Freaks

Freaks

DOWNLOAD >> https://cinurl.com/2tkk7F

Filmed in Los Angeles in the fall of 1931, some employees at MGM were discomfited by the presence of the actors portraying the \"freaks\" on set, and, other than the so-called more normal looking \"freaks\", the Siamese twins and the Earles, the performers were not allowed to be on the studio lot, relegated instead to a specially-built tent.[7] The film had test screenings in January 1932, with many members of the audience reacting negatively, finding the film too grotesque. In response to this, MGM executive Irving Thalberg, without consent of director Browning, edited the original 90-minute feature, which was significantly cut, with additional alternate footage incorporated to help increase the running time. The final abridged cut of the film, released in February 1932, was 64 minutes; the original version no longer exists.

Hans, enamored of Cleopatra, ultimately marries her. At their wedding, Cleopatra begins poisoning Hans's wine but drunkenly kisses Hercules in front of Hans, revealing her affair. Oblivious, the other \"freaks\" announce that they accept Cleopatra in spite of her being a \"normal\" outsider; they hold an initiation ceremony in which they pass a loving cup around the table while chanting, \"We accept her, one of us. We accept her, one of us. Gooble-gobble, gooble-gobble.\"[12] However, Cleopatra's mean-spirited amusement at this ceremony soon turns into fear and anger after Hercules jokes that the rest of the entertainers plan to turn her into one of them. She mocks them, tosses the wine in their faces and drives them away before berating Hans and drunkenly parading him around on her shoulders like a child. The humiliated Hans realizes that he has been played for a fool and rejects Cleopatra's attempts to apologize, but then he falls ill from the poison. While bedridden, Hans pretends to apologize to Cleopatra and also pretends to take the poisoned medicine that she is giving him, but he secretly plots with the other entertainers to strike back at Cleopatra and Hercules.

The freaks then capture Cleopatra and sometime later, she is shown to be a grotesque, squawking \"human duck\" on display for carnival patrons; her tongue has been removed, one eye has been gouged out, the flesh of her hands has been melted and deformed to look like duck feet, her legs have been cut off, and what is left of her torso has been permanently tarred and feathered. In the original version of the film, it is revealed that after the freaks caught Hercules, they made him into a castrato singer.

Film critic Melvin Matthews has interpreted Freaks within the context of the Great Depression, writing that it \"is essentially a story of the little people (average Americans) versus the big people (the rich and businessmen). The film makes it clear that the big people, personified by Cleopatra and Hercules, scorn the Freaks. Such a disdainful attitude was reflected in the real-life social outlook of some business tycoons during the Depression.\"[13] Film studies academic Jennifer Peterson similarly identifies Freaks as an example of an \"outsider film\".[14] Historian Jane Nicholas suggests that the film's conclusion, in which the circus performers mutilate Cleopatra whilst chanting \"one of us,\" is reinforcing the freaks' social currency: \"It is interesting that a statement that reads as one of inclusion is often cited as one that embodies horror in the film. What does it mean to be 'one of us' The chilling horror of the chant 'one of us' reveals why the freak show persists.\"[15]

The film's depiction of people with disabilities has been a significant point of analysis amongst film critics and scholars.[18][19] In his book Subversive Horror Cinema: Countercultural Messages of Films from Frankenstein to the Present (2014), critic Jon Towlson proposes that Freaks exemplifies an anti-eugenics sentiment.[18] In presenting this idea, Towlson cites vignette sequences that make up the beginning of the film, largely consisting of the freaks in the context of their sideshow, before Browning \"begins to undercut the voyeuristic aspects of the traditional freakshow by showing the freaks engaged in the activities of everyday life, dispelling the initial shock and revulsion, and encouraging the viewer to see the freaks as individuals who have overcome their disabilities.\"[20]

Among the supporting characters featured as \"freaks\" were Peter Robinson (\"The Human Skeleton\"); Olga Roderick (\"The Bearded Lady\");[41] Frances O'Connor and Martha Morris (\"armless wonders\");[42] and the conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton.[34] Among the microcephalic characters who appear in the film (and are referred to as \"pinheads\" throughout) were Zip and Pip (Elvira and Jenny Lee Snow) and Schlitzie, a male named Simon Metz who wore a dress.[43]

Tod Browning, I loved him. He say, \"I want to make a picture with you, Olga Baclanova... Now I show you with whom you are going to play. But don't faint.\" I say, \"Why should I faint\" So he takes me and shows me all the freaks there. First I meet the midget and he adores me because we speak German and he's from Germany. Then he shows me the girl that's like an orangutan; then a man who has a head but no legs, no nothing, just a head and a body like an egg. Then he shows me a boy who walks on his hands because he was born without feet. He shows me little by little and I could not look. I wanted to cry when I saw them. They have such nice faces, but it is so terrible... Now, after we start the picture, I like them all so much.[48]

Film critic Mark Kermode awarded the film four out of five stars in a 2015 review, noting that, \"today, Browning's sympathies are clear; if there are 'freaks' on display here, they are not the versatile performers to whom the title seems to allude.\"[79] Film theorist and critic Andrew Sarris echoed this sentiment, proclaiming Freaks \"one of the most compassionate films ever made.\"[9] Ed Gonzalez of Slant Magazine wrote in a 2003 retrospective that the film's moral significance has often been obscured by critical attention to its more shocking elements, noting that this \"seriously underplay[s] the film's blistering humanity and the audacious aesthetic and philosophical lengths to which Browning goes to challenge the way we define beauty and abnormality.\"[80]

Freaks is now widely considered among director Browning's best films.[84][85] The film's growing esteem among critics traces back to the early 1960s, when it was rediscovered as a counterculture cult film, particularly among European audiences.[74][75] It was screened at the 1962 Venice Film Festival, and shortly after was shown for the first time in the United Kingdom, having been banned there since 1932.[74] Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, the film was regularly shown at midnight movie screenings in the United States.[74] It also enjoyed a critical reappraisal in France during this period,[74] as, according to Hawkins, Browning had achieved a \"certain Poe-esque stature among French intellectuals.\"[86] Critic Derek Malcolm noted in 1999 that the film is \"one of the masterpieces of baroque cinema,\" and a \"damning antidote to the cult of physical perfection and an extraordinary tribute to the community of so-called freaks who made up its cast.\"[87]

Today, many critics debate whether or not \"Freaks\" is an exploitative product of its time or actually sympathetic towards the sideshow characters. It spotlights persons with all sorts of disabilities such as dwarfism (the siblings Harry and Daisy Earles), sacral agenesis (Johnny Eck), conjoined twins (Daisy and Violet Hilton), microcephaly (Schlitzie), and more. Yet at the same time, the film contains terrifying scenes where the \"freaks\" are portrayed as the horrifying aggressors. How then do we interpret the film's storied history and representation of disability

Tod Browning brought his own adventures as a circus performer to \"Freaks\"; starting at 16, he was a roustabout, barker, contortionist, and clown. Instead of casting non-disabled actors and using makeup or special effects, Tod Browning wanted to use the kind of persons with disabilities that he knew from his work experience and childhood fascination with carnivals. This comfortability allowed him to establish a good working relationship with the \"freaks\" ensemble.

In the film, the \"freaks\" band together as outcasts from society, forming their own makeshift family. Despite being able-bodied and conventionally beautiful, they declare Cleopatra as \"one of us\" because they believe she is a sympathetic friend and truly in love with Hans. Eventually, they discover her plot to murder Hans and her affair with Hercules, another employee of the carnival.

Cleopatra escapes to the forest and in one of the film's most horrifying shots, the \"freaks\" crawl after her beneath Hans' overturned wagon, their bodies wriggling in the pouring rain. What makes this scary is the way it is shot, not because it depicts persons with disabilities. The combination of the stark shadows and the thick mud make it difficult to see what's coming, and the only sound we hear is the storm and Cleopatra's terrified screaming. It's unsettling to imagine being chased by someone with so much vengeful anger.

There is a fade to black after the \"freaks\" capture Cleopatra and in the next scene we see she has been transformed into a squawking \"human duck\" on display for carnival patrons; her tongue has been removed, one eye has been gouged out, the flesh of her hands has been melted and deformed to look like duck feet, her legs have been cut off, and what is left of her torso has been permanently tarred and feathered. It's a spine-tingling image that burns into your brain.

The ending is a double-edged sword. \"Freaks\" shows how Cleopatra is cold and malicious towards the sideshow entertainers and we can empathize with them wanting to retaliate. It's understandable that they want to protect their loved one and themselves from further ostracization. On the other hand, this ending frames the \"freaks\" as violent and scary just because they look different and could make someone else look different, too. 59ce067264

https://www.smadlfire.com/group/smadl-group/discussion/7c5ec00e-7afb-44f7-ae30-9a62df13770a