“Vampires exist only in legends. The imaginings of sick and diseased minds... nowhere else!”

Circuses, eh? Including them in a film is always a guarantee of quality (ahem). So it’s hardly surprising that Hammer films, desperate to find a way to re-invigorate their vampire franchise without having the pay the wages of Messrs Cushing and Lee, came up with this. Vampire Circus is definitely NOT the result of a board meeting chaired by a man who said something on the lines of: “Oh my god! How are we going to pay the bills? Quick! I need ideas! You – Derek! Sorry, David! Give me an idea, now! No! Not twins, you stupid fucking idiot! We did twins last year! For fuck’s sake my fucking job’s on the line, here! I hope your entire family dies, Derek, you waste of skin. You! Clive! Idea, now! LESBIANS AGAIN? You’re fired! Ohmygod ohmygod, what are we going to do? What are we going to fucking do? Stop crying, Sheila! If you’re not part of the solution you’re part of the problem!” etc.

No, that definitely never happened. Because otherwise, Vampire Circus wouldn’t be the benchmark of intelligent writing, expensive production values and first-rate acting that it is.

Hang on…

In case you hadn’t realised, there’s a fair amount of sarcasm being employed here (yes, I know it doesn’t really work written down).

You may recall Vampire Circus as another late-flowering Hammer classic, but it really isn’t.

What it is, is a ragbag of half-thought-through ideas, off-screen violence, and massive logic vacuums. All held together by some admittedly half-decent performances (alongside some admittedly half-performances). Oh yes, and a handy circus set (or bits of one, at least).

It’s also very silly, often reminding the viewer-of-a-certain-age more of BBC children’s programme Rentaghost than of anything even remotely resembling a proper scary film.

There are many films of this ilk that can be saved by a revisionist view of what they were attempting to achieve on a tight budget, or how they paved the way for future classics. Vampire Circus is not one of these films.

It is packed full of admittedly entertaining scenes that unfortunately fall apart with even the minutest application of logic. Starting with the much-lauded pre-credits scene, which sees a bunch of terrified villagers attack the castle of the local vampire, Count Mitterhaus (Robert Tayman), muttering “he’s the count” and complaining he’ll have them all killed. This is the man who has been abducting and murdering their family members, presumably for generations, and who lives right on their doorstep. In a castle that’s remarkably easy to get into. With no-one else in attendance. Which prompts the question, “how exactly is he going to ‘have them all killed’?”. And, why didn’t they do this ages ago?

Especially when he himself proves remarkably easy to kill anyway. No amount of Mr Claypole-style disappearing-and-reappearing stops him from getting his just desserts. And in case you’re wondering what exactly has sparked all this mayhem, he does deserve it – having:

a.     Seduced the local schoolteacher’s wife;

b.     Used her to abduct and kill a small child;

c.     Cursed all-and-sundry to see the death of all their children as well.

He doesn’t do things by halves, this bloke. He is what you might describe as not just any count, but a complete and utter count.

And lo, we jumpeth forward 15 years to a time when aforementioned curse is in full effect, with the town “ravaged” by “plague”. Or at least that’s what we’re told, because apart from one visible case, everyone else seems to be getting on quite well, thank you. We’re told that the area has been quarantined whilst this terrible plague is scything its way through the populace. Armed guards are stationed at its borders, ordered to shoot anyone trying to escape. As a plot point this would make perfect sense, if it wasn’t for the weird border free-for-all that appears to be going on. Not only does a travelling circus rock up with no apparent problems, but we later find out that a bunch of devil-may-care students are enjoying a holiday there. Even a 15-year-old girl (Lynn Frederick), daughter of the aforementioned schoolteacher (Laurence Payne), manages to wander in past the blockade. Insert topical joke about border control here.

So when pragmatic, vampire-denying Doctor Kersh (Richard Owens) decides he needs to get to the big city to ask for help for the village, you’d think it would be a quick jaunt. Well, not exactly. The guards do actually kick into action at this point – probably because his “plan” appears to be to ignore the dense woodland that would offer plenty of cover, and instead ride his horse full tilt at them across an empty field. Whilst using his teenaged son to draw their fire.

Better still, once the doctor has escaped, his son just holds his hands up and says he’s going back the way he’s come, with no consequences.

But leaving aside all this border nonsense (as all sensible people should do, eh?), what of the circus? I mean, that’s what the film is called, after all. Well, just so you understand what’s going on, dear reader, it is led by a man called Emil (Anthony Higgins, one assumes not that one). Emil may or may not be (but is) Count Mitterhaus’ long lost cousin, come to revenge his sibling’s fate. 15 years on (vampires, terrible timekeepers). His vampire skill is the ability to turn into a panther (erm?). But to be fair, they did pick a panther who looks a bit like the actor. Or an actor who looks a bit like a rinky-dink panther. And he’s a panther who looks ravishing in pink. He really is a groovy cat. Eating gentlemen, and scholars, and has acrobats! He’s in a pink, a pink outfit, this rinky-dink panther, and it’s as plain as your nose, that he’s a vampire.

He is joined by a ragbag of “performers”, including an unnamed “gypsy woman” (Adrienne Corri) who may or may not be (but is) some kind of transformed version of the teacher’s wife from the pre-credits sequence. A moment here to remember Domini Blythe, who played Anna, the teacher, with a remarkable amount of gusto for someone wearing so little clothing in her scenes. The circus is here to “steal the money from dead man’s eyes”, which as taglines go, isn’t exactly a winner, but seems to work on the townspeople. They can’t get enough of it. Even when they start dying in ever gory ways. No telly, you see. What else are they going to do of an evening?

Now then, as you will recall, this is a town that has had its fair share of vampire history (three cheers for the synchronised reaction to the line “she’s been killed… by a vampire!” in the opening scenes). Yet the sight of bats transforming into acrobats doesn’t phase them at all. Or the idea that Emil can transform into a wild animal and back again.

Yet once the from-a-dead-man’s-eye penny does drop, do they take it out on the obvious vampires? No! Bizarrely they go for the chimp first, and then the token dwarf (Skip Martin) banging his head against a trailer until he’s very sad indeed.

And then it’s up to the children (Hiram Keller and Lynn Frederick) to deal with the menace, using every vaguely cross-shaped item within their grasp (FFS Hammer, please explain to me exactly why this would work? It literally makes no sense for a vampire to be terrified by anything that has a 90 degree intersection in it).

Yes, Vampire Circus is a terrible film. For every Adrienne Corri there’s a Thorley Walters, meaning we constantly veer from “trying very hard” to “not giving a shit”. It’s not scary, although it is quite violent (even so, the best bit of violence is the comedy off-screen slaughter of the students, who probably deserved it). But is it entertaining? Well, of course. There’s a lot to love, just don’t come expecting the “forgotten classic” you may see it described as.