Hello everyone, today I come to talk about this great film by Guillermo del Toro, an excellent Mexican screenwriter, director and producer, who was responsible for giving life to wonderful works such as Pan's Labyrinth and The Shape of Water.
In this occasion Bradley Cooper plays Stan Carlisle, a man who after having lost everything, begins to wander around the country and finds refuge in a traveling carnival where he gradually begins to learn certain techniques that can easily lead him to stardom or failure.
¿Es hombre o es bestia?
Is it man or beast?
The film begins by showing us a man burying a body in a house, and then burning it completely; this man is Stan, who, feeling devastated, embarks on a journey into the unknown and, as fate would have it, finds himself in a traveling carnival. In this carnival all kinds of people work, but Stan's attention is drawn to one show in particular; the host and owner of the carnival named Clem, had a special number, to show a "freak" (who was nothing more than a man) doing inhuman things for which people paid.
As he wandered around the place, he met people who worked there and offered him temporary work, but Cleam, seeing his radio, offered him a steady job.
While they were walking through several places they realized that the "freak" had escaped from his cage and frightened, they all decided to go to look for him. The "Freak" was hiding among the games and when he was surrounded by the men, he hit Stan on the head with a stone and tried to run away, but Stan hit him back and managed to lock him back in his cage. Thus begins his first day at the carnival.
The next day Stan wants to take a bath and does so at the home of a lady named Zeena, who, along with her husband Pete, was working on the clairvoyance show. While taking a shower, the lady offers him to be an assistant in the show in exchange for teaching him some tricks, which suits Stan very well.
The couple uses an ingenious system to make it look like they have mental powers, but unfortunately in the middle of the act, Pete, who had a serious problem with alcohol failed to concentrate and that's where Zenna uses her abilities to finish the act well, surprising the audience and Stan.
In the evening, Pete and Zeena warn Stan to never trick customers with those skills when dealing with spirits or the dead, as people always get hurt. Stan being intrigued by how they guess people's secrets, asks them to do the same with him, so they perform a trick with his watch and immediately guess who it belonged to and the sentimental value it has for him.
Seeing him surprised by his success, Pete shows him a book where he had encoded a language system and tells him how, with the help of his wife, he can guess its secrets.
On the other hand, Clem shows him his collection of fetuses and shows him where he stores his illegal alcohol which he brews to control some of the fair's employees. Something very important to mention here (you'll see why at the end), is that Stan doesn't drink alcohol, he avoids it all the time.
Upon returning to Pete's house, Stan asks him to teach him the language techniques he uses, which surprises him since they didn't use to ask him much, but he accepts anyway.
Meanwhile, Stan is attracted to Molly, who was showing off her electric act in front of the audience; he approaches her with an idea to improve her act, which turns out to be excellent, since thanks to that, and Stan's cunning, they manage to keep the carnival going.
After that he is threatened by other artists to stay away from Molly, but he ignores this and continues to harass her and even proposes to do a show together outside the carnival in the best places, although she likes the idea, she refuses out of fear. It is worth mentioning that Molly was one of the reasons why Stan stayed at the carnival, since he liked her from the moment he saw her.
Later they realize that the "freak" is very sick, so Clem and Stan decide to leave him in a doctor's office to avoid questions. While having dinner together, Stan wonders what a man has to go through to reach the level of becoming a "freak" or a "beast" living in squalor, so Clem explains that what he does is to seek out alcoholic men with troubled pasts and then lure them in with promises of a temporary job and daily alcohol mixed with opium.
Later that night, while Stan is learning the techniques he must use from Pete, Pete asks him to get a bottle of alcohol, because without it he won't be able to sleep well, but Stan mistakenly gives Pete the wrong bottle, which unfortunately causes his death.
After what happened, a caravan of policemen appears to close the carnival, but thanks to Stan they manage to keep the place open, as he cleverly takes the opportunity to use the techniques that Pete had taught him, thus surprising the policeman and everyone for his accurate predictions. Seeing this, Molly realizes that she would have a good future with Stan and decides to go with him even though her friends do not agree.
Two years later... we see Molly learning the techniques from Pete's book so that she can help Stan in the presentations, as Stan has become a hit in Chicago, as he is in charge of performing psychic acts for the elite.
During one of his acts, a psychologist interrupts him to try to expose his code system, which she fails to do because Stan despite the tension, manages to get the predictions right, thus keeping his act safe.
Later we see Judge Harrington who hires Stan under the approval of his psychologist to perform seances, but although Molly does not agree with this, Stan accepts the deal and meets with the psychologist.
The psychologist, Lillith, is well aware that Stan is a con man, but is intrigued by his ability to manipulate.
Through her taped sessions of her clients, Lillith has accumulated confidential information about several members of the elite, so she offers to help Stan in exchange for therapy sessions with him to learn more about her method.
Stan and Lillith begin an adventure conspiring together to manipulate the judge; while Stan reveals his guilt over Pete's death and his hatred for his alcoholic father whom he burned in his house, Molly feels increasingly uncomfortable, so she asks her friends from the carnival to visit her, surprising Stan, since she wanted to leave that circus life behind.
After working with his client (the judge), Stan gives half of what he earned to Lillith, but she doesn't accept, so he then asks her to keep it for Molly to find out what he did.
Judge Harrington, introduces her to a powerful man named Ezra, an old friend that the psychologist attended to long ago, but she warns him that he is a dangerous person and yet, Stan agrees to meet him by showing up at his mansion. Ezra is completely suspicious of Stan's abilities and so, he submits him to a polygraph test. At first he failed the polygraph, but when he started talking about his past, he gained the old man's trust and Stan began to swindle him.
Old Ezra offers Stan a lot of money to talk to his ex-wife (who died because of him) and to get her to materialize, so he tells Molly the story of the young woman and asks her to impersonate her in a "séance". Molly doesn't agree at first, but Stan's pressure makes her change her mind.
After several sessions where he manages to "communicate" with the old man's ex-wife, he impatiently asks to see her, to which Stan agrees. At this point Stan has a hard time since he has to speed things up and besides that Molly discovers that he was unfaithful with Lillith, so she leaves the house.
While all this was going on, Stan's first clients (the judge and his wife) were committing suicide because of the things he said to them.
When he arrives home, he discovers the letter Molly left him and runs to the train station to beg her to stay until he convinces her; Molly tells him that she is tired and this is the last time she will help him.
Outside Ezra's mansion, Molly pretends to be Dory (Ezra's ex-wife) while Stan tries to get the old man alone to "conjure" her. At that moment the bodyguard leaves and leaves them alone doing the "incantation" while in the distance comes Molly walking with a bloody white dress; unfortunately for Stan the old man loses control and hugs Molly realizing that she is not Dory. Realizing the scam, he threatens Stan and hits Molly, to which Stan responds by beating him to death.
His bodyguard sees what is happening from afar and starts shooting without success, so Stan ends his life also by running him over with the car.
Molly can not stand it anymore and leaves Stan for good, because of this, he goes to the psychologist to ask for help, but discovers that she has been cheating him all the time and also contacts the police; at that moment Stan attacks her, but she shoots him in the ear and seeing that the police arrived, he has no choice but to flee.
Several years go by and Stan is left wandering around like a vagabond, consumed by alcohol (something he swore he would never drink). When he finds out that there is a carnival nearby, he tries to get a job; at that moment the owner of the carnival turns him down, but at the last minute he offers him alcohol and a temporary job, to be the new freak, just like his old boss told him, remember?
In the end Stan accepts the job and claims he was born to be one.
