loyal to his family (consisting of his six children, each from a different mother), but he cannot be trusted by anyone else. He is also very cynical about priests, and he doesn't care about codified law. This relates most closely to those aspects of Southern Italian life observed by Edward Banfield and others. The film also explores the relationship between Mexican bandits and peasant communities at the time of the revolution, idealized by figures like Juan José Herrera and Elfego Baca, which Leone may have had in mind in his creation of the character of Juan. Release and reaction Performance The film was moderately successful in Italy, where it grossed 1,829,402,000 lire on its first run; it was the third-highest grossing Spaghetti Western at the Italian box office that year, behind Trinity is Still My Name (which overtook For a Few Dollars More as the highest-grossing film ever released in Italy at that time) and Red Sun. Although it was the lowest-grossing of Leone's five Westerns in Italy by a notable margin, it was also the highest-grossing Zapata Western released there. In France, it was the fourth most popular film released there in 1972, behind A Clockwork Orange, Stadium Nuts and Last Tango in Paris. Reception Duck, You Sucker! failed to gain any substantial recognition from the critics at the time of debut, especially compared to Leone's other films, though he did win the David di Donatello for Best Director. Since then, however, it has received a more favorable reception: on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the holds an approval rating of 92% based on 24 reviews, with an average rating of 7.40/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Duck, You Sucker is a saucy helping of spaghetti western, with James Coburn and Rod Steiger's chemistry igniting the screen and Sergio Leone's bravura style on full display". The Chicago Reader praised it for its "marvelous sense of detail and spectacular effects". The New York Observer argues that Leone's direction, Morricone's score and the leads' performance "ignite an emotional explosion comparable to that of Once Upon a Time in the West". In Mexico, where the film is known as Los Héroes de Mesa Verde, it was refused classification and effectively banned until 1979 because it was considered offensive to the Mexican people and the Revolution. Release history The film was originally released in the United States in 1972 as Duck, You Sucker!, and