Directed by Tim Pope, Soft Cell’s Sex Dwarf  video, released to promote their debut album, created quite a scandal in 1981. Claiming it was pornographic, British police actually confiscated copies of the video. It was banned from MTV at the time and is currently banned from Youtube.
 
The Sex Dwarf clip reminds me of the films of Jack Smith and The Kuchar Brothers, mashed up with Texas Chainsaw Massacre: a Bacchanalian group grope full of writhing bodies, hot flesh and a chainsaw. Richard Metzger, DM’s founder, knows quite a bit more about Marc Almond and Soft Cell than I do. He may have some inside info on this notorious video. Enjoy it in all its sleazy glory. 

God do I love this song! Always have.

Best. Song. EVER! Thanx for tracking this rarity down for us, Marc!

No fucking way!  What a trippy vid.  Totally never saw it ‘til now. 

“Enjoy it in all it’s sleazy glory.”  I lol’d at that.  Yeah, nothing like boobs mixed with S&M Texas Chainsaw Massacre orgies and midgets.  Wait, what’s the difference between dwarfs and midgets again?

I have a half dozen copies of this very single on vinyl back from when my older bro worked at Music Plus in LA in the mid-80’s.

I think it was inspired by this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QWhFx2jZGNE&feature=player_embedded

Manooshi: Dwarfism is the genetic characteristic of short folks; dwarf is the preferred term. The term midget is considered by many to be derogatory.

Fantastic find, guys. I had heard rumors about this video years ago, but had long ago given up the hope that it even still existed. You should work on Amelia Earhart’s bones next

@Frank J.: Thanks for the clarification.  I thought that there was an actual scientific distinction between the two categories.  Apparently there IS.  According to a quick search on the interwebs:  a midget is simply an extremely short person with no other genetic disproportions or nerve compressions as with a dwarf.  A midget’s condition is treatable with simply growth hormones, while growth hormones do not work for a dwarf, because dwarfism is a lot more complex of a medical condition to “treat” in that it involves painful surgeries for the   joint diseases, nerve compressions, disproportionate organs that the former do not have. 

And yet, although being a midget turns out to indeed be a distinct and less severe and more easily treatable condition that dwarfism, it remains an “offensive” term.  Probably due to the fact that “midget” was the term erroneously and offensively used for BOTH conditions for so long, and well, fortunate or not, these extremely short persons were often openly mocked in mainstream culture in the past, ie: the 1981 Chevy Chase comedic movie, “Under the Rainbow.”

Sex Dwarf has always been one of my favorite songs no matter where my musical muse has carried me. This is pure awesome.

On the “video album” VHS release called “Non-Stop Exotic Video Show” they keep threatening that they’re going to show this hideous video, but the actual video they show for Sex Dwarf features Marc Almond in a suit and glasses conducting a small chamber orchestra in a pleasant setting. When they released the DVD did they add this video as an extra? Of course not.

I believe the point of this video was to get attention from the Fleet Street gutter press to play up their “sleazy” image. Must’ve worked like a charm!

I’d given up hope of ever seeing this. Good find, Marc!