Film Review: The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid (Uno sceriffo extraterrestre... poco extra e molto terrestre, 1979)

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(source: tmdb.org)

Cary Guffey is a former child actor who gained the moment of cinema glory in his debut as Barry Guiller, boy who gets abducted by aliens in Steven Spielberg’s science fiction classic Close Encounters of the Third Kind. His next two films were similarly themed and allowed him to be partnered with another giant of international cinema. First of those was The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid, 1979 Italian science fiction comedy directed by Michele Lupo.

The plot is set in Newnan, city in Coweta County, Georgia, where the peace is maintained by Sheriff Hall (played by Bud Spencer), burly lawman who is well liked by fellow citizens and whose biggest problem is Brennan (played by Joe Bogner), habitual local troublemaker whom he continually puts behind bars with ease. Much bigger challenge happens when the local area became object of media hype created by UFO sightings. Sheriff Hall is sceptical towards those reports, but this changes after he is called to bring errant boy home. After he does so, he encounters another boy (played by Guffey) who says that his name is H7-25 and that he is alien left from a visiting space ship. Sheriff Hall at first attributes those claims to boy’s rich imagination, but soon strange phenomena begins to happen in the city, apparently caused by peculiar device in boy’s possession. After seeing H7-25 able to manipulate remote objects and talk to animals, Sheriff Hall starts to believe and, despite boy’s occasionally mischievous acts, begins to get fond of him and decides to protect him when he becomes object of interest for USAF Captain Briggs (played by Raimund Harmstorf), ambitious and ruthless officer who wants to capture the alien and conduct experiments on him.

Bud Spencer at the time of The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid owed its global popularity to the large number of immensely successful action comedies directed at the least demanding audience, mostly children. This film, made at the height of science fiction craze among global film makers and under obvious influence of Spielberg’s work, looked tailor made for Spencer who had already built his onscreen persona of grumbling giant with the heart of gold. Michele Lupo, who had, like many members of the cast, worked with Spencer before, doesn’t want to reinvent the wheel and uses the same approach that served the giant of Italian cinema well in his previous films – relatively simple story as an excuse for lot of slapstick and comical brawls. The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid adds to the formula adorable child in the same predicament as the title character of E.T. would be found in three years later. This results in increased sentimentality that many viewers would, at least at times, found too syrupy. The film, which was shot on authentic locations in Georgia (which allowed young Cuffy to work close to parents’ home) had much more serious problems with budget, which is reflected in near complete absence of special effects and some more annoying details. One of them is apparently unfinished soundtrack by Oliver Onions which forces producers to use certain segments in the wrong scenes. Slow motion is used in couple scenes only to beef up running time to the 90 minutes standard. One of the rare moments of inspirations is a scene that could be described as some sort of “meta” and in which Sheriff Hall explains H7-25 comedic duo of Laurel and Hardy, thus reminding Spencer’s fans of Terrence Hill, who is sadly missed here. Despite its flaws and despite not having US cinema distribution, The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid was successful enough at international box office to warrant sequel Everything Happens to Me made one year later.

RATING: 4/10 (++)