Tiptoes

A man comes from a family of dwarves, or little people, and he’s the only normal-sized one. He conceals this from his girlfriend, who becomes pregnant, and may be carrying a dwarf. Sounds interesting and well-intentioned, but I thought this was a disaster. The dialogue is terrible. The incidents are unbelievable. For some reason, Gary Oldman, who likes to play grotesques (he was the man with no face in Hannibal), plays the man’s twin brother, and he’s not a convincing dwarf. His arms are too long, he’s obviously walking around on his knees. And I guess the key word here is “grotesque.” There is nothing grotesque about little people, which seems to be the film’s point … so why Gary Oldman? The wonderful Peter Dinklage (The Station Agent, and Elf) is wasted as an angry Frenchman; why couldn’t he play the brother? And why is there no picture on the DVD cover of a dwarf? I know one of the points of the film was to portray little people as successful, normal, and sexual, which is fine, but you have to make a good movie while you’re doing it. The whole thing began to remind me uncomfortably of The Terror of Tiny Town. Avoid this one.