Berserk! (1967)

Berserk! (UK, 1967) 96 min color DIR: Jim O’Connolly. PROD: Herman Cohen. SCR: Herman Cohen, Aben Kandel. MUSIC: John Scott. DOP: Desmond Dickinson. CAST: Joan Crawford, Ty Hardin, Diana Dors, Michael Gough, Judy Geeson, Robert Hardy, Milton Reid. (Columbia)

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As far as circus-themed horror goes, Berserk! has a more adult tone than the endearingly naive romantic tragedy of Gorilla at Large, yet still does not reach the perverse flamboyance of Circus of Horrors, but its bitchy screenplay lifts this melodrama from its otherwise uninspired execution. And as an entry of the era’s “hag horror” subgenre, Berserk! neither reaches the sublime pleasures of What’s The Matter With Helen, nor stoops to the nadir of Flesh Feast, but Joan Crawford (still looking pretty good, flashing her gams at age 60) has little to be ashamed of, since she mostly spends time reacting, as the hapless Monica Rivers, whose circus is besieged by mysterious deaths of its performers. 

Perhaps producer, co-writer Herman Cohen sees the irony that most of these people aren’t worth saving, as backstage, they all cheat and lie. The major characters all have shady pasts and unrequited lust for others, or put prestige before human life. Indeed, echoing Ms. Rivers’ cold sentiment that these gruesome deaths have actually been good for ticket sales, the film may be intended as a sarcastic metaphor of the exploitation movie business itself (Death=Profit), from a man who would certainly know (ie- Horrors of the Black Museum, his notorious Grand Guignol from a previous season). Its dependable cast of familiar faces brings out the worst in their characters: the hunky new tightrope artist (Ty Hardin) is escaping to Britain from murder charges in Toronto (oh sure, it’s always Canada’s fault); the circus showgirl (a wonderfully nasty Diana Dors) betrays her drunken husband by throwing herself at any new piece of meat; Rivers’ business partner (Michael Gough- in his fourth Herman Cohen film, showing up just long enough to get a spike in the forehead) is her willing sex slave.

The horrific moments are few and far between, and the pace is lethargic (padded with too much stock footage and circus acts that now seem insensitive in our more enlightened age), but the film works best with the relish in which its capable cast spits out the venomous dialogue. (Even the typical hipsters who come to revival screenings to make fun of everything gradually shut up and listened to it.) Forget knives and ropes- these people could easily kill each other with words. They easily rescue this insidious little scenario from its cardboard production and uninspired direction. (Not coincidentally, these liabilities also work against the nasty potential of director Jim O’Connolly’s subsequent Tower of Evil.)

This film is also interesting in its dichotomous feeling of being stuck between two eras. It is an outdated model of the previous decade’s trend of American leads headlining a distinctly English genre film (we are made to overlook that giddy Judy Geeson is playing Joan Crawford’s starstruck daughter!), replete with bobbies and a baroquely dapper Scotland Yard detective (Robert Hardy) investigating the crimes. Because it was made just before one could show more onscreen explicit content, the sexual depravity can only exist beneath the surface. 

Berserk! is memorable largely for the panache of its cast, and for the bizarre sequence in which the circus’ resident dwarf, bearded lady and strong man (Milton Reid, a co-star in many Italian pepla) do a sing song (!), perhaps suggesting that these people are the happiest of all that we encounter, as the more decidedly “normal” looking characters harbour and create misery. It’s an uncommon and thought-provoking touch to a scenario that deserves better than its tawdry production.