Howdy fellas, it’s been a while since I been here. Watched Alex Cox’s Straight to Hell yesterday. Boy was it one of the most annoying films I’ve ever seen. It showed great promise at the beginning but things take a nose dive when the group reach the town.
Worst thing is I can barely understand what anyone is saying most of the time. I like acid westerns like this. Jodorowsky’s El Topo and Hopper’s (who makes a cameo in the movie) The Last Movie. The story is all over the place. It’s simply a mess.
Done watching another acid western. This time it’s Robert Downey Sr’s Greasers’ Palace. I find it to be quite enjoyable. Even though they were some annoying bits that dragged on (not as bad as Straight to Hell) and the fact most of the film is indecipherable, I thought it was quite the unique experience.
Nabbed a copy of Captain Apache of Ebay for a pretty good price being that it’s OOP. But oh boy this film was not good.
Seeing Lee Van Cleef without his mustache and in a wig was just jarring. I’ve seen quite a handful of westerns with Lee in them and I’m pretty sure this is his worst one.
I only like two scenes in the movie. If I wasn’t such a passionate western fan I wouldn’t bother with this one.
Two most excellent Westerns from 1970 and 1972 respectively…with Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford at the pinnacle of their careers.
An exciting double-bill of engaging Western folklore - combining superlative acting and directing, along with thoughtful and intelligent scripts, and awesome scenery…
nice to see you here @Popsjnr Chris Mercer Robert Woods a great figure in the Spaghetti Westerns Era
thanks for sharing your thoughts and it’s a real pleasure to have you here too
One of the first big budget westerns made with sound and the first leading role for actor John Wayne, the big trail has an admittedly rough opening act setting things up! However once the wagon trail gets moving this is pretty incredible for a early sound film from 1930!
There is a real sense of scale and spectacle to all of this as well as a really compelling small scale story between the main cast of characters that makes this probably the second best film of 1930 behind “all quiet on the western front”!
A real shame that this didn’t do well at the box office at the time and basically doomed the western film genre to the low budget b-western programmer for most of the 1930s until 1939’s “stagecoach” because I really wish there were more absolute banger A-westerns from this period!
Decided to treat my self gents. I’ve watched Yojimbo and A Fistful of Dollars back to back. This makes my second Leone western I’ve watched. And marks my 120th western I’ve watched.
Viewing the movies back to back you definitely see where Leone got his ideas for dialogue and scenes. At the end I really couldn’t decide which one I preferred. They’re both great films. Great main actors (Mifune/Eastwood) and great scores, (Although I really enjoyed Morricone’s score more).
The Italian locandina of this is hanging in my hallway, but I’ve never seen the film. With most Andrew V. McLaglen films I get the impression the main objective of the production was to have a good time with the boys. The results are sometimes entertaining sequences, but mostly it’s pretty bland, forgettable stuff. Well-produced but very routine.
Was it made one week when the ‘Alias Smith & Jones’ cast and crew were absent … Just feels like a low grade TV movie, and John Vernon’s Irish accent is hideous !!!
Kill the Poker Player/Creeping Death (1972) w/Robert Wood, Nieve Navarro, Frank Brana and Carlo Gaddi. A paella SW with a giallo storyline. Robert Wood plays a British investigator for Lloyds of London after a bank robbery results in murder. Dun, dun, dun!! One of the masked robbers even uses a gun replete with a silencer!
Pinkerton soon must contend with witnesses turning up dead. Whoever the murderer is, one thing is clear. He/she likes to kill by snake bite.
The movie had potential to be a successful eclectic mix of western and horror/thriller, like Django Kill…If You Live, Shoot or And God Said to Cain. However, what I watched was a messy story that left me with more questions than answers. Robert Wood completists and eclectic western fans only.
, I’ve always thought this one was fun.
Robert Woods a great figure in the Spaghetti Westerns Era
