Backdrop fallback

The Barker

The Barker

Share

The Barker

"You'll Hear What You See! Perfect recording of voice and action!"

1928

1h 20m

7.0(3 votes)

Romance

Drama

Overview

A successful carnival barker deals with the arrival of his eager son, who he'd hoped would stay far from the carnival world, his son's entanglement with a showgirl, and his own jealous mistress.

Links & Resources

Social & External

Production Companies

First National Pictures

The people behind it

Cast & crew

9 featured cast members

Starring

Milton Sills

Milton Sills

Nifty Miller

Dorothy Mackaill

Dorothy Mackaill

Lou

Betty Compson

Betty Compson

Carrie

Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

Douglas Fairbanks Jr.

Chris Miller

Sylvia Ashton

Sylvia Ashton

Ma Benson

George Cooper

George Cooper

Hap Spissel

S.S. Simon

S.S. Simon

Col. Gowdy

One-Eye Connelly

Tom Dugan

Tom Dugan

Stuttering Spieler

Creative team

Directed by: George Fitzmaurice
Written by: Benjamin Glazer
Joseph Jackson
Produced by: Al Rockett
Richard A. Rowland

Similar Movies

Paper Moon

Paper Moon

During the Great Depression, a con man finds himself saddled with a young girl who may or may not be his daughter, and the two forge an unlikely partnership.

Casanova

Casanova

With a reputation for seducing members of the opposite sex, regardless of their marital status, a notorious womanizer discovers a beauty who seems impervious to his charms. However, as he continues to pursue the indifferent lady, he finds himself falling in love.

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo

Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo

Deuce Bigalow is a less than attractive, down on his luck aquarium cleaner. One day he wrecks the house of a gigolo and needs quick money to repair it. The only way he can make it is to become a gigolo himself, taking on an unusual mix of female clients. He encounters a couple of problems, though. He falls in love with one of his unusual clients, and a sleazy police officer is hot on his trail.

An American Crime

An American Crime

The true story of suburban housewife Gertrude Baniszewski, who kept a teenage girl locked in the basement of her Indiana home during the 1960s.

Wild Lover

Wild Lover

A wild girl who was raised by bears is found by humans when she rescues an injured man. She is brought to the city against her will, and is put in a stage show. She is discovered and saved by her family, and tries to find a way to take revenge on the people who imprisoned her.

Lili

Lili

Members of a circus troupe "adopt" Lili Daurier when she finds herself stranded in a strange town. The magician who first comes to her rescue already has romantic entanglements and thinks of her as a little girl. Who can she turn to but the puppets, singing to them her troubles, forgetting that there are puppeteers? A crowd gathers around Lili as she sings. The circus has a new act. She now has a job. Will she get her heart's desire?

Carnival Story

Carnival Story

In search of a better life, a German girl named Willi joins an American carnival passing through Munich. While traveling from town to town, she is torn between two suitors: cruel carnival barker Joe and kindhearted high-dive artist Frank. Frank gets the upper hand when he asks Willi to join his act. The partners soon become the most popular attraction at the carnival. But tragedy is only a slip away.

Texas Carnival

Texas Carnival

A Texas carnival showmen team is mistaken for a cattle baron and his sister.

Fisher

Fisher

In the small town of Eden, Tennessee, a neglected and naive teenage girl named Clara Banks has made a habit of deceiving people online for gifts, a gambit known as "catfishing." She thinks it's all fun and games until she hooks the attention of the wrong person. A short time later, events set into motion spiral out of control as someone begins stalking Clara and her friends. As the consequences of her actions return to haunt her, twisted messages start showing up at Clara's home, causing her to fear for her life. Will she ever feel safe again now that the evil has come knocking?

The Unholy Three

The Unholy Three

A trio of former sideshow performers double as the "Unholy Three" in a scam to nab some shiny rocks.

Carny

Carny

Tired of being a small-town waitress, Donna departs with the latest carnival show, living with entertainers Frankie and Patch in a tense, emotional triangle.

The Pleasure

The Pleasure

Italy in the early 1930s. To the elderly aristocrat Gerard, all that is left of Leonora, the love of his life, are a number of erotic tape recordings. She led a double life as respectable wife and mother of two, and as a whore at the local brothel. Now, after her death, her children Ursula and Edmund pass under the tutelage of Gerard. Having not seen them for many years, he is utterly bewildered by Ursula's uncanny likeness to her mother. While Gerard's mistress Fiorella takes care of Edmund's sexual needs, Ursula follows the last instructions of her mother. In the process, she uses the legacy of her mother's recordings to get into the mindset of her relationship with Gerard. Is Gerard ready to find his lost love Leonora again... in the likeness of her very daughter?

Carousel

Carousel

Billy Bigelow has been dead for 15 years. Now outside the pearly gates, he long ago waived his right to go back to Earth for a day. He has heard that there is a problem with his family: namely with his wife Julie Bigelow, née Jordan, and his child he hasn't met. He would now like to head back to Earth to assist in rectifying the problem; but before he may go, he has to get permission from the gatekeeper by telling him his story. Adapted from the Rodgers and Hammerstein hit Broadway musical.

Gun Crazy

Gun Crazy

Bart Tare is an ex-Army man who has a lifelong fixation with guns, he meets a kindred spirit in sharpshooter Annie Starr and goes to work at a carnival. After upsetting the carnival owner who lusts after Starr, they both get fired. Soon, on Starr's behest, they embark on a crime spree for cash.

Nightmare Alley

Nightmare Alley

A roustabout joins a traveling carny and schemes to figure out the mind-reading act of Mademoiselle Zeena and her alcoholic husband.

Splinterheads

Splinterheads

SPLINTERHEADS introduces Thomas Middleditch as Justin Frost, a twenty-something slacker whose “thing” is that he has no “thing” at all. When a small-time carnival rolls into town, he meets Galaxy (Rachael Taylor), a gorgeous con artist, or “splinterhead,” who has more “things” going for her than anyone he has ever met.

Sixteen

Sixteen

Hickspoiltation film from the early 1970s ostensibly starring Oscar nominee Mercedes McCambridge, but really more a film looking for an excuse to show off Simone Griffeth's beauty. She plays a daughter of a swamp family. The whole family goes to a carnival where she is seduced by an older male performer, while her teen brother is seduced by an older female performer.

Some Came Running

Some Came Running

A former novelist returns to his small Midwest town after serving in the Army during WWII, to the chagrin of his social-climbing brother, and becomes close with an easy-going professional gambler and torn between two very different women.

Night Tide

Night Tide

A young sailor falls in love with a mysterious woman performing as a mermaid on the local pier. As they become entwined, he comes to suspect the woman might be a real mermaid who lures men to a watery death during the full moon.

Flitterwochen

Flitterwochen

Customs officers Katti and Wolfgang are so deeply in love with each other that they are barely aware of their surroundings. But after the wedding reception, there's nothing but trouble.

Recommended Movies

Flamingo Road

Flamingo Road

A stranded carnival dancer takes on a corrupt political boss when she marries into small-town society.

The Secret: Dare to Dream

The Secret: Dare to Dream

A widow with three children hires a handyman to fix her house during a major storm. When not doing home repairs, he shares his philosophy of believing in the power of the universe to deliver what we want.

Lovely, Still

Lovely, Still

A holiday fable that tells the story of an elderly man discovering love for the first time.

The Lost Husband

The Lost Husband

Trying to put her life back together after the death of her husband, Libby and her children move to her estranged Aunt's goat farm in central Texas.

Strangers When We Meet

Strangers When We Meet

A suburban architect loves his wife but is bored with his marriage and with his work, so he takes up with the neglected, married beauty who lives down the street.

The Greatest Show on Earth

The Greatest Show on Earth

To ensure a full profitable season, circus manager Brad Braden engages The Great Sebastian, though this moves his girlfriend Holly from her hard-won center trapeze spot. Holly and Sebastian begin a dangerous one-upmanship duel in the ring, while he pursues her on the ground.

Salome

Salome

In the reign of emperor Tiberius, Gallilean prophet John the Baptist preaches against King Herod and Queen Herodias. The latter wants John dead, but Herod fears to harm him due to a prophecy. Enter beautiful Princess Salome, Herod's long-absent stepdaughter. Herodias sees the king's dawning lust for Salome as her means of bending the king to her will. But Salome and her lover Claudius are (contrary to Scripture) nearing conversion to the new religion. And the famous climactic dance turns out to have unexpected implications...

My Brilliant Career

My Brilliant Career

A young woman who is determined to maintain her independence finds herself at odds with her family who wants her to tame her wild side and get married.

Blood and Sand

Blood and Sand

Bullfighter Juan Gallardo falls for socialite Dona Sol, turning from the faithful Carmen who nevertheless stands by her man as he continues to face real danger in the bullring.

Departure

Departure

An English mother and her teenage son spend a week preparing the sale of their remote holiday house in the South of France. Fifteen-year-old Elliot struggles with his dawning sexuality and an increasing alienation from his mother, Beatrice. She in turn is confronted by the realisation that her marriage to his father, Philip, has grown loveless and the life she knows is coming to an end. When an enigmatic local teenager, Clément, quietly enters their lives, both mother and son are compelled to confront their desires and, finally, each other.

Falling in Love

Falling in Love

During shopping for Christmas, Frank and Molly run into each other. This fleeting short moment will start to change their lives, when they recognize each other months later in the train home and have a good time together. Although both are married and Frank has two little kids, they meet more and more often, their friendship becoming the most precious thing in their lives.

Kitty Foyle

Kitty Foyle

A hard-working, white-collar girl falls in love with a young socialite, but meets with his family's disapproval.

Bed of Roses

Bed of Roses

The seeds of love are planted when Lisa, a high-powered investment banker, receives flowers from a secret admirer. But when his fairy-tale fantasies clash with her workaholic ways, they soon find out that sometimes, it's harder than it seems for love to conquer all.

A Ring of Endless Light

A Ring of Endless Light

When 15-year-old Vicky Austin, her sister Suzy and little brother Rob visit their grandfather on Seven Bay Island, Vicky faces several unexpected challenges. Her beloved grandfather, retired Reverend Eaton, seems to be seriously ill, but tries to pretend that nothing is wrong. Vicky met the rich but emotionally troubled Zachary Gray the previous summer, and he reappears to renew the acquaintance. Another boy, 17-year-old Adam Eddington, recruits Vicky to help him with a research project, working with a dolphin called Basil. Vicky discovers she can communicate telepathically with the dolphin and his mate - and possibly with Adam as well

High Strung Free Dance

High Strung Free Dance

Zander Raines, a dazzling and tempestuous young choreographer, gives the break of a lifetime to two hopeful artists when he casts a stunning contemporary dancer, Barlow, and innovative pianist, Charlie, in New York’s most-anticipated new Broadway show: Free Dance. But the move throws off the show’s delicate creative balance when Charlie falls hard for Barlow, while Zander embraces her as his muse.

Northfork

Northfork

The year is 1955, and a great flood is coming to Northfork, Montana. A new hydroelectric dam is about to be installed in the mountains above the town, ready to submerge the valley in the name of progress. It is the responsibility of a six-man Evacuation Committee to relocate the townsfolk to higher ground. Most have duly departed, but a few stubborn stragglers remain – among them a priest caring for a sickly orphan, a boy whose fevered visions are leading him to believe he is a member of a roaming band of lost angels desperately searching for a way home.

Bad Girl

Bad Girl

A man and woman, skeptical about romance, nonetheless fall in love and are wed, but their lack of confidence in the opposite sex haunts their marriage.

Nobody Has to Know

Nobody Has to Know

After a stroke and no memories from his past, Phil encounters Millie who inhabits a desert part of Isle of Lewis. She will shortly entrust him with his deepest secret : they were in love.

The Longest Ride

The Longest Ride

The lives of a young couple intertwine with a much older man as he reflects back on a lost love while he's trapped in an automobile crash.

Medicine for Melancholy

Medicine for Melancholy

Waking from a one-night stand that neither remembers, Micah and Joanne find themselves wandering the streets of San Francisco, sharing coffee and conversation and searching for a deeper connection.