Kid, Terror of the West / Kid il monello del West (Tonino Ricci, 1973)

Phil_H · October 14, 2011, 10:23am

Couldn’t help but be reminded when watching this of the Children’s Film Foundation flicks of my childhood. Kids outwit adults, defeat the crooks and win the reward. Just as it should be in a film for children, starring children. Not much here for an adult audience, except perhaps for a little nostalgia value but it’s all harmless in an ‘Our Gang’ kind of way.

As an aside, whoever put the trivia note on the film’s DB page got it wrong. This is not a remake of Bugsy Malone. For a start the story is completely different and for another it was made 3 years before Malone. I guess I’ll remove it from the page.

Database page: Kid il monello del west - The Spaghetti Western Database

ION_BRITTON · October 14, 2011, 10:35am

Couldn’t sit through it. I tortured myself for about 40 minutes and then I switched it off.

ENNIOO · October 14, 2011, 10:53am

Well it is different just mainly having children in the film, suppose that kept me watching. Never seen Bugsy Malone as of yet.

sartana1968 · October 14, 2011, 1:20pm

the worst SW??? posible!

ENNIOO · October 14, 2011, 3:24pm

The Fat Boys Of Trinity is worse than this one .

ION_BRITTON · October 14, 2011, 5:40pm

There’s no doubt that such comparisons tell a few things about this kind of movies’ quality. ;D

Bill_san_Antonio · October 16, 2011, 3:20pm

Same thing happened to me. Maybe I’ll give it second chance some time in the future. Maybe in 10-15 years.

sartana1968 · October 16, 2011, 8:31pm

much much worse than the ‘plan 9 from out of space’ :o

ION_BRITTON · October 16, 2011, 8:45pm

Plan 9 is great fun.

sartana1968 · October 16, 2011, 8:50pm

haha yes…

alk0 · October 17, 2011, 11:03am

Future events such as these will affect you… in the future!

sartana1968 · October 17, 2011, 11:13am

40 minutes??? are you kidding me? :o i saw the pics and read the story i don’t want to see this crap ever!!!
maybe i see it only for me bottom 20 maybe, but i see every week 10 minutes

Bill_san_Antonio · September 23, 2015, 8:08pm

I tried second time to watch this… I switched after 4 minutes to Providence 2.

ENNIOO · September 23, 2015, 10:57pm

Wise choice

Carlos · March 19, 2017, 4:07pm

As these things go it wasn’t any worse than a bunch of other similar comedies. The kids weren’t too bad. Fortunato Arena was good as the befuddled sheriff and at least there was a reason for the juvenile activities All in all I didn’t mind it at all.

JonathanCorbett · March 19, 2017, 6:58pm

I see that recently somebody uploaded a shortened version of L’ostaggio (a.k.a. La farina del diavolo) to YouTube.

https://www.spaghetti-western.net/index.php/L'Ostaggio

Carlos · March 19, 2017, 7:56pm

Thanks, I think .
Looks like the opening credits identify the actors so I suppose I’ll have to check it out

JonathanCorbett · March 19, 2017, 9:57pm

I think all actors are children in Valanzano’s movie. No Fortunato Arena to counterbalance here!

Carlos · August 4, 2023, 6:03pm

Kid, Terror of the West has been updated to the new layout (3.0). Let us know if you can add anything: pictures, posters, trivia, facts, figures, links, etc…

Mickey13 · November 24, 2023, 3:44pm

Copied from the Spagvemberfest 2023 thread:

Spagvemberfest 2023 - or the crows will drink our beers

Well, I did finish it in the end, though I cannot say I am proud much of this dubious feat. The biggest issue with the flick undoubtedly consists in the fact that with the exception of some subplot about a loan shark dispossessing indigent farmers and the principal plotline pertaining to the kids robbing the bank, there is no palpable narration to anchor the jejune bafoonery. There are raspberry shootouts, fart jokes, brats flinging manure and serving piss disguised as beer to their adversaries, you know, real classy stuff. All of the aforementioned is exacerbated by the abominably long duration which renders the film-viewing experience all the more execrable and excruciating. The movie feels overlong and protracted even when watching it at 1.5x speed which is actually an accomplishment when you really think about it.

At the end of the day, the worst aspect of the turkey is that the underage actors are required to act in the funny, cute way which basically amounts to the irritating kid syndrome multiplied by however many children this movie has. There is basically no reason to see this unless you find the first five minutes or so engaging, as the rest of the film basically peddles the same scene over and over again with very little variation in the way it is all presented. If you really want to see a kiddie spaghetti western for some obscure reason, viewing L’ostaggio would be a wiser choice in spite of its conspicuously lower budget inasmuch as the kids there do not go out of their way to be funny, simply acting out their roles in a straightforward manner; its story feels a tad more substantive and it is shorter too. As for Kid il monello del west, I find it to be virtually unwatchable. It goes straight into my bottom 20, the only reason why I am not giving it a 1 star rating is because it is framed in a competent fashion and the storyline, albeit fundamentally flimsy, is carried out in a passable manner.