Database page: Che c'entriamo noi con la rivoluzione - The Spaghetti Western Database
Not as good as the first two movies in Corbucci’s “Zapata trilogy” but still a pretty good and entertaining movie. Played more for laughs but with some gritty scenes. Two main characters were ok, but i thought Vittorio Gassman was shamelessly overacting at times. Morricone’s score was nice even if a little repetitious. I say it’s worth tracking down. 4 stars for me
The only Corbucci which wasn’t released theatrically in Germany (but later dubbed for a midnight TV showing in the mid-nineties), possibly due to the italian stars and themes.
I was surprised that this was a success in Italy, possibly due to the italian stars.
Not as bad as expected, but by no means great.
Watched a T.V print which someone had put the english audio to.
I thought it was a pretty lousy movie… Certainly way above Corbucci’s “American” westerns but still mile upon mile from stuff like Companeros and The Mercenary. Morricone’s score is pretty good but didn’t think it was utilized that well in the movie.
Haven’t seen this one, but I’ve heard there is unusually much talking in it, and not much action.
Is this true?
he couldn’t get better actors for this film? no wonder its not famous 
Guido Guidi(Vittorio Gassman) an Italian actor is duped into travelling down to Mexico to form a theatrical company but is unwittingly smuggling arms to the revolutionaries led by Mexican baddie Carrasco,while the Priest arrives at the same destination on a holy mission.Following an ambush on the theatre by Carrasco to retrieve his arms and a counter attack by Mexican General Herrero(Eduardo Fajardo),Guido and the Priest find themselves sucked into the revolution after accidentally machine gunning down Mexican troops while trying to escape the carnage.The two “heroes” initially don’t get on but eventually become firm friends as they spend the entire movie going from one opposing side to the other and getting into some very dangerous predicaments in their futile attempts to escape the revolution.
There’s much more slapstick involved here than in Corbucci’s other two revolutionary films but the two leads are very likeable-the Priest is very down to earth while Gassman as the hyper-active self-obsessed thespian is quite hilarious and he is forced to impersonate Zappata and Cardinal among other things in order to survive.There is much similarity in the set pieces to Companeros/Mercenary and one of my favourite scenes is when the Priest is nearly forced to sleep with an old hag of a matriarch who has been receiving bounties for the severed hands of Indian peasants,but is saved(as is Guidi who is buried up to his neck in sand) from this fate by a sudden attack of vengeful one-handed machete wielding peasants in skeleton masks.There’s also a great rescue by bi-plane when the Priest is lassoed at high speed from the air when about to be executed,and a motorcycle and sidecar chase with the two friends in Mexico army uniforms to protect themselves from Herrero but carrying with them a baby offspring of Zappata to save them from the rebels-well so they think!
A cool Nero-type mercenary shoot-em up this is not,and like Duck You Sucker this is maybe an attempt by Corbucci to unromanticize(but still definitely a comedy!) the Mexican Revolution as neither side is shown to be in a favourable light with the rebels being almost as ruthless and deceitful as the government troops-at one point Carrasco even tries to hang both Guidi and the Priest,and the films ending is much more downbeat than the previous two.
Ennio Morricone’s soundtrack is enjoyable if a little samey with the riff of the main theme being either whistled or damply played on a mandolin-the arrangement and melody is similar to the tune from DYS when Juan attacks the bank at Mesa Verde.
From the very little and slightly negative information i had before going into this movie i wasn’t expecting too much and to the contrary although nowhere near classic i found this film very entertaining.A proper dvd release of this is well overdue.
My rating 8 out of 10 
Yes, there is a alot of talking provided by the thespian character.
However this is probably his most violent movie.
The movie is like Giu La Testa in which it treats the revolution as a grim situation.
I believe there was an onscreen decapitation if memory serves me well.
An intersting topic is the Mexican Revolution for Corbucci. As i see.
I have been nervous of buying this one off atlas visuals. It just looks too easy and a bit confusing. Tell me someone, is ordering from atlas visuals really that easy?
I thought it was a pretty fun movie, the two leads are likeable, its a nice companion piece to Companeros. I didn’t find it any more violent than Companeros. It’s got the usual things in Corbucci revolution movies - firing squads, guy getting buried up to his neck, music similar to Companeros strolling theme, two main characters have a love/hate relationship. It’s paced really well and the action scenes are well done… especially the scene where cannon fire is going off all around the shakespearean actor.
This may be a bit late in the game… but yes, buying there is that easy. I’ve ordered twice with atlas visuals, had no problems. The print quality of their stuff various wildly, and their own quality rating is, well, let’s say a bit ‘optimistic’. If they say ‘A’, it’s B quality, ‘B’ is actually C, and so on. Their A or A/B stuff is at least watchable and sometimes really nice, but anything else I’d skip. They have some rare titles, so it might be worth a look.
Need to rewatch this one, was a while since I saw it. Otherwise, quite interesting film with a great ending.
Was better than what I thought it would be. Overall it kept my attention and was even able to overlook the bull and lasso/airplane part and enjoy the movie.
I’ve bought the Filmax DVD for awhile now but never had the will to watch it. Finally decided to give it a try. This is not a bad movie, but compared with the other Corbucci’s zapata-westerns it seems misplaced. It works well as comedy/drama.
Just viewed this one again. Opening reminds me of the sort of scene from one of the directors better Revolution films. We soon drop into farce among the two leads though. Some of the sets and action pieces look on the expensive side. There is some writing on a wall in one scene “Viva Revolution” something or other, and could not believe how huge the writing is. Not the best western by the director, but not the worst either for me.
You saw the new fandub of this film, Ennioo?
Yes. Stronger colours and image than the T.V rip that had been dubbed into english. The new fandub is in around 1.85 widescreen. The audio drops out a little like the old english dub TV print, so I suspect the same english audio source has been used.
I recently bought the Spanish DVD of this. It is an ok widescreen, non-anamorphic image which is at least a vast improvement over the quality of the copy of a German TV recording that I was kindly provided by a forum member. Although it would have been nice to have Italian audio, at least the Spanish audio is much better than the horrible English dubbing that had been put on the aforementioned TV version.
The 10 minutes shorter running time on the DVD, noted in the database, results exclusively from the editing of one section of the film. The scene involving Albino ending up in the bedroom of the large female bandit leader is removed such that after the bandit leader shoots the soldier paying them for the severed hands, we cut straight to the Indians (with missing left hands) attacking which culminates with the leader then giving the speech about their ancestral land. Interestingly this seems to be a night scene on the TV version with cheap filters being used to create the effect, while on the Spanish DVD this all appears in the daytime and at least does not have the same fake, filtered look to it. After the Indian leader has given his speech, there is then a cut to Guido and Albino walking along the train tracks. This skips a short scene of Albino punching Guido who falls down a hillside as a peasant walks by with a cart mumbling about how the revolution just goes in circles with no one actually getting anywhere. Excluding the edits to this section of the film, which amount to about 10 minutes in total, the Spanish DVD seems to preserve everything else in the German TV version intact.
As for the film itself, this is a great Zapata-western that is a fitting third instalment to Corbucci’s revolution trilogy after ‘The Mercenary’ and ‘Companeros’. I particularly like the way all three of them begin and end with the same ‘book-end’ style to create circular narratives. This third instalment is slightly marred by some unwelcome scenes: the bedroom scene with the female bandit leader (its absence in the Spanish DVD is no great loss, although I would have liked the short scene with the mumbling peasant to have been retained); Guido running through the town with his face painted black; Albino being hit by a bull and landing in a car which is just badly filmed rather than conceptually bad.
For me this one is not as interesting as its two predecessors, as it lacks mostly the powerful images and visuals of those. Some ideas are, just like Novecento says, rather badly (or better lazily) filmed than badly shaped.
Database comment:
Corbucci’s third revolution western uses a similar flashback style as its predecessors, but is otherwise quite different. The gringos here are only two average Italians who are hardly good for typical SW heroes.
The many interesting ideas of the plot are realised without any greater enthusiasm, so that the film plods along quite unexcitingly, as does Morricone’s lazy soundtrack, which varies only a few well-known simple guitar motifs. Still worth a look for being uncommon.