Misfit Horror: A film series dedicated to one-of-a-kind horror movies whose originality and power have been unjustly neglected because they aren’t at all what you expected.

March 16th – Freaks (1932, dir. Tod Browning) – a Pre-Code horror flick that still has the capacity to haunt and creep you out

The granddaddy of all the misfit horror films we’ve been exploring this quarter, Freaks is Tod Browning’s empathetic depiction of the physically deformed performers who comprise the circus sideshow of Madame Tetrallini (Rose Dione). A beautiful acrobat marries and poisons a rich midget named Hans (Harry Earles) in order to get his inheritance, for which the “freaks” in the circus enact a gruesome revenge. As this brusque summary suggests, it is the “normal” people in the film who often come across as monstrous and grotesque, though the film does provocatively pose the question of where compassion for these “freaks” stops and the exploitation of them begins. Made the year following his famous adaption of Dracula with Bela Lugosi, Browning’s Freaks is not to be missed!

Sunday nights at 7PM in 150 Stevenson. Sponsored (or at least turned a blind eye) by the Literature Department, and produced by the usual gang of aficionados. More informative flyers to follow weekly.