THIS MONTH
TALES FROM KIM'S CRYPT
TIPTOES
LEGENDARY AUTHOR AND CRITICKIM NEWMANBRINGS US HIS UNIQUE TAKES ON CULT CINEMA
MATTHEW BRAZIER
Imago
UNLESS YOU’VE SEEN Tiptoes (2002), it sounds like a made-up movie —like the films the Robert Downey Jr character from Tropic Thunder is supposed to have starred in. It’s the one where Matthew McConaughey and Gary Oldman play twin brothers Steven and Rolfe Bedalia —the latter of whom is a dwarf.
Um, yes, well… there’s the problem.
On the one hand, the illusion is remarkably good —far better than José Ferrer with shoes on his knees as Toulouse-Lautrec in John Huston’s Moulin Rouge and less jarring than the CG trickery used to create pint-sized Hugh Jackman for a joke in Deadpool And Wolverine. Oldman, always up for an acting challenge, gives a warm, sensitive performance which rates among his best work. But, even in 2002, the film was criticised for not starring an actual little person. The obvious suggestion would be to hire Peter Dinklage — which is kind of patronising since a) Rolfe isn’t a Peter Dinklage-type role and b) Peter Dinklage is in the film in a 100 per cent Peter Dinklage-type role as an arrogant, studly French dwarf who constantly bristles with indignation (and shacks up with Patricia Arquette).