Pirates of the Mississippi / Die Flusspiraten vom Mississippi (Jürgen Roland, 1963)

Spaghetti Westerns 🎬 Eurowestern & Hybrids
1

Surprised to find no thread for this film so thought I should remedy the situation.

Rewatched this one on a fan dub taken from the (I believe) French Warner DVD which was a huge improvement on my old VHS rip. Still corny of course, as these early sauerkraut western tend to be but good fun and enjoyable to see a young Horst Frank (as the villain of course) as well as Tony Kendall and Brad Harris prior to their more successful pairing in the eurospy genre.

Interesting also for me to see that my old VHS had some cuts which appear on the DVD (in German only on my fandub) and make you wonder why they were chopped out. Nothing nasty in them and often just more dialogue in a retained scene. ???

I always enjoyed this one before (without considering it any kind of classic) and seeing now in a better version increases it in my estimation a little more. A good one for a sunday afternoon.

2

Same story for the Karl May movies, often scenes with dialogue were cut from the international versions (and therefore only available in German). I noticed scenes that turned from English to German and back again to English, all within a span of seconds. So from a total of, let’s say, ten lines, two or three were cut. Lunacy! Makes you wonder what was the idea behind this (something with the double bills Alex Cox is talking about very often? We never had that overhere, at least not as far as I know)

3

Middle of the road one for me. Enjoyable but nothing special.

4

I enjoy all three of the Brad Harris/Wolf C. Hartwig Westerns, though they’re hardly essential viewing. Too bad (for me) the recent Koch DVDs have no English options.

5

If you take the River Boat, watch out for the pirates (no not Johnny, Horst and his gang):

[size=12pt][url]http://www.spaghetti-western.net/index.php/Pirates_of_the_Mississippi_Review[/url][/size]

6

I bought me the Sauerkraut Western Box from Koch last year. I shouldn’t have done it. All 3 westerns are hard to stand through.

7

Well, I think you just don’t like these type of movies. That’s understandable, but I have a weak spot for them. They’re by no means great, of course.

8

after Bad Man’s River this is another eurowestern featuring riverboat, at least i hope there are some…
It is actually very interesting idea to see riverpirates in western (i once asked on the forum, if there are any westerns with riverboats ((after watching Four For Texas)) but didn’t obtain many hints)
and don’t we even start with Maverick…

9

[quote=“tomas, post:8, topic:2593”]after Bad Man’s River this is another eurowestern featuring riverboat, at least i hope there are some…
It is actually very interesting idea to see riverpirates in western (i once asked on the forum, if there are any westerns with riverboats ((after watching Four For Texas)) but didn’t obtain many hints)
and don’t we even start with Maverick…[/quote]

I watched this movie for the first time, these Hartwig westerns are not as well-known as the Winnetou movies

Westerns with river boats? Good question, there must be more than just a few. Maybe google can help us.

10

yes, google is very reliable forum member
anyway, i haven’t seen this hartwig trilogy, but as i like winnetou films, i’ll certainly give it a try
i’m not expecting much since i read a comment once on this film from sartana1968 - he wasn’t very praisy (if you know what i mean)

now, let’s google…

11

Howard Hawks’ The Big Sky had a scene or two in a riverboat if I remember correctly.

12

thanks Bill, i’ll check that out
now i found out about western tv series Riverboat with Burt Reynolds - it has quite high rating on imdb

13

Django Strikes Again has a riverboat in.

14

yeah, one of benefits of that movie - while in Django you can see actors moving on deck (so they had real boat at disposal), in Bad Man’s River it is obvious they used only footage of riverboat or indoor scenes, but never with actors on deck (although they used some tricks to fool a viewer)

15

I don’t remember a riverboat in The Big Sky.

There are a few westerns which partly have such scenes. Like in Mann’s Bend of the River.

16

I found this site. Haven’t had time to study it yet, but looks good (not specifically on westerns though):

http://steamboats.com/museum/davetmovies.html

17

when i thought about it a little, i should start to watch US westerns finally - when i look at my list (of viewed westerns) there are not many of them (i mean mainly westerns made before 1970)

thanks scherp, i’m going right on it …

18

These two are not bad imo. The Mississipi Gambler with Tyrone Power and The Rawide Years with Tony Curtis.

19

yeah, i came across Mississippi Gambler while doing research today, i’ll try the latter also, thanks

20

This film’s page in the database has been updated to the new layout. Contributions welcome. Pretty sure we are missing VHS releases, poster artwork and more…