Il mercenario

I recently got hold of the Japanese DVD print via ebay. This is of really high quality and I was amazed that this film is not more widely known or appreciated. What a brilliant film. In many ways it is similar to Companeros and if you liked that wonderful film you will also love this. The story is somewhat far-fetched but is very enjoyable and fast paced in a 'boys own' way. The machine gun makes its familiar appearance. Franco Nero, as always, delivers a superb performance and Jack Palance gives a very good performance as a very unpleasant killer. The music is brilliant and the duel in the bullring is incomparable and is perfectly choreographed to the wonderful music. If you are interested in westerns you have to see this film.

Revolution, repercussion, robbery, shootout, greed, treachery, cynicism, retribution, all comes together in this fervently crafted, stylishly filmed and unabashedly violent spaghetti western flavoured with Mexican spices. The Mercenary is fun, amusing & thrilling from start to finish, and is laden with political underlinings that provide more depth & richness to its plot & characters.

Directed by Sergio Corbucci (Django & The Great Silence), while there is a playful, adventurous vibe to how the events unfold and are presented, the film doesn't hold back on brutality when the occasion calls for it. Corbucci's direction isn't as precise as in aforementioned classics but he nonetheless exhibits sufficient control over all aspects to give us another satisfying extravaganza.

Franco Nero plays the eponymous opportunist with charisma & pizzazz as he aids an idealistic peasant, finely acted by Tony Musante, in leading a rebellion in return for monetary gains. The on-n-off collaboration & fluid rapport they share with each other is what keeps the drama flowing. And then there is Ennio Morricone's terrific score that effortlessly elevates certain moments to new heights.

Overall, The Mercenary is a fascinating combination of skilful direction, solid acting & spirited soundtrack, and is easily amongst the finest examples of zapata western. A spicy mix of action, humour & violence that delivers the desired goods and also serves as a critique of Hollywood's handling of Mexican revolutions, Corbucci's film is engaging & entertaining in equal measure and comes thoroughly recommended.

Franco Nero, sporting a burly mustache and sideburns, stars as Segei `The Pollack' Kowalski, an angelic opportunist, who, for profit not nobility, helps a revolutionary, Paco (Tony Musante), overthrow the corrupt Mexican generals. It is a very good Spaghetti Western, with a nice pace, good action, and interesting characters playing off one another. Jack Palance is Curly, an obviously gay bad guy, whose prissy demeanor hides his ruthlessness- that is until he kills his own partner out of spite and blows a few men's heads off. The story starts with Nero establishing his badassness while catching a dice cheat, forcing the gambler to eat the dice and saying, "When you get them back, I suggest you dont use them again." He is then hired to help protect a trainload of silver make it through rebel territory to the States. Nero goes to the mining town only to find it overthrown by Paco and his gang, and the mine collapsed. Nero luckily finds himself able to offer his help to the rebels and guide Paco in the art of stealing, strategically avoiding, and attacking the corrupt army, eventually overthrowing it. But, mostly it is not a buddy-buddy relationship, Nero is in it for the money, Paco is in it for the righteousness, yet they both respect each other. (To give a good example, at one point, while crossing the desert, Nero makes Paco and the revolutionaries empty their canteens so he can have a shower while they go thirsty.)

Aside from nice bits of humor, it sports some religious allusions, such as, Paco begins with only twelve men + Nero (their Jesus), they masquerade at one point during a religious parade and attack while dressed as angels and virgin Mary's, as well as Nero being strapped to a t-shaped cross when captured. There is also a nod to Macbeth when Paco's woman uses his power drunk naiveté to convince him to turn against Nero. The film makes use of an obviously fairly high budget, with many large battles, crowd scenes, entire towns destroyed, planes bombing, and many locales. It has an interesting structure, since the bulk of the film is told in flashback before returning to the beginning and then reaching the grand finale. The Morricone score is great, and amazingly enough, very understated. Corbucci's direction has never been better.

(Any film that opens with a shot of a dwarf clown dressed like a matador, you just know is going to be good)

Last week, I came across a sale of Italian DVDs of several Spaghetti Westerns; I managed to purchase 4 of them and, being one of 2 I hadn't watched before, this ended up as the first I checked out.

Actually, I had missed this on late-night Italian TV; considering that a similar 'political' Spaghetti Western directed by Corbucci and co-starring Franco Nero and Jack Palance, namely COMPANEROS (1970), had been a bit too much tongue-in-cheek for my taste, I expected this to be in the same vein. However, while certainly lighthearted in comparison with Corbucci's DJANGO (1966; which I should revisit again in a couple of days) and especially THE GREAT SILENCE (1968), it's a more balanced proposition than COMPANEROS (particularly with respect to Palance's performance - quietly menacing here as opposed to the campiness of the later film) and, thus, superior to it in practically every way.

Nero has already matured quite a bit from the youthful gunslinger in DJANGO; here, he's basically playing a variation on Clint Eastwood's iconic Man With No Name figure in Sergio Leone's "Dollars Trilogy" (incidentally, Nero's own voice resembles that of Enrico Maria Salerno - who used to dub Eastwood in those films!). Indeed, the ongoing game of cat-and-mouse revolving around Nero, Palance and Mexican revolutionary Tony Musante is clearly inspired by the tricky relationship that went on between Eastwood, Eli Wallach and Lee Van Cleef in THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY (1966)! This is most evident in the numerous scenes where the taciturn Nero gets the brash Musante out of trouble or, conversely, 'sells' him to the authorities...and even more in the rather splendid showdown between the three characters, undoubtedly the film's highlight - given another dimension by being set in a bullring with Palance sporting a wig (he's nicknamed Curly!) and Musante made up as a clown!!

Despite her belated entrance in the film, Giovanna Ralli makes quite an impression as a fiery Mexican woman who hitches up with Musante; Euro-Cult and Spaghetti Western regular Eduardo Fajardo is also on hand as the requisite figure of oppression (who, at one point, is made to eat a living lizard by Musante!). While the comedy never quite descends into spoofiness and the political content is thankfully downplayed, the action sequences are very well handled...and the film is further blessed with a memorable theme tune by the one and only Ennio Morricone (with a little help from his friend and protégé Bruno Nicolai).

This film was actually one of my favorites at a student movie theater really many years ago. It was kinda cult and thus shown quite often and the audience could have been always the same. Like many of Corbucci's works it has frequent showings on German TV. IL MERCENARIO is very comparable to the better COMPANEROS which has particularly a much better cast. It's another buddy western with a Nordic (blond) and a Mexican guy where the first is cool and intelligent and the other hot tempered and rather low witted. Compañero Milian is much slicker than Musante who many times prevails just as a fool and is closer to Tuco Ramirez of THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY. Nevertheless Musante feels more realistic as a peasant than the grimacing Milian. Nero is more dominating in his role as the mercenary of Polish origin than as the Swedish Peterson of COMPANEROS. He is never really convinced of the revolutionary values. Curly/Ricciolo (Jack Palance) seems pretty superfluous for the plot and serves as a comic relief character with an extra portion of sadism. In the absence of a real lead villain he enters the final duel.

The pace of the film is fast and the excellent (maybe Morricone's best) and rousing score supports the generous action. Machine guns are roaring and counting the bodies falling seems pretty impossible. Impressing wide screen photography immerses the viewer.

9/10 with a slight nostalgic bonus. Top 10 Spaghetti Western.