it would be great to see a widescreen dvd release.
Well folks we got our wish its out on DVD now released by 20th Century Fox .
So today after a buying & recording spree over the last two days I watched my 4th Western this morning popping "100 Rifles" into the player. This time it wasn't the pan & scan AMC commercial interrupted version I saw over a year ago.
This was well directed by Tom Gries a veteran TV director (Route 66, Combat, Rat Patrol, Man From Uncle) who's previous Western was "Will Penny".
This is a "no-pata" Western, sort of like a Zapata with no politics much like "The Wild Bunch" which fits this category.
The cast has Jim Brown, Burt Reynolds, Raquel Welch, Frenando Lamas, Eric Braeden, Aldo Sambrel, and a lot of SW extras that you will recognize. Shot in beautiful Almeria, the release is in uncut widescreen.
The story opens with the hanging of Sarita's (Welches) father by the Federales. Officer Verdugo (Lamas) is a bloodthursty bastard, and he purposly pulls the horse out from Sarita's father so sloooowly so he's strangled rather tham has his neck broke. Sarita runs up and jumps upon her father using her weight to kill him quickly, its a powerful scene.
Sarita now becomes a Soldada, a Yaqui leader.
Jim Brown ex NFL football star isn't all that bad in this and he is believable as Arizona policeman Lyedecker on the trail of Yaqui Joe a Half Breed cross of a Yaqui Indian-Alabama Good-ol'-boy father (Burt Reynolds) who has robbed 6,000 dollars from an Arizona bank. With which he purchased the 100 rifles of the title for Sarita and The Yaquis.
This film does have some great action set pieces the escape of Yaqui Joe & Lyedecker out of the train and through the town shows off Reynolds stuntman abilities and Brown's athleticism.
There is a great bout of horsemanship as the group of Yaquis decend down an unbelievably steep ramblas, its really pretty exciting seeing the horses negotiate that decent.
All the action sequences are good, no complaints, especially Raquel's shower sequence (more like a wet "T" shirt shower) where she stops a troop train by a water tower, watch the spider holes, lol.
The train wreck at the end is also done well.
I'm thinking now that these American or British financed Euro shot Zapatas & "nopatas" are some of the best clones of the general SW trends in Westerns that influenced the genre after Leone's successes. They never reached the heights that Leone did with "gunfight" based Westerns (like FAFDM or GBU) but with "Villa Rides" a Zapata and this film they very good jobs of cloning the Italian directors, the only missing elements are the innovative camera angles and the picaresque characters.
I could be the Almeria locations have something to do with it too, Clints AW's could have used a few alumni from Spain, or at the very least it would have been nice to see him shoot a film in Almeria.
I also thought "Chato's Land" was very good in its chase/manhunt sub genre while The Hunting Party was good but had a few minor flaws.
On the other hand Welches Hannie Caulder is lame in comparison and it has Almeria locations.
100 Rifles even has a decent score, its not at Morricone's level but its good enough.
Another couple of interesting angles is the emergence of Welch as a strong believeable protagonist in this film, and also the interracial sexual affair between Brown & Welch. Cinematically speaking I don't quite know if after "The Great Silence" breaking this particular taboo if this was the next instance of interacial love or not.
This is one of Jim Browns best performances in a Western that I've seen so far, though I've not seen them all , and haven't seen El Condor since seeing it in a theater years ago so that claim may change.
Its worth finding and buying for your collection
Author