CIRCUS OF FEAR - Johnny Douglas - "Three Just Men" (1966)

"Circus Of Fear" or "Psycho-Circus" as it's known in one of it's other incarnations, is based on a novel by Dungeon Hero Edgar Wallace, entitled "The Three Just Men," and is a crazy story with enough twists and turns to keep Chubby Checker or Mario Andretti happy!! The theme music is quite MOR, but that might have something to do with the fact that composer Johnny Douglas was the music director on a boatload of those "Living Strings" records that RCA cranked out in the 60's and 70's!! Want to check out more of Johnny's work, go to any thrift store, and you'll find them right next to all those TJB records!! Here's the real surprise, Johnny also provided music for a number of TV shows in the 80's like "Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends", "The Incredible Hulk", "Dungeons & Dragons", "G.I. Joe", AND 98 episodes of "Transformers!" Put that in your "Living Strings" and smoke it!!

Because it's an Edgar Wallace tale, there's going be a lot of rationalizing, so you get a whole lot of scenes like these with Leo Genn as Elliott putting the pieces together!!

This German poster gave the viewer a good idea of what's going on, and because he was so popular in Europe, Edgar's credit is right at the top!

Nothing says lovin' like smokin' in the wagon, yeah, Circus Monkey Love!!

This is another one of Mr Wallace's trippy twisted tales, so who do you think is up to all the mischief in this here psycho circus??

Is it Klaus Kinski as Manfred Hart? Klaus always has to be a contender for suspect, just because he's so nuts, no matter what character he's playing or what film he's in!!

Was it little guy blackmailer Skip Martin as Mr. Big causing all the fuss??

Maybe it's Mario, the knife thrower played by Maurice Kaufmann! People are getting stabbed with a throwing knife, so he's a really fine suspect!!

Could it possibly have been the stupid comedian Eddie, portrayed by Eddi Arent? He's way too innocent!!

Christopher Lee as Gregor looks anything but innocent, but is it possible, is he really horribly misunderstood & disfigured underneath that hood?

I have too much respect for the writing of Edgar Wallace to give away the ending, so you'll just have it rent it yourself!!

On this poster in English, they don't even mention Edgar Wallace!! It's just all so weird some times!!

DER HENKER VON LONDON - Raimund Rosenberger - "The Mad Executioners" A Bryan Edgar Wallace Film (1963)

 

Welcome back to The Dwrayger Dungeon Saturday Night Special: Edgar Wallace edition!

Tonight's feature's original title was "Der Henker Von London" (The Executioner Of London) and was made in 1963, and released in English in 1965 as "The Mad Executioners!" It was written by Edgar Wallace's son Bryan Edgar Wallace, a fine mystery writer in his own right! The killer music right out of the Peter Thomas school of cool was written by a gentleman whose name has never come up here before, Raimund (The Crammer) Rosenberger! Here's a tasty slice of the title and a bit from the side show  "Mad Executioner Review" at an amusement park in the latter part of the film!

I love this movie! It's really two movies in one that converge in the end! One part of the film is about a group of hooded vigilantes who go around acting like judge and jury, and sentencing a bunch of bad people to death by hanging! They don't feel like waiting around for the Justice Department to take care of things, so they just do it themselves! The other part of the movie is about a madman going around beheading young women and discarding their bodies around different parts of London! Here's a great shot from command central at Scotland Yard! What's bugging Scotland Yard the most is that all of the Mad Executioner's victims have been hung by a rope from their own museum that keeps mysteriously getting stolen again and again, each time it is needed!

In the middle of this shot is Hansjörg (Brainwashed, The Man Who Sold Himself) Felmy as Inspector John Hillier! He was working both cases, but he took himself off the Executioners case so he could focus on the murders since his Sister was one of the victims! By his side is his girlfriend Ann Barry as played by the beautiful Maria (No Survivors, Please, Horror OF The Zombies) Perschy! To Ann's left is Rudolf (Island Of Lost Men, Skin To Skin) Forster as Ann's Father, retired judge Sir Francis Elliott, and the guy on the other side looking at the other guy is Rudolf (Dr. Crippen, Freitag, Der 13, The Invisible Dr. Mabuse) Fernau as Jerome the Judge's butler and closest confidant!

I do believe this is one of the most interesting compositions I've seen lately!

There's something eerie and extremely foreboding about men in black hoods that still resounds loudly to this day! So much, that I almost didn't feel like writing about this! Seriously though, these guys are really nothing more than trash collectors getting rid of a bunch of human garbage stinking up the community!

What appears to be a streetwalker is actually Chris (Kiss Me, Monster, Sadist Erotica) Howland as Tom Jenkins aka Gabby Pennypacker working undercover! Chris provides the bumbling comic relief character!

Here's a look at the side show act at the amusement park you can hear in the sound clip, and what a show it is!

The killer has been picking up young ladies at this one particular place, so Ann Barry has volunteered to help catch the slimy bastard, as he's known to be attracted to blondes!

Curiously enough, two of the guys watching, Ann walk by some headless statues! That's the kind of story this is!

The creepster is Dr. Phillip Trooper, a real pooper scooper! He lures the young gals to his pad that is filled with all kinds of fascinating artwork from all over the world! He'd be a pretty neat guy if he wasn't such a freak!

Spooky Dr. Trooper is played by Harry (The Strangler Of Blackmoor Castle, The College Girl Murders) Riebauer! He's got some serious hangups!

As it turns out, Scotland Yard didn't do such a great job of tailing Ann and Dr. Trooper, and now he's drugged her, and talked her into checking out his lab even though she tried to escape and the door was locked!

Dr. Trooper, as mad as he is, is also a skilled surgeon, and has a real Frankenstein plan of putting a live woman's severed head on top of that living, breathing plastic body he's built! It's all for the good of mankind of course, and all the murdered girls were nothing more than lab rats to him!

Finally, just in the nick of time, John Hillier and Scotland Yard close in on the crazed killer, but as they are driving him off to the hoosegow, the drivers decide to take a little detour.........

.............And the call goes out to all the Executioners! Time to show up, we've got a live one who needs to go!!

So it's at this point that the two stories meld together in seamless perfection, and The Doctor pleads his case to a deaf jury!

I'm not telling you the end, because this is an Edgar Wallace story, and that just would not be right, but do remember this, don't look back!!

"The Mad Executioners" is available from those fine folks at "Sinister Cinema," and you can also find it on Amazon for a pittance, and I doubt it would a decision you would regret! It also streams on Amazon for $1.99! You really can't go wrong!

DIE TOTEN AUGEN VON LONDON - Heinz Funk - "Welcome to Wallaceland" (1961)

Here's a thought you can ponder for a whole year or more! What if Edgar Wallace was Walt Disney? Just close your eyes,(not because of a gunshot wound), and try to imagine an Edgar Wallace Theme Park, "Wallaceland!"(Obviously not Wally World!) Of course the major attraction would be King Kong Land! Main Street would be Soho, and there'd be characters running around with names like Squeaker, The Frog, The Shark, and the White Spider!

The park would only be open at night, and Klaus Kinski would be Tommy Kirk...

and Joachim Fuchsberger would be Dick Van Dyke!!

What a freakin' happy place, instead of It's a Small World, we'd have Room 13, with a skull that dispenses cigarettes......

....and don't ever forget about all those blind guys running around like the seven dwarfs, which brings us right up to tonight's feature, "Die Toten Augen Von London" or auf Englisch, "The Dead Eyes Of London" aka over the years as "The Human Monster," "The Dark Eyes Of London," and "Der Gorilla Von Soho!" It's almost like the "Louie Louie" of mid-century Euro trash, and that ain't zu schlecht!!!

Ady Berber as Blind Jack was a professional wrassler in the 40's and 50's!!! Imagine that!!

Can you believe the lengths they went to to get this shot? They either had to put a camera in the guy's mouth or drill a hole in the back of his head! Amazing!!!

If a totally blind guy, that moves slower than a robot on heroin, sneaks into your house and hides behind the curtains, after breaking the only lightbulb in the house with his bare hands, and you don't notice, then you probably deserve what's coming to you, no matter how freakin' intelligent you are!!!

I totally dig how the blind guys have a big stash of rocks on shelves to use as weights to send their victims down the big slide into the river!

Hey, at least they try to make dying fun!! Wheeee, Splash!!!

Klaus, loosen up! No, Man, you don't look suspicious!!

Smoke 'em if you got 'em!!!

You can give a big fistful of credit to cinematographer Karl Löb for the look on so many these films, another true visonary!!!

I've told you before I love a cool stairwell shot, just don't stop to admire it, because no telling what's hiding in those shadows!!

First the dude falls down to elevator shaft, but he catches himself, only to be first, burnt on one hand with a cigarette, and then this finger stompin' treatment!

Dieter Borsche has a career credits longer than a soup line, heading all the way back to 1935, here as Reverend Paul Dearborn, the big cheese in charge of the home to all the blind mice!!

They didn't need Blind Jack's services any longer!!

Somehow Joachim Fuchsberger can deliver his lines, even with his fingers in his mouth! Oh, Hell, that's right, this film is dubbed into English!!

Surprise! Klaus is bad, but he's not even the evilest guy in this movie! That honour changes about 3 or 4 times!

When you get thrown out a window, and if you happen to possibly live, this is basically what you're going to see!!!

The music by Heinz Funk is all that and more! This cat might just be able to lay down legitimate claims to the name Funky! The theme to this movie is.......You know what, you're just gonna have to listen to it yourself!!! Heinz kept very busy after this movie on TV, and did the music for both German TV shows "Hafenpolizei" and "Polizeifunk Ruft" from 1963 to 1970!!

We dig anything and everything attached to Edgar Wallace. I don't know what it is, but this quality of writing, combined with the equal talents of the players and the musicians of the time adds up to absolute perfection! This is Karin Baal as Nora who was still doing TV as of last year!!

Whoops! Guess I'm not getting out this way!!

Time to break out the flamethrower!!!

Aw, Jeez Nora, go on and tell 'em what they want to know already!!

Here's the basic rule, old diabolical farts aren't so tough if they can't cheat!!

And just to prove that there is hope and salvation, you can download this film for free at the Internet Archive! (Link on the sidebar) Most of the rest of the Edgar Wallace catalogue is going to be more difficult to come by, unless you live in Europe, but there is new hope on the horizon with Sinister Video now offering a number of Wallace titles via their own site or Amazon! Unless there's something fishy going on, this should prove to be a Godsend of immaculate perception!!!