Michael_Elliott The Appaloosa (1966)** (out of 4) Rather bizarre Western has Matt (Marlon Brando) having his horse stolen by Chuy (John Saxon) so he sets out to get him back. The two men had previous run-ins over a woman (Anjanette Comer) who will come into play as the story plays out.THE APPALOOSA is a film that Marlon Brando didn't really want to make but the paycheck was good so he took the role. When production started he realized that he really didn't want to do the film so the shooting was somewhat of a disaster with the legend battling director Sidney J. Furie. The end result is a fairly forgettable film that tries to be something different than your typical Western.The biggest problem with this movie is the story. In all honesty even by Western standards the story here is quite weak and would barely fill up one of those 50 minute "B" films from the 30s. We basically have the two men running into each other a couple time and the film tries to be psychological and it fails pretty bad. There are really bizarre and weird camera set-ups that are meant to be deep or to bring you into the mental state of the characters but it just doesn't work. Whatever vision director Furie was trying to bring just doesn't come across and we're left with a pretty boring movie.The always entertaining Saxon manages to be the best thing here. With his thick Mexican accent and the paint on his face, Saxon manages to make for a fun villain but it's too bad more wasn't done with the character. I thought Corner was also good in her wasted role and especially early on when she fears for her safety after trying to break free from Chuy. As for Brando, I don't think he's bad here but it's certainly not into what he's doing. He ends up mumbling more than anything else and just doesn't bring any energy or passion to the part.

zardoz-13 Some day film historians may celebrate the legacy of Canadian director Sidney J. Furie. During the 1960s and 1970s, Furie helmed a number of prominent films that have been largely forgotten. He made the memorable espionage thriller "The Ipcress File" with Michael Caine as an anonymous, bespectacled spy who works for King and Country only because his larcenous skills are valuable in the field than behind bars. Later, Furie directed a genuine counter-culture character piece "Little Fauss and Big Halsey," a hare and a turtle opus about two drifters on the dirt bike motorcycle race circuit. Other interesting films Furie directed were "The Naked Runner" with Frank Sinatra; "Lady Sings the Blues" with Diana Ross as troubled blues singer Billie Holliday; the narcotics trafficking epic "Hit" with Billy Dee Williams; and his unsung Vietnam yarn "The Boys in Company C." The stories surrounding "The Appaloosa" make it sound like the worst film that anybody could have worked on since Marlon Brando had fallen out of favor after the debacle on "Mutiny on the Bounty." The tales about tension on the set are enough to make anybody cringe. Brando refused to cooperate with Furie. During an interview with John Saxon, one of the least appreciated Hollywood character actors during the 1960s, he told me he contributed the line about being blown into so many pieces that nobody would ever find him. The most memorable scene occurs when Brando's protagonist and Saxon's villain are arm wrestling with scorpions lashed down to the table where their hands would wind up if they lost the competition. Saxon told me at the Memphis Film Festival he had heard about Mexican authorities using scorpions to winnow out the prison population in a nearby town when he was acting in the John Huston western "The Unforgiven" with Audrey Hepburn and Burt Lancaster in Mexico."The Appaloosa" unfolds with our shabby looking hero in a tattered Confederate Army tunic riding back into his hometown of Ojo Prieto on the border. He confesses his sins to a Catholic Church priest. "I've done a lot of killin'. I've killed a lot of men and sinned with a lot of women. But the men I—I killed needed killin'. And the women wanted sinnin'. And—and I never was one much to argue." Absolved of his sins, Matt Fletcher (Marlon Brando of "The Missouri Breaks") is prepared to begin life anew as a horse rancher. Raised by poor Mexican peasants, Matt decides to share his new wealth with a small farmer, Paco (Rafael Campos of "Blackboard Jungle") who has a wife and several children. They live near the border, and grasshoppers have devastated Paco's corn crop. Mateo—as they call Matt--paints pictures of a rosy future as he tells Paco how the eponymous horse will sire spotted ponies for their ranch. No sooner has Brando bragged about his dreams than an evil Mexican vaquero, Chuy (John Saxon), and his pistoleros purloin his prized stallion. Our hero was drunk at the time he raved about the fabulous ranch they were going to own. When he tries to shoot at the thieves, he cannot hit them because his aim is wobbly. Chuy rides back across the stream, ropes our inebriated protagonist and drags him through the river, laughing the entire time. Later, after he has shaved off his beard, Matt tries to disguise himself as a Mexican and recover his appaloosa. "Coffee grounds do not make a Mexican," Paco's wife Ana (Miriam Colon of "Scarface") tells him. The idea of masquerading as a Mexican by staining one's face brown sounds absurd. Nevertheless, despite Ana's warnings, Matt assures her that getting his horse back will be "as easy as cutting butter." "It is your throat that will be cut, Mateo," Ana replies without hope. Paco voices similar sentiments. "Chuy is not just one man. Chuy is an army." About thirty minutes into "The Appaloosa," Furie has established Matt Fletcher as the hero, Chuy Medina as the villain, and Trini as Chuy's rebellious girlfriend. Trini dishonored Chuy in the eyes of his pistoleros when she not only complained about Matt violating her, but also when she stole Matt's horse. Chuy offers Matt the sum of $500 to buy his horse so he can make it look like Trini was merely riding the horse rather than stealing it to escape from Chuy. Everything that Matt has dreamed about is wrapped up in the horse, so he must bring it back to Mexico. Almost an hour into story, Matt infiltrates Chuy's hacienda and tries to force Trini to help him recover his horse. Unfortunately, Chuy already knows about Matt's presence from the pulque drinking scene in the cantina with Squint Eye. Later, an ancient goat herder, Ramos (Frank Silvera of "Hombre"), warns Matt about Cocatlan. When Matt tries to reclaim his appaloosa, Chuy and his gunslingers are waiting for him. They usher him into a room where they thread scorpions on a string and arm wrestle. Predictably, our hero loses. Lazaro and company dump Matt's body in an abandoned house. Trini escapes from Chuy and takes Matt to Ramos. The goat herder places Matt in a grave he had made for himself. Mind you, the ending is upbeat and our hero gets his horse back."The Appaloosa" is about as close as Hollywood got to replicating a Spaghetti western. Hands down, John Saxon delivers the best performance of his career as Chuy. Furie has veteran cinematographer Russell Metty shoot this western in an highly unconventional style. The foreground is filled with objects that block out the composition so that people are squeezed into corners of the shots. The lighting is extremely atmospheric. The scene in the cantina with Squint Eye exemplifies brilliantly Furie's signature style of lensing. Brando puts his hand over his face while he studies the other occupants in the room. Altogether, despite its authentic look and atmosphere, "The Appaloosa" amounts to an above-average, but not very memorable horse opera.

thinker1691 The Nineteen-sixties was a time of great change in the movies. For the first time, the Anti-Hero was coming into his own. Here is one such film entitled " The Appaloosa " written by Robert Macleod and directed by Sidney J. Furies, which ranks among the very best of the nuevo Westerns. The star of the film is none other than Marlon Brando who by this date, was hitting his stride. Up against him and doing a superb job as the heavy is John Saxon who plays Chuy Medina. He plays a proud Mexican bandit justifying his theft of a rare horse by Trini, his reluctant woman (Anjanette Comer) who steals it. Matt Fletcher (Marlon Brando) returns home after many years hunting Buffalo, with a sack full of Gold Coins, a beautiful Appaloosa horse and a promise of repaying a debt. However, Chuy Medina decides to steal the horse and challenges Brando to journey to Mexico and try to get it back. The touching drama of the story plays well against the stark desert landscape and the inner duel of the two adversaries matches well their behavior. The excellent cast includes Emilio Fernández, Alex Montoya and Frank Silvera as Ramos. Through the years the film has earned the crown of Classic. ****

Cristi_Ciopron Today I have seen for the first time THE APPALOOSA and it is some western, bizarre and oblique and striking, played by one the very few extraordinary actors ever, and a strange hallmark as well—made in '66, I believe, it looks like an original, rough, sharp and uncanny revisionist western taken over by Brando once more ;it reminded me of that western directed by Brando himself, several years before Appaloosa. Which one is better? I can not say that, as it's long since I have seen ONE EYED …. And can they truly be compared? These movies exists only around Brando; and Hopkins explained well that they are iconic movies, movies enlivened by Brando's iconic presence (--and whims, and antics, if you like …--), egotistical performances meant to startle and to amaze. The script is smashed, and if Appaloosa is indeed powerfully dramatic, it's because of Brando's guts. Acts of courage, of egotism, a narcissistic cinema unfortunately sabotaged or denied by the '60s Hollywood industry; come to think of it, Gabin, Grant and others were accorded what Brando needed too—a celebratory cinema intended to exploit an actor's unusual energy and iconic glow. This is Brando exploitation. Movies like this one are designed as cult—films, and this seems their primary significance. On a large scale, this was done in the generous era of cinema—the era of true stardom. Gabin, Bogart, Garbo—and, before them, the true stars of the silent cinema, fully benefited from this. Brando, like Newman, came too late, when the cult meant a rather small niche and such a strategy was possible only in the B cinema (see the Bronson file, or the Italian genre actors …).Here, as the gringo ,Brando is (again) larger—than—life; the theme of the humiliated and wronged man can be superficially traced through some famous westerns, like LARAMIE and that already mentioned above ONE EYED …,but is it any good? I think not; aside from a superficial resemblance, the scene is new each time it's used by another director from a different movie.Another aspect—Brando's role as Matteo, the gringo, is a stand—out because of Brando's own line of rough and fancy realism—if you will only accept such an expression. In the final duel, Brando uses with the same delighted nonchalance his obvious clumsiness—he used his hands in a bizarre way, and this somehow boosts his character, enhances if not the realism, then the attractiveness of a scene.When we avidly watch Brando are we really in for realism (performing credibly average unobtrusive people)? Brando always strives—if he did it at all—to play interesting, dashing, intriguing characters—not pedestrians. First of all, a realist performance presupposes a realist script and realist intentions. Brando naturally enjoys to fascinate and to startle. He offers high—voltage fancy. Of course his beautifully made characters are real—because he created them, not because they are realistic to a grand degree. Was he ever required realism? Whose realism, or, realism according to whom? In his westerns too, he is not trying to give realistic performances (the way Duvall, Costner, Eastwood, Hackman, Caan, with the adequate scripts and parts, tried—and largely succeeded too). Dean, Nicholson, De Niro and maybe even Clift aimed sometimes at achieving realist performances; not Brando, not Pacino, who characteristically subordinate the parts to their energies and personalities and even playfulness.Gabin was seldom realist in his performances; and he was seldom solicited, required to be realist.Some mistake a certain intensity for realism; but, first of all, let us inquire if a certain movie or script requires or at least admits realism, and to what degree.