It just hit Amazon Prime (and DVD) as it's been in distribution limbo for years.
I watch a lot of movies, thus I watch a lot of bad movies. Not just the triple A titles, but loads of independents. Many are just background noise as I'm playing whatever game I'm into at that time. However, movies like Circus of the Dead are the gems that make the search worth it.
Let's get the dirty details out of the way. This is an adult horror film. The themes involve mutilation, rape, cannibalism, torture, and so on. The tone of the film is clearly an homage to Rob Zombie's House of 1000 Corpses. Texas Chainsaw Massacre is also a huge inspiration.
The story has a circus (remember those?) traveling around and its band of clowns are like a family of serial killers/rapists. In each town they pick victims from the audience and then do horrific things to them. This time they pick Donald, his wife Tiffany, and their two daughters. Honestly, that's all the story they need, but there is a slight and subtle addition here and there that does make it better.
What really makes this movie are the clowns themselves. Papa Corn is their leader played by Bill Oberst Jr. who is fucking brilliant. He's creepy as shit and it goes beyond his makeup. He really puts himself into the role. Seriously an award worthy performance in a B level indy film. I cannot oversell his performance. Some of his dialogue is also pretty exceptional for this level of film. The other clowns are perfect additions, from the midget who serves as a perfect dues ex machina to the stupid giant who is responsible for my biggest laugh in the movie to the one that seems normal yet is fine with all the violence. There's also one more...but more on him in a minute.
The clowns dwarf the innocents that you're supposed to be rooting for as their performance is just that good. (Plus, the main good guy does not put in an amazing performance.)
Overall, if you enjoyed the Rob Zombie trilogy of House of 1000 Corpses, The Devil's Rejects, and 3 from Hell then you will absolutely enjoy this film. At a budget of $150K, it's not as high quality, but this is a hell of a good effort.
Stick around during the credits and you'll see a sequel was planned (Still is!!!), as well as, a cameo by someone mentioned once earlier in the film: Doll Face. Clearly a take off of Leatherface, but with a sledgehammer as his weapon. Doll Face was apparently the star of a short made 3-4 years before this movie. The short pays respect to old school cinema, and recent efforts by Tarantino and Rodriguez with bullshit previews for two movies that now either really exist or is being made. Do NOT judge Circus of the Dead by what you see below. This was, in the filmmaker's own words, "practice":
https://youtu.be/FcrK8U1bjj0
Circus of the Dead (2014)
Circus of the Dead (2014)
“Every record been destroyed or falsified, books rewritten, pictures repainted, statues, street building renamed, every date altered. The process is continuing day by day. History stops. Nothing exists except endless present in which the Party is right.”