She Freak

A waitress who has dreams of a better life decides she'd have more fun working for a traveling carnival. Weird choice for a better life, but whatever. Once there, it isn't long before she's courting the rich owner of the carnival freak show. After marrying him, she carries on an affair with the ferris wheel operator behind his back. Everything ends badly for all involved.

This is a pretty poor attempt at a remake of Freaks. Instead of actual character development, the film feels content to give us countless scenes via musical montage. The entire courtship between the lead and the freak show guy is a wordless series of scenes set to music. We also have several lengthy scenes of the carnival being set up and then even more of it being taken down. This is sort of neat to see, but it takes up way too much time. The pointless scenes don't stop there, as we also get a cheesy fight midway through. One guy gets a screwdriver through the hand, which would seem pretty serious, but there are no repercussions.

Leading lady, Claire Brennen (who unfortunately passed away ten years after this film), was actually quite good in the movie. The ending is decent too as the freaks have their revenge and we see what's become of her. I was really surprised to read that Claire had a romantic relationship with the actor who played the sideshow midget that her character is so disgusted by in the film. Good for them.

The film itself is absolutely nothing to write home about. For a better freak-oriented movie, check out Jack Cardiff's The Freakmaker.