Pancho Villa

Telly Savalas stars as the Mexican rebel Villa, `the only man to invade the USA!' Although the story had been told historically before (i.e. `Villa Rides' with Yul Brynner) this version is played more for laughs. This was made at the height of Savalas' popularity in the year that Kojak became a household name.

Here, Villa `borrows' $30,000 to buy guns for his rebel cause. He sends his partner Scotty into America to do the trade, but while there he is double-crossed. He escapes back to Mexico where Villa prepares to take revenge on the men who cheated him. He crosses the border and captures the American town of Columbus.

This western pits a mainly Spanish cast against Savalas, Clint Walker, Anne Francis and Chuck Connors. They give good performances although Savalas has a tendency to go over the top at times; so does the film, with dumb scenes such as when a whole room of soldiers cannot (at the command of Connors as Col. Wilcox) swat a fly. But this scene is justified however, as Wilcox explains `By killing that fly, I am saving your lives'. Well, ahem, quite. Yes, the script is that bad. But keep watching for the `exciting' climax . When the film is boring, it's awful, but some scenes are excellent, helped no end by Savalas' performance.

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.

This is an odd little film about infamous Pancho Villa featuring an all Spanish cast except for a quartet of "name" American actors. Savalas (attempting no sort of accent or strong characterization) slides through the film on his unique brand of charm. (He was at or near his height of fame at he time.) He's given a scene to explain why, in this version of the story, Villa is bald, yet in a clip that takes place prior to the shaving, he is bald then, too! He is only effective at all because so many of the rest of the cast are bad. Roman god come to life Walker co-stars as a gunrunner who works alongside Savalas. Sadly, he is covered up by a jaunty captain's hat and a double breasted coat much of the time, so his treasure of a chest is under wraps. Still, his innate charm and handsome face add a lot to this very slight movie. He manages to inject some humor and slyness into his part. Francis has very little to do in her role (and disappears without a trace at some point!), but is attractive. Conners (with his skeletal features and corpse-like lips) plays a mad, driven Army officer who's bent on cleanliness and order at the expense of efficiency. He has a notable scene in which a mess hall is virtually trashed in order to excise one fly. The film is impossible to take seriously and it doubtful that it was intended as such. It's a sort of parodic, satiric take on the genre. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the wit or the money to make much of an impression. The sets look like they wouldn't pass muster on "Bonanza" and the dubbing (in fact all of the sound) is horrible. The music in this film is almost it's worst aspect. There is a highly aggravating theme played by the Mexicans as they enter the U.S. and it is ceaseless in its torture of the viewers' ears. To top it off, there's a hellacious closing credit song sung by Savalas (!) and written by John Cacavas (who did music for "Kojak" and a horde of TV movies.) The film is not very good, but watchable once if little is expected of it.

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.

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!