The Greatest Show on Earth

The Greatest Show on Earth
1952

Clowns are plotting to take over the world and probably kill everyone whilst at it. It’s a true story. Why else would they always be smiling? They have awful jobs! They have to trip, cram themselves into tiny cars, and smash pies into their friend’s faces on a regular basis. If this was your existence, would you my friend be smiling? No. You’d cry daily and be in therapy. But not clowns. No, because they are coming to take over the entire world!!!!!!!

I hate clowns. They freak me out. Guess where you find clowns? At a circus! Guess what The Greatest Show on Earth is about? A circus, right! But the main clown wasn’t too creepy. He was only a clown because he randomly killed his girlfriend out of love. No. Not creepy at all. He just proves the clown theory.

Anyway, this movie is about the inner drama of a circus. We have our three main lovers, Manager Man, Trapeze Lady, and Trapeze Man. They had real names but no one ever remembers the names of the circus people, just what they do, so it’s all good. Manager Man and Trapeze Lady had this thing going. Sorta. See Manager Man has no feelings at all and only cares about the circus. This drives Trapeze Lady crazy.
Because no one really likes the circus, they bring in this crazy daredevil, Trapeze Man, and he steals Trapeze Lady’s center ring. So they every night perform in separate rings at the same time, having a competition for the crowds love and applause. As time pass the Trapeze People fall in love.

Manager Man kind of does not like this, but mainly does not mind. Because he is a big feelingless jerk. He doesn’t notice during all of this time that Elephant Trainer Lady likes him. Poor ETL.

So more time passes and one night while not over a net Trapeze Man falls and nearly dies. The show goes on. He comes back with a dead hand. But don’t worry! All’s well because he and Trapeze Lady love each other! They are a cute couple honestly. I truly like them. Which is a big clue they aren’t going to last in the end. The couples I like never end up working out. You have no idea how upsetting this is for my life. But I digress.

Everything continues to continue and Manager Man finally notices Elephant Trainer Lady likes him! So now they love each other. Everything’s good right?
Wrong.

ETL has a crazy ex boyfriend who tried to have an elephant stomp on her head. That was actually kinda funny… Anyway! He decided to blow up the circus train in revenge. So now the train is crashed and Manager Man is hurt. Right before this the Trapeze couple became engaged! It went like this.

Trapeze Man: Someone’s gonna get married!
Trapeze Lady: Who?
Trapeze Man: You!

I kid you not. I love Trapeze Man. But unfortantely now Manager Man is hurt so Trapeze Lady loves him again. The circus people decide to hold a circus in the field as they have no tent anymore. AND! And, get this. Trapeze Man asks Elephant Trainer Lady to marry him. She says yes. The end.
WORST ENDING EVER.

I know that reason and love keep little company these days but this is ridiculous. How can you switch from loving one person to someone completely different overnight and think it’s a good idea to get married? How is that even slightly logical to anyone? It’s not at all. It’s something that would only happen in an overdramatic 50’s movie.

Which this happens to be. The acting is unrealistically dramatic. The ending is atrocious. Nothing goes at all the way it would in real life. You might be saying, “Well duh Kelsey, that’s why we watch movies to escape reality.” Sure. Fine.

Whatever. They should still not be CRAZY improbable. The only thing that happened that I can actually see playing out in real life is that Buttons the clown finally went to jail. Which is actually sad, even though he’s a creepy clown killer. That’s how messed up this movie was.

And besides all that, this movie had way too much circus in it. Like you actually watched the same trapeze acts over and over again. Or you saw the same clowns perform. And the same people sing. It was just at a different city this time. It was incredibly boring when they went into these parts. I mean you don’t watch a movie to see a circus, you want a story, and I kept getting twenty minute breaks from the story.

For these reasons, and the fact that clowns are trying to kill us all, I would say that The Greatest Show on Earth is a very misleading title for this insanely odd movie.