I am slightly more positive. Bandidos looks very good thanks to the directing etc, but has not so interesting SW music. The story is OK, but not more, and not too simple. The final shootout is much too long.
I havenāt been able to conclude where the opening scene with the train attack was shot. The very large open green rather flat areas could indicate somewhere in the Madrid province, but I rule out the railway near Colmenar Viejo due to a tunnel/viaduct under the railway in the film that is wider than any existing tunnels there.
Possibly it could be near Villamanta west of Madrid where some SWs had railway scenes.
Anyhow the 3 node telegraph pole has seldom been seen (and probably never near Guadix area in the 1960ās).
Otherwise there were scenes shot in Comenar Viejo north of Madrid and possibly Aldea de Fresno also west of Madrid. And the western town with the green surroundings was Dino Laurentiis Studio near Rome, Lazio, Italy.
In the scene with the train when it stands still you can see a motorbike (or similar) driving in the distant background.
I initially rank Bandidos right after Vengeance which I watched yesterday (both weak 6/10).
73 Death Played the Flute /Requiem For A Bounty Killer/Requiem for a Bounty Hunter (Angelo Pannaccio) 1972
74 Vengeance (Antonio Margheriti ) 1968 75 Bandidos (Massimo Dallamano) 1967
76 And the Crows Will Dig Your Grave (Juan Bosch) music Bruno Nicolai 1971
77 El Rojo (Leopoldo Savona) 1966
The Arrow Blu-ray looks and sounds great. Unfortunately mine went out of sync a few times, so I am going to assume that it must be player since itās happening with nearly every disc.
My third watch of the Vengeance Trails release. I hadnāt heard of this one before I saw the set and I hadnāt looked up its plot synopsis or anything so this was a completely blind watch. To say I enjoyed this would be an understatement. Iām a sucker for Mentor/Student films so I really enjoyed the interactions between Martin and Ricky. The opening scene of the train robbery is probably one of my favourite openings in a SW. The long tracking shot showing the aftermath of the robbery was awesome. Speaking of which, the actual camera work was really great and had plenty of cool shots. The final duel was tense and I really enjoyed Billy Kane as a villain - he manages to come across as really evil without being completely over the top. The music was good, nothing compared to Moriconne of course but good nonetheless. My only minor criticism is Terry Jenkins was a little bit lacking compared to his co-stars Enrico Maria Salerno and Venantino Venantini. For me, this is a top 5 Spaghetti.
I just gotta say that the Arrow blu ray is fāing fantastic. It is maybe the best transfer Iāve seen out of all the spaghettis. It has a ton of film grain present, and I love that personally. Really, really beautiful transfer
As far as I understand it, its present on all the Arrow blu rays but they have set some kind of flag that makes it skip the scene when played back on a UK region device. If you have a blu ray drive, you can rip the disc off to your computer which would bypass the flag and give you the full video. Iām not 100% sure about that but Iām pretty sure its the same full video for both releases, just played back differently
Whatever it does, Iām sure the scene is actually on the disc and its the same video whether its the US or UK version. A lot of movies have alternate versions available but it often just changes how the movie plays back - its not actually different cuts of the entire film.
Iām pretty sure Iāve read about Arrow programming the discs to play the cut version on region B players, but I canāt remember where I read that now
Uk bd disc of Conan the Barbarian has both cut and uncut versions. If your bluray player language is set to english it will show you the cut version but if you set the language to letās say france for example it will play the uncut version. Maybe this is the similar case.
Yeah that sounds like a good example of the same kind of thing. I imagine all the recent spaghetti releases that allow you to watch with either Italian or English opening credits work the same way - the disc has both scenes and will just insert them at that point depending on what you select to view. The video on the disc is just assembled for playback depending on whatever parameters. Thatās how I understand it anyway.
If you have a blu ray drive on your computer, you can extract the movie to a single MKV file using a program like MakeMKV - then you can put that mkv file onto a USB drive and connect it to your TV/playback device such as Roku/Xbox/whatever. Now you can watch the full movie. However this specific kind of scene cutting can create problems with the audio sync, so that may have to be fixed. Anyway, just wanted to state anyone with a UK release, its probably possible to get the uncut movie out of your disc you paid for
I can imagine that makes sense for Arrow, who sell in the US ā¦ theyāre not going to the trouble of authoring 2 separate versions ā¦ however, I wonder if the same applies to 88Films who released āNavajo Joeā with a cut horse trip scene, which as mentioned on another thread ā¦ the trip is there for all animal cruelty enthusiasts to enjoy on the included trailer.
Finally watched this tonight and loved it. Salerno played one of my favorite Spaghetti protagonists. The visuals and story were incredibly well done. The music, although not Morricone level, was very nice. The wardrobe was rather weak in this one. Unfortunately I saw the UK release on a European player with the terrible censorship. If I were to buy a region A player and use the same UK disc on it, would it play uncut?
I think this movie could have made a great sequel to Django with some tweaks. It could have opened with the crippled Django some years after the original movie.
I wasnāt expecting Salernoās last stand but it could have worked perfectly as Djangoās last stand!
The movie would have needed Corbucci and some more bleakness !
āBandidosā premiered in the UK at Odeon South Harrow on 29th September 1968, co-billed with āAssassinationā. Distributed by Butcherās Film it remained very much off-circuit and played a limited number of theatres. It returned briefly as āGuns of Deathā in February 1970. Complete listings below.
Odeon South Harrow (29th Sept 68 - 5th Oct 68)
Prince of Walesā Cinema, Paddington (18th Nov 68 - 23rd Nov 68) (Prince of Walesā Cinema closed its doors for good on 23rd Nov 1968, making āBandidosā the last film ever screened at this venue)
Walpole Cinema, Ealing (24th Nov 68 - 30th Nov 68)
Lido Cinema, Bolton (2nd Feb 69 - 8th Feb 69)
Criterion Picture Theatre, Hull (2nd Feb 69 - 8th Feb 69)
Broadway Cinema, Hammersmith (24th Mar 69 - 29th Mar 69)
Rex Cinema, Newcastle upon Tyne (8th Jun 69 - 14th Jun 69)
Scala Cinema, Liverpool (15th Jun 69 - 21st Jun 69)
This was already in my top ten but might go even higher after rewatching it last nightā¦very close to being flawless. Venantini should have done more spaghettis, he has such a great look and gave a great performance in this one. Have no issues with Jenkins performance either, although it would have been interesting to see a Craig Hill type in his role.
