Nightmare Circus (1974)
aka Terror Circus
aka Barn of the Naked Dead
Genre: Horror
Country: USA | Director: Alan Rudolph
Language: English | Subtitles: None
Aspect ratio: Widescreen 1.85:1 | Length: 84mn
Bdrip H264 Mp4 – 1920×1080 – 23.976fps – 1.60gb
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070445/
Three showgirls on their way to Las Vegas have car trouble and are stuck all night out in the desert. The next morning cheerful Andre offers them help in fixing their car. However, Andre is really a maniac with a lot of family problems; his mother ran out on him when he was a child so now he keeps kidnapped women chained up in his barn and trains them to perform circus tricks. Andre’s father is still around of course, but because the old homestead is next to a nuclear test site he has been transformed into a raving homicidal mutant that Andre keeps locked up in a shed.
A choice scuzzy chunk of hardcore nasty 70’s psycho exploitation horror sleaze. Director Alan Rudolph, who went on to helm such acclaimed art-house hits as “Welcome to L.A.,””Remember My Name,””Choose Me,” and “The Moderns,” does an expert job of creating and maintaining a grim, sordid, and unpleasant tone of seething madness and depravity. The raw, unflinching violence against women is genuinely brutal and ugly stuff; this picture reaches its skin-crawling nasty peak when Andre has a large boa constrictor wrap itself around one hapless lass. Moreover, we also get a decent smattering of tasty nudity and a handy helping of grisly gore.
E. Lynn’s rough, but fairly accomplished cinematography astutely captures the dingy, dusty, and desolate aura of the isolated desert location. Tommy Vig’s wonky, spacey, droning score likewise adds considerably to the overall harsh and unnerving quality of this resolutely foul-minded trash. Jennifer Ashley pops up as a traumatized mute hippie chick; she was mistreated by Prine some more in the even sleazier and hence better “The Centerfold Girls.” The groovy theme song “Evil Eyes” and the nihilistic bummer ending totally hit the slimy spot as well. A satisfyingly mean’n’grungy serving of vintage 70’s grindhouse junk.
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