Piccoli ladri di cavalli

This is a cute and heartwarming little movie about kids who develop a fantastic heist together, after planning to steal some horses (which are actually just ponies I think) from a mine company's owner who, after deciding to fully mechanize his operation and destroy the horses which are now useless to him and obsolete. It is a great family film but very hard to find here in North America and I eventually tracked down a second hand copy on tape from a television broadcast in I think the 1980s. The movie was originally made in the 1970s if I remember correctly.

The kids are great and the story is fun and realistic and never boring, even though it's a pretty simple plot. The kids will love this one, trust me. Also keep an eye out for Alastair Sim, a really fantastic and under-appreciated actor best known for his role as Scrooge in what I think is the hands down best version of that story ever filmed. I give this one 9/10.

Luckily this is not a syrupy-sweet Disney film. It was filmed entirely in the forbidding Yorkshire moors. And though you know it will be a happy ending, they make no bones about the fact that the small working ponies have spent their entire lives down in the coal mines and are about to be sold to the slaughterhouse. Alistair Sims makes his final movie appearance here - most of you will know him as Scrooge from the 1951 version of "A Christmas Carol" or in a featured role in Alfred Hitchcock's "Stage Fright."

The stage curtains open ...

Set in 1909, this is the courageous story of 3 brave children who set out to rescue pit ponies scheduled to be sent to the slaughterhouse because they are being replaced by modernized mining equipment. It is a well written and directed live-action Disney film that touches the heart in the setting of the harsh reality of living in a coal mining town during the turn of the century.

When Alice, the daughter of the quarry foreman, finds out that the pit ponies used to haul coal out of the mine are going to be slaughtered because they are no longer needed, she teams up with two boys from the town to set up a plan to sneak into the mines, steal the ponies, and hide them. Aided by a good-hearted man named Bert - the caretaker of the ponies - they find another way in to carry out their daring plan.

This was a film I remember watching when I was in school as a kid under the Amercian title of "The Littlest Horse Thieves". I remember liking it and I was able to finally track it down again all these years later. Watching it again, I was suprised at the level of reality that was represented with changes that they had to face back then, echoing down through the ages to changes we all face daily, some of which we may not like. But, like our littlest thieves, we all find a way to make the best of things and move on with a positive attitude.

I absolutely loved this movie upon rewatching it. This Disney film flew under the radar, and even among most people my age, it has become forgotten. I highly recommend it to anyone, who can find this lost gem, at a strong 8 stars out of 10.

Alastair Sim, in his last screen role, tasks the manager of his colliery with making it profitable. The proposed solution is to install machines to move the coal about and retire the pit ponies -- and by 'retire' is meant 'send them to the knackers.' Three of the children in the neighborhood work out a scheme to save them.

There's some inconsistency in the writing in this script, particularly in the way Sim's character behaves; it's surprising given the writers: Burt Kennedy and Rosemary Ann Sisson. I also never saw children who could muck about in coal pits and remain so clean as the three the movie centers on, not to mention pit ponies. Nonetheless, the performances are excellence, and Chloe Franks gives a particularly lively and engaging performance. Good location shooting in Yorkshire adds to the pleasures of the film. All in all, it's a strong Disney movie, with milder humor and some actual fear and sadness under the direction of Charles Jarrott.

Equines of many types were used in the mines. In the US, it was mostly mules, but in Britain, it was ponies, who could move through the confined spaces more easily. the first recorded use of ponies was in Durham about 1750. In 1887 the British government began to regulate their use, and the Pit Ponies' Protection Society (later the National Equine Defense League) was founded in 1907. Ponies' use peaked in 1913, with an estimated 70,000 working underground. Use declined with rising mechanization, and the last known pit pony, "Robbie" retired from a Welsh mine in 1999. The last known living pit pony was Tony who died in 2011 aged 40 at the Newcastle Cat and Dog Shelter.

This British film from the Disney Studios is a real sleeper. Although Alastair Sim in what would turn out to be the last theatrically released film of his career is top billed, his is really a supporting role. I doubt most on this side of the pond would know any of the cast members other than Sim, but the real stars are three kids and a Shetland pony, one of many ponies that is used in the Yorkshire coal mines in the beginning years of the last century.

In the mines the little ponies are used to take the coal out but Sim has hired Peter Barkworth as a new manager and he wants to bring in automatic conveyor machines to take the coal out. What happens to the faithful ponies, most likely sent to the slaughterhouse for pet food.

That does not sit well with Barkworth's daughter Chloe Franks and her new friends Andrew Harrison and Benjie Bolgar who are miner's kids. The three steal the ponies. I won't say more but the ponies prove their worth in the end.

This Disney film raises some real adult labor management issues and also issues about the ethical treatment of animals. Among the other issues that are raised is the ponies develop eye trouble and even blindness from exposure to coal dust. It's what happens to the kid's favorite pony. And I guarantee when you see the sacrifice this pony makes on behalf of its human masters you will not have a dry eye for days.

This film should be better known. It's for kids and kids of all ages. And the review is dedicated to one Amber Small, the most dedicated animal activist I know.