Berserk! (1967)

Film: Berserk! (1967)
Stars: Joan Crawford, Ty Hardin, Diana Dors, Michael Gough, Judy Geeson
Director: Jim O'Connolly
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Occasionally you come across a film and realize that a certain modern movie or piece of art that you've been obsessing over was clearly an inspiration for the film.  That was my first reaction when I was watching Berserk!, a campy film from late in Joan Crawford's career when she was in her "Grande Dame Guignol" period.  The film, about a circus where random performers keep dying, seems like it was drawn right out of this season's American Horror Story, complete with the stoic bearded lady and the movie star ringmaster.  The problem for Berserk! is that it doesn't have enough knowledge of its own camp and enough sense to put most of its spotlight on its personal Elsa Mars, and so it falls flat when it should be a deliciously silly delight.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film is about a woman Monica Rivers (Crawford) who co-owns a circus with Dorando (Gough).  In the opening scene of the film, a tight rope walker randomly falls to his death, causing a panic in the circus as it appears to have been murder.  It also causes a record number of people to start coming out to the show, suddenly titillated by the prospect of potentially seeing someone murdered.  Monica and Dorando have differing ideas of what to do in this regard, with Monica intent on continuing the show while Dorando wants to close things down.

A new act suddenly appears on the scene when the tight-rope artist leaves, a handsome man named Frank (Hardin) who intrigues Monica both with his daring and his impressive physical prowess (Joan Crawford-eternally getting her man, even if there's a 25 year age gap between the two).  We also get the return of Monica's troublesome daughter Angela (Geeson) who wants to join the circus as well.  More murders ensue, with the eventual killer revealing herself in the stunningly and a-characteristically dramatic final act.

The film is easily at its best when it knows that it's being campy-that's kind of the point of a film like this.  It's never going to be great art (not even hiring Joan Crawford will ensure that), and it's not particularly scary (it's way too silly), so you should want to ratchet up the ridiculousness of the movie.  This is quite clear when we see, say, a ridiculously trampy magician's assistant like Matilda (Dors) throwing herself in vain at Frank, even though his loyalty lies with Monica (also, he's blackmailing her for part of the circus, so you know, money before sex, apparently).  It's less clear when we get the ludicrously bad ending, where the killer is revealed to be Angela, who wasn't even in the first half of the movie and is only killing so that she can get some attention from her mother.  Honestly-the entire film sets it up so that either Crawford or Hardin should have been the murderer, so it's a tad bit ridiculous that they didn't go with the easy answer here-the twist makes absolutely no sense.  The twist also makes the ending needlessly dramatic without any sort of comedy to it-Frank dies thanks to Angela killing him, Angela gets electrocuted by a random bolt of lightning, and then Monica goes to comfort her like she's Mildred Pierce trying to be martyr-of-the-year.

So the film is only occasionally fun, and as a result gets two-stars.  I do always admire the stamina and determination of someone like Joan Crawford when I see a film like this though.  This is a woman who, when she wasn't getting the parts she wanted from MGM, went out into Hollywood and started winning dance competitions in order to get a bigger name for herself, and once she became a major headliner in the late 1920's, she wasn't ever going to give that up.  Her 1960's period of filmmaking was principally in the horror genre after the massive success of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, which gave Crawford her third major bout of stardom, and she wasn't going to let crap scripts get in the way of the spotlight (it worked, too-this was a big hit in 1967).

I also want to comment on how bizarre the career of Ty Hardin was after this picture, since we're probably never going to get to him again (he was far more famous for his roles in television westerns than he was for his film work).  Despite essentially playing a himbo here and throughout most of his movie career, he eventually joined an arch-conservative group in the 1970's called the Arizona Patriots, a notoriously anti-semitic/anti-immigrant that wanted to bring "Christian patriots" back in charge of freedom in the country.  The FBI actually shut the entire organization down in the mid-80's since they were stockpiling weapons and Aryan pamphlets, but Hardin remains an activist for extreme-right causes (he's also been married eight times).

So, yes, a pretty silly movie with a pair of stars with decidedly different careers-what are your thoughts on Berserk!?  Do you like this period of Joan Crawford's career?  Do you think that the film would have gained by embracing the camp a bit more, or are you fine with where it ended up?  And did anyone else clearly see that Ryan Murphy appreciated this movie before making Freak Show?  Share your thoughts in the comments!