Django porte sa croix

Two worlds collide as Italian action master Enzo G Castellari takes on English wordsmith William Q Shakespeare in a mash-up of Hamlet and Spaghetti Westerns. It's faithful up to a point I guess. Not sure if Hamlet gets crucified in the play mind you.

Johnny Hamilton has a dream in which his father's ghost visits him and tells him he's been murdered and to head home and avenge his death. The usual stuff. Johnny's been hitching along with an acting troop who just happen to be performing Hamlet, so you get the 'to be or not to be' speech right there at the start of the film, on a beach, while another does backflips! Johnny heads home and meets his friend Horace, who seems reluctant to tell him what his mother's up to, and lo and behold, she's married Johnny's Uncle, the scheming Claude (Horst Frank, great as usual). Johnny now has to avenge his father's death, find out who really killed his father, get in many punch ups (like the play, right?), and kill loads of Danish Mexicans or something.

You see, Enzo is no fool. He's got the great source material, but he's still got to deliver an action-packed Western as well, and he manages to bring them together. Johnny is Hamlet, Horace is obviously Horatio, Ross and Gill I guess are (checks spelling) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, only with guns. Ophelia's there too but played down a bit.

You've also got a high instance of the 'Enzo Factor', which includes all his usual crazy camera angles, people appearing in mirrors, camera shots very often through objects (a chair, someone's legs, a bullet hole in a sheriff's badge), hyperactive camera shots, and the action amped up to ridiculous levels. I laughed twice - once when Mexican bandit Santana rode his horse through a glass door, and then again when Ennio Girolami shot a Chinese bartender by mistake.

This is a great because all the effort Enzo put into it is up there on the screen. It appeared on YouTube about a week ago in a great print. I don't imagine it will be there long, mind you.

Now someone upload The Return of Ringo! Also, my wife and I tried to go see Hamlet performed live in a park once, but for some reason the actors decided to perform it on the top of a hill while we were all seated at the bottom of the hill. It quickly became agony to sit on the tiny stools we rented so we left at the first interval, but also took the stools with us as compensation. The kids still use them to this day.

Take that Shakespeare!

Based on an idea by Sergio Corbucci, Enzo Castellari directed this western adaptation of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" drama, as Django (or Johnny, depending on which dubbing you get in your country) avenges the death of his father. It is interesting to observe how the classical tragedy elements work in the context of a Mediterranean style western movie. Not yet 30 years old, Castellari was already very creative at little touches like the camera circling around Django's face in the scene at his father's grave, and should take this way further in "Keoma" a decade later.

"Quella sporca storia nel west" suffers a bit from the unconvincing cast: German actor Horst Frank with his blond hair does not look like he is a member of the same family as Gilbert Roland, the veteran actor Roland is too old to play Andrea Giordana's brother, whose mother is much too young to be the mother of any of them. But even if the audience won't buy this ensemble for a family, the cruelty of the old tragedy is working great for a tough western, and the visual qualities of the movie, also gifted with a thrilling musical score by Francesco de Masi, save the day and make it a must for the collection of every spaghetti western fan. Regrettably, Andrea Giordana did not make any westerns after this anymore, because the young man had talent.

First the good. The revenge story has a somewhat unique feel to it, despite being simply another revenge story, with a Hamlet storyline for the script. This makes it seem like fresher "Spaghetti." The location shooting is good, with some unique geological rocks, and more importantly caves. It is intriguing to see a cemetery located in one of these underground caverns. The soundtrack by Francesco De Masi is appropriate and good. Now the bad. Acting by anyone not named Gilbert Roland is sub par, including the wooden lead performance. The stunt work is also at fault, especially the fight scenes, which appear weak throughout. The film is totally watchable, but certainly is no classic. MERK

This western starts of with our hero Johnny, who sports an orange brown tan and sparkling white teeth, having a nightmare about his father (of whom we only get to see his long black cape). He soon wakes up at the beach (?) where a group of traveling performers are reciting Hamlet. Johnny shoots some people (not the actors) and gets on his horse to leave. If he had stayed to get more acquainted with "the Danish play" it could have saved him a lot of trouble.

After a rip-roaring theme song that proclaims ‘A dreamer grows wise as he opens his eyes', director Enzo G. Castellari immediately sets the tone by mixing Sergio Leone's spaghetti style with that of Sidney J. Fury's "The Appaloosa". There are countless zoom shots, a loud and eclectic musical score ranging from angelic choirs to kitchen utensil sound effects, extreme closeups, minute attention to detail (we spend some time seeing an extra tying his old fashioned cowboy laces) and just about every shot seems to have something obscuring the frame, be it a chair, a staircase or an open fire. But when Johnny arrives back home to spy on his widowed mother (nicknamed 'the Queen') and witnesses her being spanked in the bedroom by her new husband Claudio, it becomes clear as water where these characters originated.

Johnny has the habit of getting into trouble everywhere he goes, but luckily each time his Clark Gable lookalike guardian angel pal shows up to save him. This man not only looks like a 1930's matinee hero, he also acts like one, laughing in the face of danger and saying ‘hopla' when jumping down on somebody's head. He has even perfected the ‘James T. Kirk Drop kick'. There are some other additions to the original text: while looking for his fathers killer Johnny is sidetracked by a subplot involving a Mexican bandit called Santanna, and I also don't remember any crucifixion scene in Shakespeare's play.

The performing troupe from the prologue reappear to help the mystery along, but although Johnny manages to bed a red haired actress, he fails to use them in his plans to compromise Claudius. His other love interest Ophelia- I mean Laura appears too briefly to lose her mind, but still ends up all wet and tragic. The comedic gravedigger actually gets a bigger part in this version, and still manages to show up in the same place as always, albeit without Yorick.

The finale does take a bit too long, as there are at least three dramatic shootouts (with an ever decreasing number of participants). Some directors never learn that prolonging a hero's suffering is pointless as long as the audience knows he will eventually get his revenge. Besides that, Clark Gable will always be there to save Johnny at the last minute. I don't suppose the real Clark ever played the part of Horatio. That versions Hamlet might have survived to ride into the sunset too.

7 out of 10

Adieu, adieu ! Remember me.

The first 30 minutes of 'Johnny Hamlet' might be the most inspired in all of Spaghetti Western. The movie opens with a misty nightmare scene that immediately let's you feel the mindset of the war-struck antihero. He awakens by an actor reciting Shakespeare with the chosen text being very appropriate for Johnny's situation. After that we get a scene of Johnny finding his father's grave which is on a cemetery in a cave. The scene has a surreal feel to it and impresses with its moving camera. Then he comes home to his mother after having been away fighting in war for two years to find her having a jolly hot time with his uncle, Johnny's father's brother. Johnny is understandably flabbergasted learning that his father got killed and finding his mom living together with his uncle all on the same day. After that Johnny meets his old flame who got married while he was away. When asking her what she knows about the killing of his father she refuses to talk, out of fear apparently. That's when two guy shows up advising Johnny not to ask so many questions and a fistfight ensues. Johnny is saved by an old friend (and a good friend of his father's) who's a tough guy and enjoys this kind of thing.

And that's how this thing starts. Yes, it's an adaption of Shakespeare's 'Hamlet'. Not only is this revenge story like made for a Spaghetti Western but the film doesn't even struggle with the complex source material. The directing is inspired and clever (in those first 30 minutes I was especially impressed by the prevailing theme of melancholy) but beyond anything else it is well-written. Instead of feeling constructed the plot development feels remarkably natural with the individual characters simply following their own interests. Nevertheless this is a Spaghetti Western through and through with everything we've come to expect from films of this subgenre, including shootouts and a fine score. A bit of Spaghetti Western routine sets in after the magnificent beginning and while the action is merely competent the film thanks to its writing nevertheless manages to stay interesting until the showdown.

It's an extremely well-working mix of low-brow and high-brow cinema, if you will, with elements that fans of only low-brow cinema would call "artsy". 'Johnny Hamlet' is not only a new Spaghetti Western favorite but even an unexpected Shakespeare adaption favorite. If you are a fan of both of those "genres" I reckon this is a must-see.