A Reason to Live, A Reason to Die

I seem to have checkered pasts when it comes to tracking down hard-to-find movies that I really want to see. On first effort, something goes wrong; cable goes out, recording the wrong film/time, ninjas....that sort of thing. I actually saw this 1972 spaghetti western two years ago via Netflix streaming, but it was the heavily edited 92-minute version. It aired recently on MGM HD and was listed at the much longer, less-edited 111 minute version. Well, point to you MGM, you fooled me. It was the 92-minute version, but here's the review just the same, 1972's A Reason to Live, A Reason to Die.

It's early in the Civil War and as the fighting picks up in the Southwest, Colonel Pembroke (James Coburn), a disgraced Union officer, is looking for vengeance. He has been labeled a coward and a traitor for surrendering Fort Holman, a key position in the territory, to the Confederates without a shot fired. Now, he's got a plan to exact his revenge on the man who took the fort from him, a Confederate major named Ward (Telly Savalas). A frontal assault on the mountaintop fortress would be suicide so he intends to take the fort back on a nearly suicidal commando mission. Commanders won't grant him any troops so instead he ends up with a small squad of convicts, seven men he saves from the gallows, including a man from his past, Eli (Bud Spencer). His odds seem slim as his convicts squad seems more interested in killing him than completing the mission, but heavily guarded and fortified Fort Holman awaits.

It's pretty obvious watching the heavily-edited 92-minute version of this spaghetti western from director Tonino Valerii that some important and major portions of the story were edited. Much of the 20-to-25 minutes that were cut (lengths vary depending on sources) were from an opening prologue that establish how Pembroke and Eli meet in the war-torn Southwest. Instead, we get a dropped-in opening that actually gives away much of the ending. Ta-da, then we're back to the beginning -- sort of -- and away we go with the mission. At different times, the story does feel disjointed, out of sorts, a little rushed and at ends. Can I think of anymore cliches? Nah, that's good for now. The longer version was released on DVD via Wild East, but that DVD is currently worth $190 at Amazon so I don't see a viewing happening any time soon so for now, the heavily-edited version it is!

Now take the rest of what I'm about to write with a grain of salt. I love spaghetti westerns, and I love men-on-a-mission movies. So with that said, is this movie especially good? Nope, but I still liked it a lot. Obviously with the Civil War setting, this isn't your typical gunfighters and bandits spaghetti western. The Civil War background certainly adds a nice touch to a familiar genre. 'Reason' is also aided by some familiar locations from movies like Once Upon a Time in the West, The Deserter and others. The best use though is the fortress from El Condor, here as Confederate garrison Fort Holman. It appears gigantic and imposing, a fortress that's impossible to take down. It's a good-looking western, and the score from Riz Ortolani is a little schizophrenic but pretty cool. Give it a sample HERE with the main theme.

If the basic storyline sounds familiar, it should. It's a not subtle rip-off of 1967's The Dirty Dozen and countless other convicts turned commandos flick. Coburn is solid but nothing special as the revenge-seeking Pembroke, his backstory giving him a sympathetic edge, but he's mailing it in here. Spencer is the star, given more screentime and providing more interest in general. Savalas is given absolutely nothing to do in an appearance that is little more than a cameo. Pembroke's convict commandos lack the star power, basically a unique group of murderers/rapists/thieves and deserters that include Spencher's Eli, Sgt. Brent (Reinhard Kolldehoff), the Union NCO, MacIvers (Guy Mairesse), a murdering muleskinner, Wendel (Ugo Fangareggi), Pickett (Benito Stefanelli), a deserter and rapist, Fernandez (Adolfo Lastretti), a thief who doomed 30 Union soldiers with a bad deal, and a half-breed Apache (Joseph Persaud). The group reminded me of a similar convict crew in 1969's Play Dirty, unique faces with no real background who are meant to be picked off one-by-one. Cool group just the same.

Spaghetti western fans going in shouldn't expect much in the way of action or violence the first 50 minutes or so. If you're looking for a positive, it's this; they were saving all the action for the last 40 minutes!!! Pembroke and his convict commandos make their play attacking Fort Holman in an explosive finale that features an orgy of Gatling guns, explosions and some impressive stuntwork. Like the movie itself, it's a lot of fun. Yes, stupid fun with a whole lot of flaws, but fun just the same. Oh, and the name is one of the coolest ever.

A Reason to Live, A Reason to Die (1972): ***/****

It Can Be Done, Amigo

When I bought the Spaghetti Western Collection and its 44 movies in January, I pretty much knew what to expect.  For $15, I was getting 44 movies which by my math is about 35 cents per movie. So at that value and knowing that these are public domain movies, I was rolling the dice on the actual film quality on the DVDs. I wasn't worried about the actual movies -- I can find a redeeming quality in even the worst spaghetti -- but I was only hoping that the quality was watchable, was bearable, enough that I could understand what was actually going on and hear what was being said.

I thought I had stumbled onto a gold mine when I watched the first three movies in the set, and all three were average to above average widescreen movies.  We're talking able to see and hear everything.  Novel concept, huh? It didn't hurt that all three movies were pretty good in their own right regardless of the quality.  Well, it had been a couple months since I actually watched anything from the collection, and at the rate I was going it would have taken me about six years to watch all 44 movies.  After three winners, I finally got a dud in terms of video quality, 1972's It Can Be Done, Amigo.  Not to say it was a great movie, but the quality certainly wasn't helping.

A drifter in the west with no particular goals or direction where he is going, Hiram Coburn (Bud Spencer) finds out he's being followed. In his travels at some point in his past, Coburn had a mistaken romantic encounter with a dance hall girl, Mary (Dany Saval), and now her brother, Sonny (Jack Palance), wants Coburn to marry her.  Naturally, he then plans on killing her new husband. Coburns hits the trail, trying to put some distance between him and Sonny but is slowed down when he meets young Chip Anderson (Renato Cestie) alone on the trail. Chip's uncle has been killed, and now the youngster is all alone. Coburn agrees to help, bringing him to Westland, a small, corrupt town where the boy has been given a deed on land in the area. There's something of value on the land though so now Coburn finds himself with enemies on all sides.

In a lot of ways, Bud Spencer is a perfect example of the atypical spaghetti western hero.  Where actors like Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef and Franco Nero were the ideal strong, silent, glaring type who let their guns do the talking, Spencer was a big, lovable, goof of a hero (in most of his movies at least).  Comparing him to most spaghetti western heroes -- anti-heroes I guess -- there is nothing typical about Spencer as Coburn here.  He talks to his horse, asking for advice...and getting it, wears eye glasses and puts them on before a fight, and never wears a gun much less uses one.  As was the case with any other Bud Spencer movie I've seen, I genuinely liked him as a star and the characters he played.  Standing 6-foot-4 and weighing at least 300 pounds with his wild hair and crazy beard, he is a galoot of a teddy bear on-screen.  Different from most spaghetti western leading men, but in a positive way.

Where Spencer made a name for himself in European westerns was alongside fellow star Terrence Hill in comedic westerns, especially the Trinity series.  Without Hill here as his sidekick, the tone and story still go down that comedic route.  If you're unfamiliar with Italian/European comedic westerns but familiar with the Clint Eastwood movies, take out the cynicism, the shootouts, the staring and glaring, but replace them with bumbling villains, eccentric weirdos all around, and fistfights and brawls instead of guns, and you've got the Italian comedic western.  Of the Trinity movies I saw, I liked them, but didn't love them.  Here with 'Amigo,' I liked Spencer but didn't love the attempts at laughs. The brawls go on too long -- how many times can we see Spencer pound someone on the head? -- and the premise with the marriage subplot seems thrown on so Palance can be his usual weird self.

Now let's talk about the video/DVD quality which is...how do I say....piss-poor.  Public domain means anyone who can or wants to distribute the movie can do just that.  You don't need ownership rights because there aren't any.  It's in the public domain!  Translated that means no quality-control has been done on the films, in this case in the almost 40 years since it was released.  The hearing and audio were fine here, and the dubbing was above average, but the actual viewing was hit or miss.  One scene looks immaculate -- or as good as pan-n-scan can -- and the next looks washed out with colors changing mid-scene.  One scene is rich and full of color, the next looks like a first season colorized episode of Gilligan's Island.  I've seen worse prints of movies, but this one was pretty bad.

Poor quality aside, I just didn't find myself drawn into this western.  Spencer is as reliable as ever, and Palance is an ideal choice to play the weird, eccentric, possibly crazy gunfighter.  He's not as evil here as say A Professional Gun or Companeros, but because it's Jack Palance you just know he's up to something.  There are some cool locations used (including the McBain ranch from Once Upon a Time in the West), and the score has its moments.  Francisco Rabal is a sub-par villain as Franciscus, a reverend/sheriff/judge in Westland with Sal Borghese and an unidentified actor as his twin brother deputies.  The movie was okay without being memorable, but you can do worse.

It Can Be Done, Amigo <---trailer (1972): **/****   

The Five Man Army

Some movies just do their best to avoid you.  For me, one of them was 1969's The Five Man Army.  I don't know how many years back, but TCM devoted four Saturdays one month to showing spaghetti westerns, and I took my chance, watching just about all of them.  Besides the Clint Eastwood spaghettis and about 15 or 20 more, it is definitively harder to track down the rest (there were about 600 made overall) which I soon figured out.  One Saturday, I caught 'Army' and loved it, but could never track down a copy because it wasn't available anywhere.  Thankfully, someone was able to send me a VHS copy of the TCM print, and tada, I had my copy.

This isn't your typical spaghetti western with gunfighters shooting it out for women and riches in the desert.  As well, it was made with financial backing from MGM where most spaghetti westerns were made with backing from Italian studios.  Considering all the different elements of the story, it's a heist zapata spaghetti western with a men on a mission/mercenary setting for all the characters.  So all those things rolled together to form basically the coolest idea for a western ever.  Is it a classic?  No, but it isn't trying to be.  Good cast, great musical score, and action around every corner.

During the Mexican Revolution, a group of revolutionists catches wind of a gold shipment bound for Mexico City and hires an American to get the job done.  His name is simply, Dutchman (Peter Graves), and he goes about putting a team together to accomplish the mission.  His crew includes Augustus (James Daly), an explosives expert, Mesito (Bud Spencer), a mammoth strongman, Luis (Nino Castelnuovo), an acrobatic bandit and dead eye with a slingshot, and Samurai (Tetsuro Tanba), a master swordsman and knife thrower. The mission/robbery seems suicidal though as the five men must get aboard a heavily guarded armored train outfitted with 100 guards, machine guns and a cannon that can pick them off if they try and board.  All along the route, patrols of soldiers will be waiting for the signal to move in if trouble arises.  It seems impossible, but the Dutchman's got a plan.

A sucker for men on a mission movies, I fell for this one from the first time I saw it. 'Army' follows a familiar formula, but director Don Taylor (who reportedly only filmed part of the movie) handles everything so smoothly it is fun just to go along for the ride.  The movie follows the formula; recruit a team, introduce their specialties, reveal the mission, let the team loose on the mission, and the fallout with the survivors.  Taylor does just enough different to keep you on your toes, and does throw the audience a curveball here and there when he thinks they're too comfortable.  But at its most basic is an action-packed story that never waits too long in between gunfights and showdowns with Dutchman's crew, revolutionaries, bandits, and Mexican soldiers.

The calling card for 'Army' is easily the actual heist sequence when the Five Man Army hits the armored train.  To this point, we've only been given hints as to how they'll pull off this impossible job, but it all comes together in an almost wordless 26-minute sequence that is a masterful presentation of how to shoot a tense, exciting heist action sequence.  You can watch it starting HERE and continuing into Part 8, 9 and 10.  The movie was shot on location in Spain (you'll see some familiar locations from other spaghettis, including Once Upon a Time in the West), and nowhere does that benefit more than the heist sequence which features some crazy, absolutely ridiculous, and I imagine rather dangerous stunts.  But credit to the cast who seems to be doing a majority of their stunts, and on a moving train at that.  I love the movie on the whole, but the heist is the strongest and best part.

Filling out the Five Man Army is a great group of actors who were never huge stars.  Graves filmed this while on hiatus from his hit TV show Mission Impossible, and it's only fitting that the story is basically M:I in the wild west.  I like Graves a lot, and he's a good choice to play the tough, no-nonsense leader of this group of mercenaries.  His four men are all given a chance to shine, and none disappoint.  Daly is a scene-stealer as dynamite expert Capt. Augustus, delivering a monologue about the changing times in the west and how he doesn't expect any of them to survive.  Watch it HERE starting at the 4:30 mark. For a dumb old action movie, this speech says more than whole movies that cover the same time period. Spencer is awesome as ever as the immense, somewhat dim-witted Mesito, Castelnuovo is great as a shifty bandit you're never quite sure of, and Tanba doesn't say a word, letting his sword do his talking.  A great group, and a perfect team to pull off an impossible heist!

Watch enough spaghetti westerns, and it gets to be an easy thing to overlook composer Ennio Morricone and his great musical scores. His 'Army' score is an underrated one (listen to the main theme HERE) mixing the big and epic with the quieter and emotional.  Augustus' speech is aided by Morricone's soothing score being played under his words, but then the action sequence is boosted by this perfect action score that keeps the story flowing at all times.  Just another element of one of my favorite movies.  It is available to watch from start to finish starting with Part 1 of 11 in a great print on Youtube.  Enjoy it! 

The Five Man Army <---TCM trailer (1969): ****/****