Bezenby "Gmmffsssklpp!" I exclaimed, while watching some pretentious Japanese animated film (Wolf Children, it turns out). "What was that?" My wife asked, languishing nearby on a futon, dressed in only a coat made from Madagascan Tenrecs. "That," I said, waving my glass of brandy in the air, "Was the sound of my brain trying to vomit out of my ear because of this film." I'll never forget her reply. "That," She imitated, around a mouthful of roasted dolphin, "Is how I feel when you are watching one your crappy old European films."My blood froze. Cold sweat broke out on my forehead. My fingers clenched into my palms, forming bloody crescents. I unsteadily rose to my feet, staggering to the front door, only pausing once to vomit into one of my children's wellington boots. I somehow made it to my car, got in, and blindly drove through the tears until my heart stopped racing. I parked the car in a disabled space and, hunched and tortured, called my wife from a phone box somewhere outside the town of Penrith. I couldn't believe how much they charge for a simple phone call these days."Wh-what did you say?" I muttered into the phone. "How can you compare an arty Japanese film with Italian (and/or Spanish) films? How can you, for example, compare that to the Italian Rambo-rip off Brothers In War, where the two protagonists sing "Jingle Bells" to cheer each other up while captured by the Vietcong?"Noting that I had several minutes left and wanting to get my money's worth, I continued. "Pancho Villa is another example. It's a seventies Spanish film with Telly Savalas playing the titular General, and yes, since you ask, people do say 'titular' to each other in conversation. This film spends about five minutes discussing why Pancho Villa has no hair just so it can have an excuse to have Telly Savalas in the lead role. It's not striving for any artistic merit!"I angrily pounded my slave-shop produced meerkat skin gloves on the telephone box walls, stomping my crocodile skin boots. "And what about the bit where Chuck Connors has an entire room of US army officers trying to catch a fly? That was terrible no matter what way you looked at it. Just thought I'd mention that bit. What I'm trying to say is these films aren't meant to be taken seriously. This is supposedly a historic film about a guy who invaded America, and instead we get Telly Savalas pretending to be in a coma, trying to sort out his sidekick's marital problems, and some other third example, too!"I was in tears now, and would have been lying on the floor of the phone box had it not been for my ivory walking stick. "I mean, Telly Savalas sings the jazzy theme tune at the end! How can you deride these spectacles of wonder I hold dear to my heart? How? For is it not enough that I deemed you suitable to bear my children? Must you destroy my true love in life – the crappy Euro film?""Why are you using a phone box instead of your mobile phone?" She asked, deaf to my entreaties. My vision greyed as I stumbled out into the night, a broken man. Nearby a red squirrel paused in its search for food to regard my twitching form. I felt a little bit better as I opened the back door of the car and set my two dogs on it.

mgtbltp Well I was avoiding this film for a while, seeing as how I've heard that it was total crap, but since I had gotten a gift card for FYE I picked up the box set Rawhide Season 1, and had a little credit left on the card so when I saw this DVD marked down to $2.99 well, thats a price that I can stomach experimenting with little known films.Pancho Villa, Dir, by Eugenio Martin, stars Telly Savalas as Pancho Villa, Clint Walker as Scotty, in the standard role of the gringo American gunrunner, Chuck Connors as clean freak nut case Col. Wilcox, Anne Francis (who played Altaria in Forbidden Planet) as Flo, and it also has Dan Van Husen and a few of the regular list of SW bit part players.The version I picked up was released by Geneon its runtime is 92 minutes, it has no chapter stops, and no special features. When your expecting total crap your expectations are lower than whale sh*t, so I was actually pleasantly surprised that this turned out to be very watchable. Its supposed to be either humorous or a lighthearted farce rather than a slapstick comedy but with the casting problems and limits of the script it comes out as neither. I guess we all got to remember that this was made post "Trinity is Still My Name" and the time for serious SW's and Zapatas Westerns had passed.Three things though really stand out and they are the quality of the transfer which was widescreen and excellent, secondly, the beautiful cinematography of Alejandro Ulloa which is one of the things that really impressed me when I first saw his work on Corbucci's Companero's, his other work some of you will recognize from The Mercenary, Sonny & Jed, Cry Onion, Providence, and other great SWs and third is the almost star billing for the TRAINS! This film is a train-lovers delight, this is one Zapata Western that really emphasizes the trains, there is some great railroad action footage, including a beginning act that has a locomotive chase, that for me anyway really compensates for the rest of the film who's biggest problem is the miscasting of Savalas as Villa. Savalas sucks basically is about the best you can say about his performance as Villa, he effects no accent whatsoever, but he is still his charming wise-guy persona and he does have some good scenes (like when he's pretending to be a corpse where he doesn't have to talk which was not much of a stretch for him) so you can suspend disbelief.Walker is his hulking self. I think the only memorable time I saw these two together was in "The Dirty Dozen". In this film Walker runs around dressed like a sea captain with insignia cap and blue brass buttoned watch-coat, a strange choice. Chuck Connors plays a misophobic US army Col. Wilcox, but rather than be a strong villain he comes off as more of a nut job. Flo (Anne Francis) has some scenes with her wayward husband Scotty (Walker) which were supposed to be funny but don't quite work, mostly because Walker doesn't have much range as an actor.The town sets and the border custom station/army post look fine, you will recognize La Calahorra station, Colmenar Viejo, & Guadix.This film is unique from other Zapatas in that it covers Villas attack on Columbus, New Mexico, in 1917, long after his glory days were past and that it emphasized his use of railroads with his "Army of The North". It does have a spectacular set piece real head on collision with two steam locomotives, similar to DYS, but without the dynamite, its cool to see real train-wrecks. Nowadays it would all be computer generated effects The score is mostly mariachi music and fits the film well, but it does have Telly sing the ending credit tune which is a hoot, on par with LVC's turn in Captian Apache.Any way this worth getting for $10 or lower.

Poseidon-3 This is an odd little film about infamous Pancho Villa featuring an all Spanish cast except for a quartet of "name" American actors. Savalas (attempting no sort of accent or strong characterization) slides through the film on his unique brand of charm. (He was at or near his height of fame at he time.) He's given a scene to explain why, in this version of the story, Villa is bald, yet in a clip that takes place prior to the shaving, he is bald then, too! He is only effective at all because so many of the rest of the cast are bad. Roman god come to life Walker co-stars as a gunrunner who works alongside Savalas. Sadly, he is covered up by a jaunty captain's hat and a double breasted coat much of the time, so his treasure of a chest is under wraps. Still, his innate charm and handsome face add a lot to this very slight movie. He manages to inject some humor and slyness into his part. Francis has very little to do in her role (and disappears without a trace at some point!), but is attractive. Conners (with his skeletal features and corpse-like lips) plays a mad, driven Army officer who's bent on cleanliness and order at the expense of efficiency. He has a notable scene in which a mess hall is virtually trashed in order to excise one fly. The film is impossible to take seriously and it doubtful that it was intended as such. It's a sort of parodic, satiric take on the genre. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the wit or the money to make much of an impression. The sets look like they wouldn't pass muster on "Bonanza" and the dubbing (in fact all of the sound) is horrible. The music in this film is almost it's worst aspect. There is a highly aggravating theme played by the Mexicans as they enter the U.S. and it is ceaseless in its torture of the viewers' ears. To top it off, there's a hellacious closing credit song sung by Savalas (!) and written by John Cacavas (who did music for "Kojak" and a horde of TV movies.) The film is not very good, but watchable once if little is expected of it.

wotamovie1 The genre of westerns fell on hard times during the 1970's after its flourish in the 1960's. Still, there was a handful of good westerns in the seventies. Unfortunately, this isn't one of them. There is essentially no plot here. It seems that the movie's sole function was to cash in on the rising popularity for Telly Savalas at the time. Naturally, with very little to work with, he simply chews up the scenery. I'll be the first to admit that Telly was one of the coolest and charismatic actors ever to make his presence on the screen. I'll even go as far as to call him an "icon" of the seventies. Still, there is really no excuse for this garbage. The actors seem to know what they got themselves wrapped into as evidenced by their "ridiculous" performances. The scene with Chuck Connors and the fly "buzzing" around him has got to go down as cinema's most appallingly bad and incompetent sequence. One simply has to see it to believe it! If you treated the whole movie as one long bad joke, then you might feel a little better at the end of the film. You may even come away with a grin. Just don't expect much from this movie. On the plus side, I truly enjoyed the last sequence with Savalas on the caboose of the train fading out of the screen with the soundtrack in the background of Telly belting out the theme song. Truly astonishing! For me, it negated the pain and suffering I had endured through the length of the movie. For others, it may not be enough.