| Reviewed by Elliot V. Kotek Writer/Director: Ward Roberts
Starring: Sid Haig, Richard Riehle, Mel England
Studio: Fly High Films In-a-nutshell:
The first surprise in Ward Roberts's "Little Big Top" is that there is a locally-based Circus Capital of the World... a second is that it is Peru, Indiana... and the third is that the formerly blue-faced star of Rob Zombie's The Devil's Rejects, Sid Haig, portrays "Seymour Smiles," a career clown who's come home to live in oblivion. Seymour is, not surprisingly - at least initially - more slime than smile. (He's also more beef jerky, Pabst Blue Ribbon and cheap whisky.) Richard Riehle, as the good-natured producer of the Big Top's amateur circus program, is similarly less haunting than in his Ken Park outing for Larry Clark, and provides the rounded counterpoint in kindness to Haig's gruff facade. In fact, it is only the usually kind-minded Mel England who takes the trip in reverse, having convincingly created for his character a cigarette-butt-flicking, creepy carnie incarnation looking to land Smiles back in the bottom of the bottle he's crawled out of. As Smiles finds his home as a teacher for his amateur troupe, this Indiana indie production becomes to charm what Marcel Marceau became to quiet. View trailer on our website. Click here.
http://www.littlebigtopmovie.com |
