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Vampire Circus is a Hammer vampire film, separate from their extremely over-rated Dracula series.  I was hoping Hammer could pull it together with this film and have at least one decent vampire movie.  Maybe they did, but it wasn't with Vampire Circus.

The movie starts out very strongly.  Anna, a human thrall, has brought her vampire master, Count Mitterhaus, a little girl to eat.  Disturbingly, she brings the girl to Count Mitterhaus's bedroom to introduce her to him.  Even more disturbingly, Mitterhaus makes a grand production of feeling the little girl up before giving her one of the most sexualized vampire-bitings I've ever seen in a movie.  While this is going on, Anna is so aroused she starts to touch herself and strip out of her clothes while Mitterhaus is putting the bite on the little girl.  Then, after the little girl is dead, Mitterhaus is so horny he and Anna go at it.  Wow!  But we're not done yet.  A lynch mob from the nearby town of Stetl shows up to kill Mitterhaus, and he effortlessly slaughters almost all of them.  He is only defeated - and even then narrowly so - due to an act of carelessness on his own part.  But -- Mitterhaus is not truly defeated, he merely goes into hibernation and leaves Anna with instructions to seek out his cousin Emil, who will know how to resurrect him.

So, we have one of the most debauched vampires you're likely to find outside of a porno movie and he also comes off as a real badass.  Compare the one-sided ass-whooping Mitterhaus hands out to the lynch mob against poor Count Dracula's mostly pitiful showings against the human heroes in his movies.  The intro is enough to make you think Vampire Circus is going to be something truly special.

About fifteen years later, Stetl is suffering from a plague of boils.  The town doctor leaves for the capitol, hoping that perhaps he can get help there.  Later that very day, a circus arrives in town.  There's a gypsy fortune teller, a strongman, a dwarf, brother and sister acrobats, and a man named ... Emil.  This is indeed the Emil that Mitterhaus sent Anna to fetch, the gypsy woman is Anna herself, and the acrobat twins are Anna's kids (which by implication means they're also Mitterhaus's kids).  The strongman and the dwarf are human thralls.  The vampires waste no time in killing off the surviving members of the mob that sent Mitterhaus into repose, and they also start preying upon the Stetl teenagers to get the blood necessary to resurrect Mitterhaus.

Vampire Circus does have some good things to recommend it.  It has that intro, for one thing, and Count Mitterhaus is easily the best vampire lord I've seen in a Hammer film.  It strikes a good balance between young people in peril and stodgy old men facing down timeless evil.  It's got plenty of pure, 70s-style sleaze.  The simple camera and editing tricks used to convey the vampires' superhuman abilities are well done (except for a bat turning transparent against the background in one shot).

Unfortunately, Vampire Circus also has plenty of problems.  The movie feels as though it's missing a few scenes, almost like it wasn't quite finished.  Maybe that's actually the case; Hammer wasn't doing well financially in the early 70s.  Not much is made of the plague, which really ought to have gotten more attention.  The fact that Anna has borne Mitterhaus's kids is left entirely by the wayside.  The vampires are also idiots.  If the mere sight of the cross is enough to cause them immense pain, they ought to know better than to attack someone inside a chruch!  Also, the Hammer rule where any object with a "+" somewhere on it is close enough to a crucifix to repel vampires is in full effect here.  That one really, really bugs me.

*major spoilers here*

Now, all of that I could forgive.  However, I simply cannot forgive them for the way they kill off Count Mitterhaus.  Yes, he does come back.  Just when I was gearing up for a bleak, 70s-nihilistic ending, one of the village youths put that damned "any + is good enough" rule into effect and killed him effortlessly.  Screw you, Hammer.  You don't create the best vampire in your entire cycle of vampire movies and kill him off as an afterthought.

I'm a big fan of Hammer films-I've wanted to see this one for years!
Also need to see LUST FOR A VAMPIRE and TWINS OF EVIL as well.
I like the idea behind it-and the fact that the vampires can turn into animals beyond bats and wolves.

I started watching that a while back but I must have been in the wrong mood or something because I turned it off halfway through.  I usually love Hammer horror and I'll definitely have to give it another try one of these days.

VAMPIRE CIRCUS is one of those movies that has eluded me all my life.  I've always wanted to see it, but never had the opportunity.

Me three!

This is one that I've never managed to see. FM used to run some really intriguing photos from it.

I love the Hammer films but truthfully most of the 70s ones are something of a mess. Still, this sounds better than DRACULA AD 1972 and THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA.

The whole "If it resembles a cross it will repel/kill vampires" bit was really goofy, particularly when the shadow of a widmill vaporized the bampire in BRIDES OF DRACULA. Hammer did get away from this in one of the Christopher Lee Dracula movies (can't recall offhand which one. DRACULA HAS RISEN FROM THE GRAVE, maybe?) where a measly stake throught the heart won't even kill Dracula, you have to say a prayer to finish him. Turns out the hero is an Atheist!

Just found this: Here's a link where you can watch the whole darn thing on Google Video!

 VAMPIRE CIRCUS (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7269775409488583954#)

THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA had a few good scenes, an interesting premise and some top notch 70's goofiness, but that ending! It was worse than Vampire Circus'.

Oh, dear, Mr. Akiraturbo, but I do feel sorry about your "vastly over-rated" comments business about Hammer vampires - Not that I could convert you, as you've made up your mind, but I love them all - They all had access to the vast treasury of The Old Vic Theatre in London for props and costumes.  The results were delivered with verve, by those who had a classical background.  They have panache, lurid lighting, and deep commitment on the part of those involved.  How very sad it is that you cannot enjoy this wonderfully showy stuff - and yet you frequent here .  . . why?
peter j.

I've seen this on TV several times, and I've always liked it. Holding, that with "Captain Kronos," another vampire film from Hammer, they are the two best vampire films that came out in the decade of the '70s.

Part of the fascination is not only the film's flirting with the subject of pedophilia, in the death of several of the children in the film, but, as far as I know, it is the first vampire film to hint at the subject of beastiality, as one of the female film characters seems to have an attraction to the circus panther in the film.

And yes, it was a rush job. They were running out of money towards the end of the film, so they had to rush the ending. It would be interesting to see what they could have done if they had enough money to do the ending correctly.