Truly Dreadful Film

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

This would be a quite conventional Western from the 30's and 40's if it were not played by an all-midget cast. There is the good and charming white-hat cowboy who struggles against the mischievous plans of the black-hat villain. The movie starts very boring, but gets better with more action-oriented scenes and a faster pace. Indeed, the action scenes are nice and not ridiculous as one could expect, particularly for a B Western. The goal of being a funny comedy has not been achieved, though. There are lots of musical footage, varying from awful to amusing throughout the film. Watch it in this link: https://archive.org/details/TheTerrorOfTinyTown1938_802

Fun little western with an all-midget cast. I first saw clips of this back in the '90s in the Hal Ketchum music video for "Small Town Saturday Night." The plot's pretty standard stuff about cattle rustlers and the like with a Romeo & Juliet romantic subplot. But no one is watching this for the plot. They're watching for the novelty of seeing midgets play cowboys, riding little ponies and such. It's all terribly cute and fun with some nice songs, to boot. Apparently the "Oh my stars & garters" crowd have their knickers in a twist over the exploitation of these midget actors. Whatever. They are all having a good time acting and making a living. No one is humiliated in this and I fail to see how it hurts anyone, living or dead. But you know how some people got to have something to whine about. Anyway, it's a cute little B movie that isn't supposed to be taken too seriously. A nice way to kill an hour.

This film is a genuine novelty. The film has been put together as a straightforward B-Western as produced in the late 1930s. It appears to have been filmed on the same locations as dozens of other B-Westerns, with a stock, wall-to-wall music score. The difference is when you see and hear the players. This takes a few minutes to get used to, but once you are into it, you start to get caught up in the story and don't even notice the fact that the entire cast is made up of "little people". The acting in this ranges from fair to good, and the direction is as good as in any Roy Rogers or Gene Autry opus. This is not a bad little film and well worth your time if you are in the mood for something different.

One wonders who thought this would be a great idea--a western done straight with all midgets. Plot-wise this is like any other B western--two neighboring ranchers suspect each other of rustling their cattle. The Hero (that's how he's billed in the cast--Billy Curtis) of one ranch falls in love with the Girl (Yvonne Moray) of the other ranch! And the Villain (Little Billy) tries to frame the Hero.The plot is as old as the hills and every single Western cliché is firmly in place. Also there are songs! The movie opens with the entire town singing a nauseating song about how happy they are! There's there's a saloon vamp (Nita Krebs) who squeaks out a few more (and very badly too). The acting is truly horrendous and (cinematically speaking) this movie is worthless. After the initial novelty of the midgets wears off this is pretty lame stuff. Still it moves quick and is only about an hour long. Also there are some good action scenes--if you can get past the midgets riding ponies instead of horses! I give this a 3 because it does have its moments and you have to admire the fact that the whole movie is played straight.