Gavotte

Gavotte (1968)

** (out of 4)

Walerian Borowczyk made some pretty bizarre films during his career and that includes some really strange shorts. This one here clocks in at ten-minutes and features a play without dialogue. The play is being performed by a couple dwarfs and I'm sure there's no real plot going on. Yeah, this one here really didn't work with me. I said there wasn't any sort of plot and that's an understatement because there's really nothing that happens throughout the running time. Someone loses something. Another item is lost. Something else. One dwarf enters the stage as the other leaves. I'm not sure what the director was going for but there's just not much entertainment to be had here.

While I will admit that this is the best short film about 17th century French midgets ever made, I don't think that would be true if you removed any of those adjectives. It sounds like it would be a hilarious show, but instead it just lies there. It seems like whoever wrote it was either trying to make a serious philosophical statement, or thought the concept alone was funny enough, because watching a 17th century midget sit down for a minute, and then be forced to stand up because of some minor annoyance over and over again just doesn't pass as entertainment. I won't spoil the surprise ending.