Little Cigars

There are some hilarious moments in this comedy caper about a group of circus midgets who rob banks and casinos. Billy Curtis delivers some great lines. Angel Tompkins puts in a good performance as a kind of moll for the midgets. I first saw this film while on board a US Navy ship. It was the ships evening movie and throughout the showing hilarious roaring could be heard from all the compartments on board that had TV sets in them.

Little Cigars (1973)

** (out of 4)

Mildly entertaining, if 100% bizarre, film from AIP has a gangster's moll (Angel Tompkins) leaving his controlling arms and hooking up with a gang of midgets. The midgets are involved in a small circus but the woman turns them into bigger criminals with a string of robberies. LITTLE CIGARS will probably entertain those who like off the wall material but there's no question that the overall film is incredibly uneven. The film never seems to know if it wants to be kid friendly fun stuff or if it wants to be a tad bit darker and aimed for adults. The strange mix just makes for an uneven film and this here is what really kills things. The kinder side of the picture is innocent enough as the robberies are all done in good taste and none of them feature anything too graphic to the point where you couldn't show the film to kids. However, the darker side of the picture deals with a lot of sexual innuendo between the moll and the midgets, which is somewhat strange to watch. There's also a twist at the end, which leads to an ending that I won't spoil but this too is a lot darker than the rest of the film. These two elements just keep going back and forth and I really wish the filmmakers had selected one and just went all out with it. Still, there are some good things here that make the film worth viewing. The biggest is the performance of Tompkins who really comes off well here. The sexuality of her character is something the actress pulls off with no problems and there wasn't a single time where I didn't believe her in the part. Billy Curtis is also good as the leader of the midgets and I really enjoyed the fire and passion he brought to the character. The rest of the midget actors all fit their roles just fine and certainly help keep the film moving.

A gangsters former mistress (Angel Tompkins) is on the run from him after robbing him. She falls in with a midget acting group (called Little Cigars) who are also robbers. She teams up with them and starts falling for the head of the group (Billy Curtis).

As you can see this is an odd film---even for American International Pictures (AIP). In many ways this is an fun but ordinary caper film--the dialogue and plot would not be out of place in any generic film. It's just this is done with midgets. You think that might play with that more but they don't. There is some pretty explicit sex talk for a PG film and it's pretty obvious that Tompkins is sleeping with Curtis. And get a load of the very obvious sexual animation during the opening credits! The acting is just OK but Tompkins is pretty good.

All in all a strange film. It is fun and it moves very quickly but why have midgets in it and not use that aspect at all? Still it was enjoyable. I give it an 8.

Angel Tompkins(grrrrr.....)stars in this dodgy modern retelling of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs", portraying a shifty waitress who falls into a life of crime with a band of midget grifters. Together, they turn their initial petty thefts into big-time capers which ultimately lead to very serious consequences.

Not at all the light comedy it was marketed as, though there are giggles in spots, the mien of LITTLE CIGARS borders more on seedy noir in a rather nontraditional and semi-exploitive way. Miles short of masterful, but a unique and quirky as hell B flick with considerable cult appeal.

5/10

This film essentially begins with an attractive woman named "Cleo" (Angel Tompkins) robbing a mob boss and quickly fleeing the scene in her car. Needless to say, this infuriates the mob boss who orders a couple of his men to track her down and kill her. To that effect, they eventually stumble upon her while she is working at a roadside diner but after a sudden altercation she manages to escape again. Not long afterward, she takes up with a small group of thieves in a traveling carnival and under her leadership they begin a lucrative crime spree that spans multiple states. What they don't realize, however, is that each heist brings them closer to getting captured by either the law or the mobsters still pursuing her. Now, rather than reveal any more, I will just say that this turned out to be a rather tepid comedy which had just one saving grace--the presence of Angel Tompkins who was absolutely stunning. That said, those viewers familiar with her career might find this film somewhat entertaining and I have rated it accordingly. Average.