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Released by: Severin Films
Released on: 3/31/2009
Director: Vidal Raski
Cast: Anne Sparrow, Tony Eades, Clara Keller, Torben
Year: 1974
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The Movie:
Call them little people, midgets, dwarfs or Lilliputians, many of us (well maybe not many, but I count as at least one person), for whatever reason, has long held an affinity for the tiny unsung heroes of exploitation cinema. Give me Weng Weng over James Bond any day. I'd rather watch The Terror Of Tiny Town than any other standard B-grade western you can name and I consider Louis De Jesus (who also rules in the XXX Ultra Flesh) the trump card that made Joel Reed's twisted Bloodsucking Freaks the trash cinema masterpiece that it is. The Sinful Dwarf, however, is just wrong. Don't misunderstand me, it's all kinds of awesome, but yeah, this movie is pretty fucked up.
This 1973 American-Danish co-production stars former Danish children's show host Torben Bille, who also pops up in the Agent 69 films, as the titular dwarf named Olaf who lives with his mother (Clara Keller), a former but still marginally inspired night club chanteuse, in a boarding home that she runs. When he's not hanging around the house getting into trouble or playing with his primitive children's toys acting generally creepy, he's abducting local hot chicks, drugging them with dirty looking needles, and keeping them captive.
Enter quaint newlywed couple Mary (gorgeous Anne Sparrow) and Peter (Tony Eades), a couple out to enjoy their new life together, but without a whole lot of money to spend. They're in town for a business trip and wind up at the boarding house where, of course, Olaf sets his sits on the curvy blonde Mary. When she wanders into the attic where Olaf stores his sex slaves, who he pimps out to local dirtbags and keeps doped up on heroin, he makes her his latest catch but thankfully for Mary, her husband soon notices she's missing and calls the local fuzz. Soon enough, the race is on to save Mary from a fate worse than death before it's too late!
From the opening scene where Olaf and his mechanical toy poodle accost a woman who is obviously in her twenties who is for some reason playing hopscotch by herself on the sidewalk, to the odd musical interlude where Olaf plays piano as his mother belts out an off key show tune, The Sinful Dwarf is… something else. While the odds of a crazed dwarf who can't even walk without the aid of a cane successfully holding a bevy of beautiful and obviously very healthy young women hostage are pretty slim, you probably knew from the title going in that this wasn't a film particularly concerned with logic. It's even less concerned with political correctness, and God bless Vidal Raski and William May, if those are in fact their real names, for unleashing this unapologetically nasty piece of trash on an unsuspecting public. Is this is nice film? A well made film? A scary film? No, not at all, but it's definitely a dirty one, a picture that'll have you trying to scrub off its foul stench for days to come once you see it.
As primitive as the picture is on a technical level, and as absurdly filthy as the whole ordeal may be, the movie isn't completely without some artistic merit. The opening credits have a childlike surrealism to them that instantly grabs your attention and the quirky score, that sounds like something a horribly untalented child musician might make if left alone to his own devices for too long definitely suits the material. The cinematography is about as good as your average seventies porno, meaning that it's competent enough that it's in focus, but not particularly impressive in any way shape or form. What the camera does manage to capture, however, is the seediness of the locations used for filming. Olaf's den of sin is a dirty place indeed, and the unwashed naked women held captive there don't appear to be any cleaner. There's an unsettlingly authentic atmosphere of depravity here that, while likely captured completely by accident, definitely sticks to you whether you want it to or not. And you probably don't.
As far as pacing goes, the movie doesn't move at a lightning quick pace and you could argue that Olaf deserved more screen time than he's given here, particularly when you consider that, well, he's the star of the show and all. That said, the film is unique in its ugliness, bouncing back and forth between scenes of unintentional hilarity and legitimate upset with no regard for rhyme, reason, tone or logic. You've got to admire that.
Originally shot with hardcore footage in the feature itself, the movie was distributed in the United States by Harry Novak's Box Office International Pictures with the XXX material trimmed out, and it's that alternate version that Severin presents on DVD (and the same cut that Something Weird Video previously offered on VHS and DVD-R, though it is a title that they no longer offer). The Danish two-disc special edition of the film (from AWE) presents both cuts of the picture, and while it's unfortunate that both cuts of the movie are not included on this NTSC release, Severin will be offering the full uncut version of the picture at a later date though it should be noted that the 'international version' contained on this DVD isn't so much a cut version as it is a perfectly legitimate alternate version, as it's the one that played theatrically pretty much everywhere except Denmark. The film was also released on DVD in Japan in 2004 through Happinet Pictures. The film played theatrically in the United States (and possibly elsewhere) under the alternate titles of The Abducted Bride.
Video/Audio/Extras:
A big improvement over the VHS sourced SWV DVD-R (which featured the SWV bug in the bottom right corner for the duration of the film), Severin's 1.33.1 fullframe transfer, which presents the movie in its original aspect ratio, looks about as good as you'd expect from a transfer sourced from 'a 35mm print discovered hidden in a janitor's closet at the Danish Film Institute!' (a claim which some parties have taken far too seriously - humor can be lost on people sometimes, I guess). There's a hefty coat of grain over top of the entire film but it adds to its nasty charm. Detail levels are pretty strong and the source material, which was actually Novak's own 35mm print, used for this transfer were obviously in pretty good shape as while there is some minor print damage, there's nothing too serious to complain about here.
Again, compared to the previous SWV offering, this new disc is pretty much a revelation. Just take a look at the screen caps to the right - the differences are pretty damn obvious even with the small picture size. The colors are brighter and more natural looking without ever appearing oversaturated or artificially boosted and detail is stronger without a hint of edge enhancement or mpeg compression to note.
The actors all appear to have spoken English on set and the dialogue surprisingly matches the lip movements of everyone involved in this production. The Dolby Digital Mono sound mix on Severin's DVD presents the track in decent enough quality that, even if it won't blow you away, sounds good enough. There's a bit of background noise here and there but aside from that the levels are all fine and the dialogue is easy enough to understand throughout the film.
Special features are slim, but the disc has a few treats hidden beneath its set of bad ass menu images starting with The Severin Controversy (10:00). Online cult film fanatics might remember this piece as a fun little viral marketing campaign that Severin released on various movie forums and on YouTube back in 2008 to generate some buzz around this release. 'John Severin' hosts this faux-documentary that purports to investigate some of the controversy around the film by interviewing a few viewers at a video store who discuss their experiences with various cult films which lead them to The Sinful Dwarf, a film which of course scarred them for life. It's all done with tongue placed firmly in cheek, and even if it doesn't really shed much light on the background of the film or its cast and crew, it is definitely good for a laugh, particularly in its accusations of Denmark being a country where people grow up watching child pornography and how The Sinful Dwarf lead to one of the viewers having difficulty relating to women after seeing the film.
Also included are the film's original American theatrical trailer (3:07) under the alternate The Abducted Bride title, which does a great job of really selling potential viewers on the film's depravity factor and two American radio spots (0:30 and 0:30 respectively). Hidden on the DVD as an Easter Egg is a rough quality U.S. TV spot for the film using the Sinful Dwarf title. The quality isn't so hot and it looks like it was swiped from a YouTube upload but it's cool to see it here. There probably aren't a lot of supplements kicking around for a movie like this, though it's a shame that Severin didn't put together a still gallery for this release as the various marketing campaigns used to promote the film in the different international territories it played in tend to be pretty sensational. Torben's dead, so it obviously wouldn't be possible to get him on camera to talk about the movie, but it might have been cool to get American distributor Harry Novak's input on this picture.
The Final Word:
While some of us are still clamoring for the upcoming hardcore release of the film, Severin have done a very nice job bringing the international version of The Sinful Dwarf to NTSC DVD. As odd and sleazy as they come, it's a pretty twisted picture featuring a fantastic performance from one of the most crazed 'little people' to ever take a starring role.