A Man called Noon
Put my thoughts about it in the film’s thread
I tried a comedy western for a chance, the Martin and Lewis vehicle [size=12pt]PARDNERS[/size]
An enjoyable, if unmemorable effort
[size=12pt]http://westernsontheblog.blogspot.be/2014/10/pardners-1956.html[/size]
I just started Pardners today but I had to stop after 15 minutes because friend came to stop by. I’ve seen quite many Lewis films but I didn’t knew about this film before I found a dvd from library. Great supporting cast.
Over the weekend: a first look at A Minute to Pray, a Second to Die (Giraldi 1968) (autephex’s composite version) and a long-overdue re-watch of Sabata (Parolini, 1969). A Minute to Pray… was excellent imo, Sabata was considerably less so, but still a decent movie for a lazy or a rainy Sunday afternoon. I enjoyed William Berger’s performance far more than I recall having done so previously.
Today I shall be watching Death Sentence (Lanfranchi, 1968). Never seen it, really looking forward to finally seeing it.
Now Death Sentence is one I really need to rewatch, I haven’t seen it in many years… great idea
Today, I’m going to be giving a second look to the much heralded And God Said to Cain (Margheriti, 1969). I always felt that there was a cracking movie hiding in the gloom there somewhere, but my copy (on the Spaghetti Western 44 Movie Collection cheapo boxset) was so very black and free of any detail that it rendered the movie nigh-on unwatchable and remains one of the only times when dodgy film quality has been an issue for me. Still, my recent acquisition of a decent copy of the film means I’m going to give And God Said to Cain a proper go at last.
As to Death Sentence, which I watched yesterday: Fugging brilliant, outstanding. One of the very best westerns, Italian or otherwise, that I’ve ever seen. Easily crashes my Spag Top Ten. Even the segment centered around a card game was tense and interesting, and I usually switch off for those scenes in other spags such as the Sartana pics or whatever. I noticed on here that Death Sentence was Robin Clarke’s only Spag, and what a shame that is, because I thought he was superb. To be honest I’m just itching to watch it all over again. I can see this finally settling as one of my three or four favourite spags of all time, eventually.
Today I’m going to try The Specialists (Corbucci, 1969). A little apprehensive with this one; part of me thinks, well, it’s a Corbucci movie so it’s bound to be a winner, but I also think that there must be a reason (beyond simple availability) why this pic is a relative minnow stacked up against the Corbucci pics that surround it, chronologically. Still, that’s all rather unfair until I’ve seen the movie, so let’s get to it.
Glad that I was actually able to SEE And God Said to Cain yesterday. The immeasurably improved picture quality with which I enjoyed it this time around saw the movie soar a good fifteen places or so up my personal list of favourite westerns but, ultimately, it’s still a strange picture, albeit one that definitely stands out from pretty-much all of the others. That “Horror Organ” score suits the “Castle Transylvania” look of the movie but bloody hell, it’s distracting. IMO, that is. Great turn from Klaus Kinski, though.
EDIT: Well, that’s The Specialists watched, and I have to say I was underwhelmed. Liked the Alpen backdrop, didn’t like much else I’m afraid. I didn’t connect with the story, I found Johnny Hallyday dull, lacking in charisma and tbh a bit wooden. “The French Elvis”, Wikipedia tells me. Hm. I’d say that an uninspired turn in a 1969 western marks him out more accurately as “The French Glen Campbell”, myself. And what were the hippies all about? I mean, I’ve seen anachronistic flared ‘n’ flowery late sixties/early seventies influences creep into the late 19th-century period costuming choices of a few Spags before (Four of the Apocalypse and ¡Matalo! spring immediately to mind), but this just felt purposely obstinate. They couldn’t have been more out of place if they’d begun freaking out to Steve Hillage or The Mothers of Invention, which they seemed on the verge of doing at any time. It didn’t help that the copy I watched snapped constantly between the Italian audio and the English dub; I had the subtitles on, I should really have just watched it in Italian, but it just wasn’t gripping me anyway.
Ah well. I guess they can’t all be zingers.
Today, it was a second look at Vengeance (Margheriti, 1968). It’s a movie I’d only previously seen in super-murky-vision on YouTube and, as with And God Said to Cain, I was looking forward to checking out a slightly more watchable copy (and as I write that, I only now realise that both pics were by Antonio Margheriti). Anyway I found it a far more enjoyable movie this time around and it’s catapulted into the lower reaches of my Spag Top 30 as a result. Messrs. Harrison and Camaso are both fantastic.
You’re not alone, last.caress. I didn’t find the flick too impressive as well. Seemed as though Corbucci had taken too much acid whilst making the movie.
Not sure what version of The Specialist you watched, but I did a fandub mixed with the French audio. It still isn’t perfect, but I spent quite a lot of time cleaning up the audio as best I could. Original english dub was in pretty bad shape. I’m guessing you went with Westernfan’s fandub which is Italian/english, no disrespect to WF, got a lot of love for his dedication, but his mixed dubs don’t use any kind of noise correction and can be distracting when they switch back and forth between lots of hiss and no hiss.
I actually trimmed the dialogue portions on that one down so that the english was used only for spoken words, with the silence in between being the french track. took forever.
These days if an english track is that bad, I prefer to just use it in its entirety instead as its less work and noise removal always produced warbly sound artefacts, unless its only a small amount of noise
Edit: surprised to see no one has added a rip of my fandub dvd at cg, I will do so soon
It was indeed the “westernfan” one. And absolutely sir, no offence was/is intended towards this gentleman who, like all of you fellas who dedicate your time and efforts into keeping these films as good as they can be and as accessible as possible, deserve a medal or a blowjob or f*cking something for your troubles. 
What am I watching today? (checks calendar) Ah, yes: Yankee (Brass, 1966). I’ve never seen this one; I’ve never seen any Tinto Brass movie, for that matter. Probably should have done, by now.
The cold indifference of REAL LIFE overran me yesterday and I was unable to fit a Spag into my schedule, alas. Undaunted however, today’s Spag adventure will be a double bill: Yesterday’s Yankee (Brass, 1966) and today’s intended selection, a long overdue return to Companeros (Corbucci, 1970). #Something something, something about sombreeeroooooos, bangabangabang bangabangabang companeerooooooos! Sing up, gringos! The revolution’s finally arrived!
Jeremiah Johnson (1972) - Following up on the recommendations here, and no complaints. A nice story of taking off into the wild away from everything for the first part of the film, followed by a descent into isolated darkness. I do agree with ENNIOO, I won’t be getting this score stuck in my head any time soon and the soundtrack at times is appropriate although far from noteworthy, and at other times its a little obnoxious. Crazy how much different Robert Redford looks with a full manly beard.
Yankee (Brass, 1966) was good and perfectly enjoyable as a means to while away an hour-and-a-half but it wasn’t great. It was distinctive looking though and in this genre, that certainly counts for something. And it was an easy watch too, not one of those Spags filled to the brim with inexplicable double/triple/quadruple bluffs. But it didn’t snap my radish. I didn’t really take to lead Philippe Leroy and the theme music often felt disproportionately light-hearted, jarring against the gritty and serious film. And often, Mr. Leroy would be whistling the theme tune as he went about his business, and this would imbue him with a jaunty, almost carefree air; again, inappropriate for the circumstances in which he would find himself. Still, this isn’t a huge quibble and, as I said, Yankee was a good film. No more, no less. All merely IMO, of course.
Companeros (Corbucci, 1970) is of course in a different league, technically speaking. This is one of Spaghetti Western’s Premier League titles and the step up in quality is apparent immediately and throughout. Still… I don’t think I’m crazy on Zapata westerns. They’re okay, and it’s nigh on impossible not to like a movie as good as Companeros, but I just don’t get the same thrill from them that I get from a good old morally unstable and vaguely supernatural revenge-fuelled murder rampage, carried out with physics-defying precision by a silent, inscrutable and cool-as-f*ck bringer of death.
Anyway, today I’m slumming it with my Mill Creek Ten Thousand Ways to Die cheapo box set; specifically, Four Dollars of Revenge (Balcázar, 1965). When I carefully constructed the list of Spags I would be watching this month, I definitely had a clear and compelling reason as to why this film demanded inclusion. Now, less than two weeks thereafter, I haven’t got a f*cking scooby. I’ve got loads of also-ran movies in shitty box-set quality still sitting on my shelves waiting to be watched. So why have I put this one in my Spag Marathon? When oh WHEN will Acquasanta Joe get his day in the sun?
Been checking out my Mexican made Westerns, I do have a few, and I did found a name for which Mexican Westerns are usually known in Mexico, chilaquile western.
Tiempo de Morir - 1966 – Arturo Ripstein
I start with the best of the lot. Ripstein is a very good director, with some relevant work to show over the years.
The script of Tiempo de Morir is based in a Gabriel Garcia Marquez book, and it’s a real good story to be told. We are very far from SW influence, it’s a very classic western US style, but with a specific Mexican feeling.
Tells the story of a man that after an 18 years sentence for killing a man In a duel, returns to his hometown to live in peace the rest of his life, but the sons of the man he killed want revenge.
Marquez libretto (with dialogues rewritten by an Mexican writer), was placed in present time, but Ripstein was advice to turn it into a western, because it will be easier to sell the films rights to the European market, with SW being a great success mostly in Germany and Italy.
Very good premise for a Western, with some very dramatic scenes, good acting and the real (non dubbed) Spanish Language sounded real good to ear. Also liked the good acting, a real western with a more dramatic even tragic edge in it. The ending was great
A very good western, from a very talented director.
Cinco mil dolares de recompensa – 1974 – Jorge Fons
This one tells a more conventional story in terms of westerns that is, a more similar one to SW, which it got the inspiration in the first place. Some nasty and curious characters. The story starts with a very common start a city mayor, wants someone to get rid of the local bad guys, and offers a reward of 5000 dollars for someone to do the job, but without killing the bad guys. A good start, and a real good SW…sorry Mexican Western, made in a time where SW weren’t doing so well.
Some familiar actors and a great score. Not easy to find a decent copy but it worth the watch.
Los Marcados – 1971- Alberto Mariscal
Left to end the strangest of the lot. Clearly influence by El Topo (the film of course), it still a conventional western, well most of the times at least. Lots of violence, and a great main character Lo Marcado (brilliant played by Mexican actor Antonio Aguillar). The bad guys are a surrealist lot declaiming Shakespeare and all.
There’s a lot of sadistic violence in it, Questi Django Kill is a walk in the park compared to this one. I did had some difficulty to understand the story, but somehow the film looked great to me.
A must watch for SW aficionado.
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After all that hype surrounding these Mexican westerns, I guess I’ll have to check several titles out. The fact that they’re that obscure and esoteric will make the things even more enjoyable for me. 
Ace high…It was OK, I did read some very negative comments about it and luckily it did not turn out to be that bad. There is some quite fine shootouts and not as much humour as you would except from hill, spencer and eli but not totally serious movie.
One not to revisit though, once is enough for this flick.
Hmm, now I’ve looked up chilaquile and am going to have to try making this, sounds delicious.
Los Marcados was the first Mexi-western I viewed recently which set me off on this little project of seeking them out. I shared similar views to your own and also made note of the obvious El Topo influence, which I posted about in the Alberto Mariscal thread. It seemed like it was trying a bit too hard at times to be strange, which dropped it down a notch for me, but you’re right that Django Kill is pale in comparison.
I haven’t seen or heard of those other two films, but I will take note of them.
[quote=“gringo_bastardo, post:11537, topic:141”]Ace high…It was OK, I did read some very negative comments about it and luckily it did not turn out to be that bad. There is some quite fine shootouts and not as much humour as you would except from hill, spencer and eli but not totally serious movie.
One not to revisit though, once is enough for this flick.[/quote]
Haven’t seen Ace High in probably 5 years, but remember it being quite good actually. Another one it is time to rewatch
Heh, I specially loved scene in beginning when spencer and hill “talk” with banker but that is not shown but you hear from sound effects what kind of discussion is going on