|
|
Post by wmcclain on Jan 17, 2020 14:14:02 GMT
Bandolero! (1968), directed by Andrew V. McLaglen. First reviewEntertaining but formulaic western. Everyone knows how to behave during a bank robbery and when escaping from a hanging. Many familiar faces and the same old sound effects. And where do they get all those little leather vests? It's supposed to be 1867: shouldn't there be more Civil War paraphernalia? The late-60s twist is to make the good guys dullards and James Stewart a spur of the moment bank robber. A little anti-hero sentiment. This is when westerns had to have a little funky jaw-harp music for background whimsy. But the bandit leader treats his female hostage more or less decently and she has nice outfits. It's startling how many 1960s westerns have Rat Pack crew. This is one of several with Dean Martin. Raquel Welch's problem was that she was a notorious beauty and the filmmakers didn't let her do anything else. Jerry Goldsmith score. Second reviewA few additional notes and new thumbnails from the Blu-ray. - There is "tough" but "tough old man" -- as James Stewart plays here -- is something even harder. As it turns out he's actually a sweetie who uses comedy rather than meanness.
- Inevitably we will compare this to the The Wild Bunch (1969) which came out the next year. We open with a bank robbery gone wrong and have a pursuit of the gang into Mexico. This film is brutal by the standards of the time, but Peckinpah's film goes to a whole new level.
- Raquel Welch always looks like a million bucks, no matter how hard the riding or how harsh the desert conditions. Those cheekbones are always perfectly lit. The filmmakers can't help it in this case, although I note that Barbara Rush looks pretty stressed in Hombre (1967) made the year before.
- In a early exchange with the banker, Welch says "I was a whore at 13 and my family of 12 never went hungry".
- The movie reminds me of how much George Kennedy added to every film he was in. Here he is the shy small town sheriff hopelessly in love with the former prostitute, now a rich widow.
- Doesn't anyone wonder how the condemned man got a gun on the gallows?
- Hiding the saddlebags of bank loot in plain sight is a nice gimmick.
- Jerry Goldsmith's main theme was given lyrics and became a minor pop tune as "There's Got to Be a Better Way".
Photographed by William H. Clothier -- The Horse Soldiers (1959), The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962), Seven Men from Now (1956). Available on Blu-ray from Twilight Time. The commentary track by western film scholars is more about the people than the story. 
|
|
|
|
Post by wmcclain on Jan 17, 2020 14:14:18 GMT
100 Rifles (1969), directed by Tom Gries. First reviewAn entry in a well-known western genre: running guns to Mexico, blowing up trains and having massacre-level gunfights. Lawman Jim Brown has crossed the border to bring back half-breed bank robber Burt Reynolds, who has spent the money on rifles for peasant revolutionary Raquel Welch. Brown becomes tangled up in the cause, gets hot and steamy with Welch (an interracial novelty at the time) and when Welch takes even a mostly clothed shower under the water tank, you can bet the train will stop for her. (The disc is PG today; times have changed). It's large scale and action-adventure-packed with fine Spanish locations. Jim Brown was still a semi-pro actor but is likeable and studly. Reynolds is funny and Welch gets to do more running, jumping and fighting than usual. Fernando Lamas and Eric Braeden are the villains. Some of the dialog drags and the plot is a problem: a jumble of chasing, fighting, shooting, blowing things up, drinking, getting caught and escaping. The same director did the Rat Patrol TV series and you can see the similarity: lots of episodic desert action that doesn't get anywhere. We do have a final big battle: train vs town, both sides having machine guns and artillery. Certainly not top drawer (as, for example, The Professionals (1966)) but I liked it better than the IMDB rating would suggest. Exciting Jerry Goldsmith score and a rather good-looking dual-layer DVD. Second reviewA few more notes and new Blu-ray thumbnails. - The director really wanted Welch to remove her top for the water tank shower scene. As always, she refused to do nudity. Burt Reynolds said it was sexier with a shirt. He's right. As curious as I might be I can't imagine her firing a double barreled shotgun topless.
- The three leads did quite a bit of their own stunt work.
- For a couple of seconds in Goldsmith's score I thought I heard a Borg percussion motif, 27 years before his music for Star Trek: First Contact (1996).
Available on Blu-ray from Kino with a enthusiastic commentary track by Lee Pfeiffer, Paul Scrabo and Anthony Latino. 
|
|
|
|
Post by wmcclain on Jan 17, 2020 14:14:38 GMT
Hannie Caulder (1971), directed by Burt Kennedy. First reviewAnother Raquel Welch western, R-rated and more brutal than Bandolero! (1968) or 100 Rifles (1969). Lots of blood splatter with vivid red paint, a color not found in nature. Welch's husband is killed and she is raped by three vicious but comically moronic bank robbers: Ernest Borgnine, Jack Elam, and Strother Martin. Wandering the desert she falls in with bounty hunter Robert Culp. After some resistance he takes her to master gunsmith Christopher Lee and we have a long segment of her discipleship in the gunfighting martial arts. Then she's after the Clemens Bros. The rape and revenge plot would be pretty grim but the story is softened with some humor and light romance. Originally wearing nothing but a poncho, she later adds pants but still wears nothing else above the waist. It's a wool blanket; that must be rough. She picks up some snappy comeback patter. The villains are just strange, as if wandering in from a different movie: Would you believe there is a walking on the beach holding hands at sunset with girly music scene? Stephen Boyd appears uncredited as a mysterious gunman. There's no explaining him. Filmed in Spain. Second reviewNew notes and thumbnails from the Blu-ray. - Raquel Welch's production company made this, so it must be the film she wanted. She would not do nudity, but featured degrading rape and abundant blood splatter. (I respect the decision not to take off her clothes: once everything is exposed the mystery is over, right? There is more power in keeping covered).
- The villain brothers wear filthy dusters, which I suspect is a jibe at Leone films.
- A weird and nonsensical bit: during the opening bank robbery the camera looks out both barrels of a shotgun, an impossible point of view.
- Robert Culp lightly oils his cartridge belt, the first time I recall anyone maintaining their leather gear in a western.
- We have a lot of style drift in the score: action, girly romance, comical goofing.
- British bombshell Diana Dors has a cameo as the bordello madam.
- This is said to be well-liked by Quentin Tarantino, and you can see why. Apart from the rape-and-revenge story, the apprenticeship to the bounty hunter is like the master-pupil relationship in a martial arts film. He particularly liked Culp's master bounty hunter.
My thumbnails are from the original Olive Blu-ray. It looks like it was taken from an old scan done for DVD. The image is brighter than the DVD which helps with contrast, but is otherwise a modest upgrade. I haven't seen it, but Olive has produced a "Signature" disc from a new scan which is said to have a better image and more extras, including a commentary track. 
|
|
|
|
Post by snsurone on Jan 17, 2020 16:56:49 GMT
Since you seem to like Raquel Welch so much, how about a review of MYRA BRECKINRIDGE (featured in the Medved"s book "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time, 1977)?  |
|
|
|
Post by wmcclain on Jan 17, 2020 17:13:09 GMT
Since you seem to like Raquel Welch so much, how about a review of MYRA BRECKINRIDGE (featured in the Medved"s book "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time, 1977)? It's on my list... I'd advise ignoring "worst" lists, though.
|
|
|
|
Post by snsurone on Jan 17, 2020 18:13:45 GMT
Since you seem to like Raquel Welch so much, how about a review of MYRA BRECKINRIDGE (featured in the Medved"s book "The Fifty Worst Films of All Time, 1977)? It's on my list... I'd advise ignoring "worst" lists, though. But it's much more fun to read about what's wrong with a movie than what's right with it. Don't you agree?
|
|
|
|
Post by bravomailer on Jan 17, 2020 19:08:54 GMT
Visual aid  |
|
|
|
Post by OldAussie on Jan 17, 2020 19:22:16 GMT
Been a while, but I recall Bandolero! & 100 Rifles as decent entertainment for western lovers.
Haven't seen Hannie Caulder but I'm interested - a female Nevada Smith?
My only memoery of MYRA BRECKINRIDGE is that it should be in a list of worst movies.
|
|
|
|
Post by Prime etc. on Jan 17, 2020 20:03:50 GMT
Haven't seen Haddie Caulder yet. I have it on file. Maybe I will save it for the 50th anniversary.
How can you leave out Lorenzo Lamas in the 100 Rifles review?
You look marvelous.
It is better to look good then to feel good.
I do not think I had ever seen one of his movies until watching this last year. Strong presence. Dominates the scenes he is in.
I watch a lot of Euro westerns so it is interesting how the American versions differ in theme on the same subject.
I.e. if one compares TEPEPA 1969 to 100 RIFLES 1969.
Both have a bad ass general (Orson Welles in the former, Lamas in the latter), both have a foreigner entering the fray (Jim Brown as a federal agent in 100 Rifles, an English doctor in TEPEPA), both have the rebellious type (Burt Reynolds, Tomas Milian in Tepepa).
Both talk about "the revolution" but there's a difference--the ultimate message in TEPEPA seems to be that the revolution is an internal matter--no outsiders allowed (the subplot involves an English doctor who wants revenge on Tomas Milian for raping his Mexican fiancee`. In the case of 100 Rifles, Reynolds is more of the outsider yet he (reluctantly) gets recruited as leader by the end.
|
|
|
|
Post by teleadm on Jan 17, 2020 20:09:21 GMT
Bandolero! 1968, I liked the first half of the movie, but once they stop in an "abandoned" Mexican town it stalled and became boring, but still with a few good ideas, and and Jimmy and Dino play bad guys. Since I have this on DVD maybe time to watch it again.
100 Rifles 1969, once sensational love scenes with Raquel and Brown, is rather tame now, as is the movie, thought a pre-Burt Burt Reynolds was funny.
One can notice a few things that the Italian Spaghetti Westerns had influenced, violence and humour.
Hannie Caulder 1972, never seen
|
|
|
|
Post by politicidal on Jan 17, 2020 23:37:31 GMT
I wouldn’t have thought about casting Stewart and Martin as brother but it surprisingly works.
Saw 100 Rifles years ago but remember little from it.
|
|
|
|
Post by petrolino on Jan 17, 2020 23:49:59 GMT
Hannie Caulder (1971), directed by Burt Kennedy. First reviewAnother Raquel Welch western, R-rated and more brutal than Bandolero! (1968) or 100 Rifles (1969). Lots of blood splatter with vivid red paint, a color not found in nature. Welch's husband is killed and she is raped by three vicious but comically moronic bank robbers: Ernest Borgnine, Jack Elam, and Strother Martin. Wandering the desert she falls in with bounty hunter Robert Culp. After some resistance he takes her to master gunsmith Christopher Lee and we have a long segment of her discipleship in the gunfighting martial arts. Then she's after the Clemens Bros. The rape and revenge plot would be pretty grim but the story is softened with some humor and light romance. Originally wearing nothing but a poncho, she later adds pants but still wears nothing else above the waist. It's a wool blanket; that must be rough. She picks up some snappy comeback patter. The villains are just strange, as if wandering in from a different movie: Would you believe there is a walking on the beach holding hands at sunset with girly music scene? Stephen Boyd appears uncredited as a mysterious gunman. There's no explaining him. Filmed in Spain. Second reviewNew notes and thumbnails from the Blu-ray. - Raquel Welch's production company made this, so it must be the film she wanted. She would not do nudity, but featured degrading rape and abundant blood splatter. (I respect the decision not to take off her clothes: once everything is exposed the mystery is over, right? There is more power in keeping covered).
- The villain brothers wear filthy dusters, which I suspect is a jibe at Leone films.
- A weird and nonsensical bit: during the opening bank robbery the camera looks out both barrels of a shotgun, an impossible point of view.
- Robert Culp lightly oils his cartridge belt, the first time I recall anyone maintaining their leather gear in a western.
- We have a lot of style drift in the score: action, girly romance, comical goofing.
- British bombshell Diana Dors has a cameo as the bordello madam.
- This is said to be well-liked by Quentin Tarantino, and you can see why. Apart from the rape-and-revenge story, the apprenticeship to the bounty hunter is like the master-pupil relationship in a martial arts film. He particularly liked Culp's master bounty hunter.
My thumbnails are from the original Olive Blu-ray. It looks like it was taken from an old scan done for DVD. The image is brighter than the DVD which helps with contrast, but is otherwise a modest upgrade. I haven't seen it, but Olive has produced a "Signature" disc from a new scan which is said to have a better image and more extras, including a commentary track.
Raquel Welch has never been hotter than here. Damn good movie too. Imagine her riding side-saddle with Cat Ballou.
|
|
|
|
Post by hitchcockthelegend on Jan 20, 2020 22:25:51 GMT
|
|
