acting/script was only mediocre, the footage of the actual Clyde Beatty Circus & its performers make this a better than average film. It is a very enjoyable film for this reason alone. The acting was not all that bad, just not top-grade. It is in color & cinemascope...rare for such low budget pictures. Rent it, I think you'll like it even if you never saw a circus under "the Big Top". As a child in the '40's, I got to see this circus many times, along with Barnum & Bailey's, so this brought back many fond childhood memories. What kid didn't want to be a lion tamer? 40 yrs later, I did get to try my hand at it...what a thrill even though I had too much fear of the cats to be successful...only did it twice. I did work several seasons with circuses as a trick shot, bullwhip & knife throwing artist...memories I will carry to my grave.

After being analyzed by three psychologists and considered schizophrenic with homicidal tendencies, the former ringmaster Dublin O'Malley (Sean McClory) subdues the guard that is escorting him to his room and escapes from the mental institution where he is interned. He travels by train and later he attacks a worker and swaps the clothing, throwing the man on the trail of an approaching train. Then he goes to the city where the Clyde Beatty Circus is camped, seeking revenge against the lion tamer Clyde Beatty and also seeking out his former lover, the trapeze artist Valerie St. Dennis (Marian Carr). Valerie is married with her mate Armand St. Dennis (John Bromfield), with whom they have a daughter. Dublin meets the alcoholic clown Twitchy (Emmett Lynn) and uses booze to force him to sabotage the circus. Then Dublin is hired by Frank Wallace (Pat O'Brien) to his former position. Frank also brings the writer Mickey Spillane and detective Jack Stang to investigate the sabotages and make clear to the superstitious performers that there is no jinx in the circus. When Dublin kills Twitchy, the smart investigators find evidences that he might be a maniac killer.

"Ring of Fear" is a weird and disappointing movie, with a forgettable story, many non-actors performing themselves and filmed in a circus. The result is a great circus show, but with a predictable weak plot and terrible performances. In the end, it is better off going to the circus than watching this flick. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "O Circo do Medo" ("The Circus of the Fear")

Although William A. Wellman took over the direction about halfway through, Ring of Fear (1954) offers middling entertainment at best. It's a "Hand me another shot of the same crowd" movie in which the premier pleasures are Sean McClory's charismatic performance as the maniacal ringmaster, and the circus acts themselves. But although these latter acts would seem a natural for CinemaScope, they are not as prominently featured as we would wish. We do see a lot of hardboiled crime writer Mickey Spillane though, and even more of Clyde Beatty, who is not slow to advertise himself. In the credits and the first few minutes of the film, his name is prominently displayed 28 times. Despite Beatty's fearless big cat taming, he is out-acted by less grand-standing members of the troupe, particularly Emmett Lynn and Pat O'Brien. Marian Carr makes a delectable heroine.

Well, say what you will about RING OF FEAR, it's certainly a novelty. First of all, the real "Star" is the Clyde Beatty Circus, which couldn't have purchased better advertising than this beautifully shot color and cinema-scope production, half of which must be the circus's best acts. A psycho is at loose in the circus, so the great crime writer Mickey Spillane, playing himself, is called in to investigate! Spillane himself calls in for a fellow investigator to help, and that guy poses as a magazine reporter. Pat O'Brien plays the manager of the circus, and Clyde Beatty himself also appears and does a number of lion and tiger-taming routines. Irish actor Sean McCrory, in an over-the-top performance, plays a one-time circus employee who became a stalker of a lady working at the circus and escapes from a mental institution to re-join the circus (and this is NOT a spoiler--all this is shown in the first few scenes), where he's accepted back as ringmaster. There's even comedy scenes with Batjac Productions regular Pedro Gonzalez-Gonzalez! My favorite scene is one where Mickey Spillane shows up at the circus and runs into the uncredited comic master Vince Barnett, who is reading Spillane novels on the job all day and explains to Spillane himself how his productivity has gone down so much due to Mick's novels! Mick then produces his newest one, hot of the press, and hands it to Barnett, who almost salivates over it! There's not much "mystery" here since we know exactly how each crime is committed, and we only get to know about a half dozen employees of the circus at all, so obviously the suspect pool from which Spillane and assistant have to choose isn't really that large. No, what makes the film entertaining is the circus setting, the idea of Mickey Spillane playing himself, and the colorful performances. Pat O'Brien (no relation to the bar or the TV gossip host) could play a role like this in his sleep, but he still has the gruff authenticity that makes him so watchable and loved by audiences for decades. Spillane comes off as an amiable and sarcastic yet tough guy. Sean McCrory, the "human star" of the film (the circus itself being the main star), chews the scenery and one wonders how ANYONE would not instantly think he was guilty of SOMETHING. This film will no doubt get a large audience through its being included in the new box set JOHN WAYNE'S SUSPENSE COLLECTION, which contains four Batjac Productions (see also my review of MAN IN THE VAULT, also in the package). It's a fascinating curio that's worth watching once, and may have some camp appeal for future viewings. As a Spillane fan, I'm happy to see the master in anything, so I may well watch it again. The transfer is superb on the DVD with rich colors and fine widescreen composition. One can only imagine how beautiful and awesome the circus scenes were on a large 1950's movie screen.

In some ways this is s standard "formula" mystery. Yet it's a very interesting and off beat film in other respects. A young Mickey Spillane; looking like a near clone of Sean Penn; plays himself as a rather inept detective.

The action takes place in the real Clyde Beatty Circus, where a homicidal maniac is on the loose. Clyde Beatty, who also plays himself, was perhaps the most skilled animal trainer of all time and in the 40s and 50s ran his own circus, a serious competitor to Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey. The best parts of the film (at least from my perspective) were closeups of him performing with lions and tigers, often several at a time. You can actually see the highly specific and technical body poses and behaviors he uses to control multiple animals that would love to tear him to pieces. A fascinating peek into the psyches of large carnivores.

Entertaining and quite out of the ordinary.