Werner Herzog's black and white 1970 film, Even Dwarfs Started Small (Auch Zwerge Haben Klein Angefangen) is one of those films that is beyond such grounded definitions as good and bad, and, like its American predecessor, Freaks, is simply one of the oddest films ever made. Bad critics have praised it for all the wrong reasons- such as being a statement on politics, the Vietnam War, the partition of Germany, against religion, and prudish ignorants have condemned it for similarly wrong reasons. Yet, few have ever watched it all the way through with unsparing eyes. It is a film that has a very sparse narrative structure, seeming improvisations, yet it is clearly not an early example of Postmodern preening, nor is it an amorphic surreal mess in the Warhol Factory mode. It is, however, like Freaks, neither as good nor bad as its greatest champions nor detractors claim it is. In fact, as one of the earliest films in the Herzog canon, made concurrently with the 'documentaries' Fata Morgana and The Flying Doctors Of East Africa, it far more resembles such low budget 1960s black and white horror masterpieces as Herk Harvey's Carnival Of Souls, Francis Ford Coppola's Dementia 13, and George Romero's Night Of The Living Dead, or even the low budget 1960s films of American maverick filmmaker Sam Fuller. Yet, it is both a horror film and a black comedy
. Yet, the film, also written by Herzog, is not about rebellion, but weak anomy and enervation, for nothing is accomplished in the end, except mindless anarchism. The screenplay, such as it is, is virtually nonexistent, and, save for the soliloquies of the asylum boss, none of it matters, in terms of content. The film was shot on one of the Spanish Canary Islands, Lanzarote, which is a bleak volcanic wasteland, and mostly from the eye level of the dwarfs, which adds to the monstrous feel that the 'normal things' take on. That it only runs 96 minutes is a good choice, but if the film was only 70 or so minutes in length it would be even more effective. As it is, it as an oddball film that fits no categories, is beyond good and bad, yet also an early example of Herzog's continuing filmic war against the evil of nature- which Herzog sees as despairingly immanent. For the rest of us, the sights and sounds of the two sickest of the dwarfs- Pepe and Hombre- laughing maniacally until they both seem ready to drop dead, is one of the most bizarre and powerful images recorded on film, as well as one of the scariest. It may not mean a damned thing, but it sure packs a wallop. Would that every film could say even that much.
Review of Even Dwarfs Started Small
