Film · TMDB
7.8A circus' beautiful trapeze artist agrees to marry the leader of side-show performers, but his deformed friends discover she is only marrying him for his inheritance.
Released: 1932-01-0164 minDir: Tod BrowningDrama, HorrorBudget: $310,607
▶ Watch trailerStream on: Bloodstream
Cast
- Harry Earles as Hans
- Olga Baclanova as Cleopatra
- Daisy Earles as Frieda
- Henry Victor as Hercules
- Wallace Ford as Phroso
- Leila Hyams as Venus
Themes
- infidelity
- dwarf
Article
Freaks (also re-released as The Monster Story, Forbidden Love, and Nature's Mistakes) is a 1932 American pre-Code drama horror film produced and directed by Tod Browning, starring Wallace Ford, Leila Hyams, Olga Baclanova, and Roscoe Ates.
Freaks, originally intended as a vehicle for Lon Chaney, is set amongst the backdrop of a travelling French circus and follows a conniving trapeze artist who joins a group of carnival sideshow performers with a plan to seduce and murder a dwarf in the troupe to gain his inheritance. However, her plot proves to have dangerous consequences. The film is based on elements from the short story "Spurs" by Tod Robbins, first published in Munsey's Magazine in February 1923, with the rights being purchased by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM). Cedric Gibbons, a childhood friend of Robbins and MGM art department chief, was responsible for the purchase.