Dites-le avec des oignons

I love Spaghetti Westerns, but am kind of weary of the more comedic ones as most, to be honest, are rubbish. This one stars Franco Nero as a man who travels in a carriage full of onions pulled by a farting horse, eating onions, juggling onions, drinking onion juice, and using them in fights. This film goes beyond stupid and because you've got Enzo Castellari behind the camera, you've got 100% effort. The might is extremely silly and full of slapstick though, so be warned.

I forgot to say that Nero's character is also called Onion, and he's just bought some land to plant onions from a guy who we've just seen being murdered by Romano Puppo and Massimo Vanni and another guy (the three bad guys Nero went up against in Castellari's Street Law). They work for the usual generic big business guy (Martin Balsam) who wants the land to prospect for oil. What's not generic is that Martin has a robotic hand that for some reason is maintained by Hitler!

Sterling Heyden is the local supressed newspaper guy with Emma Cohen as the daughter who falls in love with Nero (he even uses onion talk romantically). He also ends up looking after two young kids named Al Capone and Dutch Schultz. I'm guessing most people will have stopped reading the review by now, because how many do you know like this sort of stuff?

It is fun if you sit back and let the stupidity roll over you. There's a motorcycle gang, loads of stunts, and way too many Benny Hill style chases. Romano Puppo and Massimo Vanni have larger roles than usual as the bad guys. My eight year old kid thought the few minutes of it were funny, before he slipped away to continue playing his Xbox.

Spaghetti-westerns weren't just Sergio Leone and Clint Eastwood, friends; they weren't even just Terence Hill and Bud Spencer.

I saw this film years ago on the Caribbean SuperStation, a short-lived satellite channel from Aruba. I found it weird and fascinating, a spaghetti-western gone nuts; but I didn't catch the title. Afterward, all I could remember was that (a) the hero was named Onion, (b) Martin Balsam was a co-star, and (c) a child in the film spoke with an adult's voice. After some time, I began to wonder if I'd just ... imagined the film.

Now, thanks to the IMDb, I can rest assured that (a) I did indeed see this film, (b) it does exist outside my imagination, and (c) others have seen it, too.

Spoof and entertaining tongue-in-cheek spaghetti Western . Silly slapstick euro-western , Terence Hill-style . Funny but average film with action , struggles , and shootouts by expert Enzo G. Castell . This Spanish-Italian co-production deals with a likable countryside man (Franco Nero) called Onion Stark who arrives in a little town named ¨Paradise City¨ , where he attempts to start a new life . Stark buys a parcel of land from a family whose father (Antonio Pica) was recently killed . He assumes the land is worthless , attempting to grow an onion farm , he subsequently joins forces with a pair of orphan boys . After a while , Stark is chased by three bounty hunters (Romano Puppo, Nazzareno Zamperla , Massimo Vanni) going after him . Later on , Onion Stark to be aware that the parcel is actually worth a lot of money , he realizes what it has valuable petroleum . Meantime , a greedy landowner who has a strange mechanical hand , proprietary of a powerful oil company , called Petrus Lamb (Martin Balsam) , has robbed all the property around the town due to the vast oil reserves under the location . After that , Lamb and his band of fanatics hoodlums along with a corrupt sheriff (Leo Anchoriz) and deputies (Dan Van Husen) set out to take the precious lands from Stark and decided to steal lands at whatever cost . Onion is helped by a publishing editor called Pulitzer (Sterling Hayden) and his daughter (Emma Cohen) with whom falls in love . Finally , it revolves around the increasingly ridiculous tryings to take the lease out of Stark's possession . At the ending takes place an absurd duel between Onion and the nasty hoodlums .

This is a regular Faglioli-Spaghetti Western in Trinity and Bambino style and for that reason there is a cult to dirtiness with an appropriately goofy tone , customary issue in this sub-genre . It looks passable , have some pretty amusing characters , some bemusing pursuits in silent cinema style and a really catchy theme song . The movie made me laugh a few times , even though I insist that it has too much slapstick humor for its own good . The movie takes parts from Enzo Barboni movies such as ¨Trinity is my name¨ and ¨Trinity is still my name¨ . The film is plenty of action , fun , brawls , shootouts , surprise-filled entertainment , chases with cycle , motorcycles , pony , and including a horse with hat . The picture contains funny gun-play along with fist-fight very much in the Terence Hill/Bud Spencer territory . The violence isn't crude but suits the light-weight comedy fun and silly slapstick like the Trinity series . This film reaches its sidesplitting comedic highlights with a couple of wild anything-goes rough'n'tumble fist fight scenes . It certainly has an enthusiast cast , plenty of slapstick , some very impressive gymnastics , especially in the massive fight sequences . The movie was finely starred by habitual Spaghetti as Franco Nero . Here Franco steals the show with his gestures , faces and excesses , including some scenes eating onions ; furthermore , the silly final filled with modern motorcycles , cycles and embarrassing shoot'em up . The picture displays crazy characters with twists , thrills and being quite amusing . It does eventually outstay its welcome , and there are a surprising amount of fights and laughters . Moreover , the lively support cast play their broadly caricatured parts with tremendous lip-smacking enthusiasm . There appear usual secondaries as Italian players : Romano Puppo, Nazzareno Zamperla , Massimo Vanni , American players : Sterling Hayden , Martin Balsam , as Spanish actors : Leo Anchoriz , Daniel Martín , Antonio Pica , Charly Bravo , Mariano Vidal Molina , Manuel Zarzo , Xan Das Bolas , Jorge Rigaud .

A really catching and commercial score musical by Guido and Mauricio De Angelis who often work with Castellari . Atmospheric cinematography filmed by Alejandro Ulloa shot in Almeria , of course . Silly screenplay with ridiculous situations written by the usual Luciano Vincenzoni , Sergio Donati , both of them Sergio Leone' regulars and Miguel De Echarri , also producer . Enzo G Castell makes a nice camera work with usual zooms and clever choreography on the showdown , fighting , slow motion shootouts and bemusing scenes . Enzo relates the nutty story at a constant zippy pace and maintains an amiably silly tongue-in-cheek tone throughout . He made more Western as ¨ Johnny Hamlet¨ , ¨Kill them everybody and came back alone¨ , ¨Seven Winchester for a massacre¨, and in similar style ¨Tedeum¨ . His masterpiece is : ¨Keoma¨. Some of them are serious , others are goofy and plenty of slapstick and slapdash . This is a bewildering story , funny in lots of parts and it will appeal to Spaghetti Western fans . It's a mediocre film , but still better than a lot of the ulterior spaghetti western comedies to come .

This B movie stands out among similar western comedies by the absurd, sometimes quite Pythonesque humour. Franco Nero would not be the first name that comes to mind for such a production (nor the second, or third), but he does very well as the Terrence Hill stand-in; his wide blue-eyed stare conveys both innocence and mischief, and he does fine in the slapstick sequences too. His "hero" role is complemented by a diverse bunch of side characters, not well-known but well-cast. The sets and camera-work are good, too. The music covers the complete gamut of italo-westerns and then a bit more, a little crazy like the whole movie. The pacing is quick, there's not a single boring moment in Cipolla Colt.

The only drawback to this otherwise nice comedy is the generic plot (an oil magnate trying to grab poor farmer's land); with action that absurd the movie would have deserved some crazier story, too. Apart from that, recommended for anyone not put off by absurd humour.

I went in this movie with the expectation of a mediocre-mid-70s-Spagetti-Western. But what I found was a weird, little trashy western comedy with an absolut hilarious surrealism and absurdity. The juggling scene cracked me up like not much did in some time. If your looking for a silly but still lovely little movie that makes you cheer up and laugh this one will be a good choice.