Pancho Villa

This is a semi-fictional chronicle of the notorious bandit Pancho Villa (Telly Savalas) . It is a witless recounting of Villa's American campaign with broaden focus about action and irony . Villa (Dorotea Arango , 1878-1923) sends his gringo pal (Clint Walker) as gunrunner into US , but he is betrayed . As he encounters every obstacles with MacDermott (Luis Davila) ; besides , there meets his beautiful spouse (Anne Francis). Then , Villa leads his merry men in the famous raid over an American fort after being double-crossed in a weapons deal . Crossing the frontier attacking firstly the checkpoint and bombing the cartel captioning ¨You are entering in United States¨ . Later on , it begins an intense charge over the Columbus headquarter . A cocky and megalomaniac colonel (Chuck Connors) attempts to battle against him .

This Spanish/American co-production paints an ironic , cynic portrayal of the famous leader following the exploits of Villa and his men formed by a peasant army into USA territory . The picture ignores the wealth of the authentic history and becomes yet another action/adventure/humor Western and this failed production doesn't deliver what it should . It is an average Western with comedy , tongue-in-cheek , action and plenty of shootouts , gun-play and some moments results to be quite entertaining . This Paella/US Western was regularly directed by Eugenio Martin who made terror films (Horror Express) and more Spaghetti Western (Bounty killer , Requiem for a Gringo and Bad man's river) , among others .

This uneven rehash about Pancho villa exploits is partially based on real events , the authentic deeds are the following : For a time Villa,who seemed in line for leadership of Mexico , enjoyed the sympathetic interest of the US government who then dropped Villa and supported his rival , Carranza . Villa's resentment resulted in the vengeance raid on Columbus . Villa slapped the United States in the face by mounting a surprise raid on the town of Columbus,New Mexico,on 9 march 1916, killing eight American soldiers and ten civilians.In retaliation , President Woodrow Wilson sent General Pershing and a Punitive Expedition into Mexico in hot pursuit of Villa.General Pershing's column included the Seventh Cavalry and Apache scouts, chased Villa deep into Mexico , the Americans captured and killed several of Villa's lieutenants but failed to catch the guerrilla leader . Because of Mexican protests , Pershing's command returned to the US.Villa was assassinated in 1923 when gunman ambushed his car .

Somebody must have had the idea to make this actual historical event (1916 Raid on Columbus, NM, USA) into a farce of a film for the audience's pleasure.

It portrays both the American Army and Pancho Villa as bumbling, inept fools. I don't know what Telly Savalas (a huge star at the time) was thinking participating in this film.

With a comical, farcical sound track and ridiculous sound effects it is like watching a combination of MASH 4077, Three Stooges and horrible Chop-Sokey martial arts films of the day.

It's so bizarre, it's worth watching it to say that you did.

comedy, western,cartoon, music and Telly Savalas. in one film. a film about nothing except easy amusing. because each character is only caricature. few fight scenes are not worthy spice for this salad.and poor Pancho Villa is absent. his story is only subject for not very inspired party. is it a disappointment ? no way ! it is only slice from a time.small experiment for a kind of public, ironic piece about USA and different form of cartoon about a really Mexican hero.nothing more. after 40 years it can be a curiosity. but the purpose is entertainment, discover of a good actor as clown and few drops of comedy with French nuances.

Fast and funny account of Pancho Villa's invasion of the United States in order to get revenge on an unscrupulous arms dealer that double crossed him, only to get side-tracked by various mishaps and distractions.

Telly Savalas and Clint Walker are great as the smarmy Villa and his number one crony but Chuck Conners is wasted on the caricatured role of a gung-ho Colonel racing to repel Villa's army. All his scenes (particularly the fly in the mess hall) are cringe-worthy in their silliness!

All the fun is somewhat spoiled by the (historically accurate) sight of foreign invaders murdering US soldiers. These scenes would have been better off if they had been whitewashed as they undermine Savalas' "lovable rogue" performance, though it probably played better in those early-seventies days of "radical chic" than it does now.

Overall, the film is so fast-paced that you never slow down long enough to realize how dumb it is until the ending credits roll and Telly starts singing to you!

The western was in a bit of a cul-de-sac by the early 70's. The spaghetti and revisionist strands had pushed the format to its extremes, meaning that not much new territory was pursued. Pancho Villa was neither spaghetti, nor a revisionist; it was a Spanish western which decided that the best foot forward was to play things for laughs. It traded largely on its star actor Telly Savalas who was a massive TV star at the time as a result of Kojack.

The result is a silly and often tedious biopic about the Mexican revolutionary of the title and is specifically about his mini-invasion of the U.S.A. in 1916. I don't know the real story but it's quite obvious that this is a loose retelling at best. There is a lot of very stupid humour here including ludicrous separate scenes involving a fly and a lizard. The humour really isn't very good so these scenes just come across as misguided. To ramp up the campy nature further the army officer who is Pancho Villa's adversary is played by Chuck Connors in a quite deranged fashion. Despite a promising opening half, things get bogged down when the Mexicans enter America and things do drag quite a bit thereafter. It is a somewhat strange movie so is possibly worth watching for that reason if you are inclined enough. It ends with Savalas crooning a song over the end credits.