Skip to content
The Kid paints the scenario of a very unhappy family, as young lad Rio Cutler (Jake Schur) is faced with no choice other than to take out his evil father, who has just dispatched of his wife, and thus, Rio’s mother. Stepping in is his even angrier uncle, Grant (Chris Pratt, with an even more ridiculous beard than usual).
Rio gets caught up in Billy The Kid’s (Dane DeHaan) situation – a young man who’s always trying to evade the law, and who was painted as some kind of anti-hero along the way, so we think of him as a latter-day Robin Hood, in that he’s done some bad things, but he’s still being good to those who deserve it. Hence, not just about the titular Kid, but this lad as well, so that gives something additional to the story.
Rio and his sister Sarah (Leila George, who’s the daughter of director/actor Vincent D’Onofrio, but who still puts in her time well onscreen so it’s not a case of unwarranted nepotism, such as you’d expect of, say, Beattie Edmondso in alleged comedy roles) go on the run from Grant, but get separated, so not only is it a case of ‘getting the band back together’ but employing the talents of Sheriff Pat Garrett (Ethan Hawke, who worked on 2016’s The Magnificent Seven reboot with D’Onofrio, as well as 1998’s The Newton Boys, although I haven’t seen the latter) in delivering justice to Grant, even though Pat has enough on his plate with the main baddie in question.
DeHaan is a good choice for Billy The Kid. Okay, the actor was 31 at the time of making this, and Billy was 21 when he bit the bulet, but DeHaan has a boyish look to him. In fact, he looks younger than Emilio Estevez did when he was 25 whilst filming Young Guns. Similarly, Garrett was only 9 years older, but Ethan Hawke is almost 50. Still, he’s also fine in the role.
Overall, The Kid is a moderately interesting movie, and it’s clear that DeHaan could make a great Billy if he had the script to do it with, but there’s just not enough of him, here, and it feels it’s more Rio’s story than Billy’s. Then again, perhaps the title is referring to Rio since he’s a young boy, rather than Billy and his nickname, but that would be rather misleading.
Also, at the point where Billy the Kid is dead, and is laid down for townsfolk to pay their respects, the camera lingers a little too long, since DeHaan is clearly taking a breath 😉
Oh, and I had to suffix the title with the year, in case you confused it with the 1921 Charlie Chaplin movie, or Bruce Willis’ rather brilliant 2000 time-bending film.
There are no issues with the picture and sound, not that you’d expect any. However, don’t expect much in the way of extras, since while that section says “Extras”, there’s only one: “The Making Of The Kid” (9:25), which is a straight-forward mix of clips from the film with chat from key cast and crew members.
The menu features a short piece of music on a loop, set against clips from the film. Subtitles are in English only, and there are just a bog-standard 12 chapters.
The Kid is out now on Blu-ray, Amazon Prime and DVD.
|
FILM CONTENT PICTURE QUALITY SOUND QUALITY EXTRAS |
4 10 8 1 |
| OVERALL | 6 |
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 101 minutes
Year: 2018
Distributor: Lionsgate
Cat.no: LIB95748R0
Released: June 3rd 2019
Chapters: 12
Picture: 1080p High Definition
Sound: DTS HD-MA 5.1
Languages: English
Subtitles: English SDH
Format: 2.39:1
Disc Format: BD50
Director: Vincent D’Onofrio
Producers: Sam Maydew, David Mimran, Jordan Schur, Nick Thurlow
Screenplay: Andrew Lanham
Music: Latham Gaines, Shelby Gaines
Cast:
Rio Cutler: Jake Schur
Sara Cutler: Leila George
Grant Cutler: Chris Pratt
Billy ‘The Kid’ Bonney: Dane DeHaan
Sheriff Pat Garrett: Ethan Hawke
Billy Wilson: Charlie Chappell
Tom Pickett: Clint Obenchain
Charlie Bowdre: Chris Bylsma
Dave Rudabaugh: Chad Dashnaw
Jim East: Benjamin Dickey
Bill Cutler: Tait Fletcher
Oran Moler: Hawk D’Onofrio
Manuela: Diana Navarrete
Paulita Maxwell: Samantha Zajarias
Sheriff Romero: Vincent D’Onofrio
Bob Olinger: Adam Baldwin
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.