China 9, Liberty 37

"There ain't no soft-hearted gunfighters" says Matthew Sebanek (Warren Oates) to Clayton Drumm (Fabio Testi) late in Monte Hellman's lyrical western "China 9 Liberty 37" a/k/a "Amore, piombo e furore". The English title reflects the words on a crossroad's sign shown at the start of the film.

Hellman fans will be happy to finally find this film available on DVD, as a 2005 release by Mill Creek Entertainment. Although the IBDb does not yet link to it, Amazon has it listed as "China 9 Liberty 37/Gone With the West". The second movie on the DVD, "Gone With the West" (a/k/a "Little Moon and Old Jug"), is a James Caan-Sammy Davis Jr. western best described as "The Rat Pack on LSD". It is a horrible western made even worse by the condition of the print they used to make the DVD, but it does feature one of the most intense cat-fights in cinema history.

The print for "China 9" is a bit better but suffers from a poor "pan and scan" full-screen treatment and weak audio tracks. It also has some editing glitches, which probably resulted from the need to cobble together a decent print for transfer to DVD. And I suspect the original release was longer than this 98minute version.

Hellman and Oates also collaborated on "The Shooting" and if you enjoyed that effort you should really like "China 9". In "China 9" Oates plays a retired gunfighter mining gold on land he refuses to sell to the railroad. Testi (the best of a long line of English-challenged pretty-boy European actors who worked in the western genre in the 60's and 70's) is hired by the railroad to kill Oates. But the two gunfighters hit it off and Testi refuses to complete the job. In the meantime Oates' wife Catherine (Jenny Agutter) comes on to Testi. They run off together believing she has killed Matthew, but he survives and begins to hunt them down. To add additional complications to the story, the railroad recruits a squad of gunfighters to kill both Matthew and Clayton.

Clayton Drum is good western hero. Although he drinks a lot of cocaine based tonic, he maintains his professional integrity and refuses to sell out to the wild west show promoters or the dime novelists. The world may be changing and making him irrelevant, but he sticks to his principles. "My life is not for sale".

Fans of "The Hunting Party" will find a familiar storyline, Fellini fans will find a nice homage to their favorite director, and Sam Peckinpah fans will find an actual appearance-while a small speaking part it is more than just a cameo.

The action sequences are extremely well staged, although the effects are on the cheap side. The action in the big final showdown scene is totally credible and leaves one wondering why other directors can't exercise their imaginations and come up with equally plausible shootouts. Plus there is an extremely nice twist to the story's resolution that you don't see coming. Finally, Hellman goes out on a slick "mise en scene" shot that actually advances the story a final notch.

"China 9" is an absolute must-see for fans of Jenny Agutter. Hellman liked to give his films an overexposed grainy look (as if the film stock was pushed a couple of steps in processing). Combined with minimal makeup this gave his heroines a strikingly haunting and earthy beauty, check out Millie Perkins in "The Shooting" and "Ride the Whirlwind". Like Perkins, Agutter has never looked better and is more than credible as the catalyst of this love triangle.

Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.

This one comes very late in the Spaghetti Western timeline, is directed by an American, and plays out like a love story. It's different to say the least.

Fabio Testi is Clayton, a condemned man who is reprieved at the last minute, as long as he tracks down Warren Oates and kills him. Oates used to work for the Railroad and they don't like loose ends, so Clayton has to take him out. A problem arises in the form of Jenny Agutter, Warren's much younger, hot wife whom Clayton first spies skinny dipping. Clayton shacks up at the Oates/Agutter household under the pretence that he's passing through, but Oates is no fool, and Agutter starts making goo-goo eyes at the hunky Clayton.

Not a shot is fired in anger for the first fifty minutes of this film, as Clayton decides he can't kill Oates by he can get it on with Agutter, which leads to Oates attacked her and Agutter retaliating in a surprisingly violent way (she stabs him in the back and brains him with a rolling pin). Clayton and Agutter think Oates is dead and they can be a couple, but Oates wakes up and gathers his numerous brothers for some revenge...as does the Railroad when they find out Oates isn't dead...

As this is a late era Spaghetti Western, the pacing isn't exactly full throttle, but I was surprised to see that the violence was very realistic - people get shot and fall over instead of clutching themselves and spinning around the place, and the violence is very abrupt and sudden, like the accidental shooting of a hooker through a window or two corpses being shot over and over again.

Plus, Testi stands out as the lightening fast Clayton, made weak through his love for Agutter. Apart from her dodgy Irish accent, Agutter does well too and spends a lot of time naked with Testi (I actually gave birth to Testi's child just by watching this film!). Warren Oates stands out too, with his mumbly, tired character.

This must be one of the very last Spaghetti Westerns, and it's worth tracking down if you can find an uncut version of it. Sam Peckinpah makes a surreal cameo too, just to add to the sense of weirdness.

China 9, Liberty 37 (1978)

** (out of 4)

Condemned gunman Clayton Drumm (Fabio Testi) is saved from the noose but he must track down farmer Matthew Sebanek (Warren Oates) and kill him since he refuses to sell his valuable land to the railroad company. Clayton goes to do the deed but ends up falling in love with the man's wife (Jenny Agutter), which just adds more problems. This Italian/Spanish co-production from cult director Hellman has a few decent moments but in the end this is a pretty boring affair from start to finish. I know Hellman has a strong cult following among some film fans but I can't say I'm one of them. This film here is yet another Spaghetti Western that tells a rather familiar story but Hellman puts his own spin on things and these spins actually hurt more than help. This film has a lot of problems including letting the viewer know who we should be cheering for. The film starts off with Testi being the bad guy and we're given Matthew to like. At around the thirty-minute mark we switch sides as it turns out Matthew is a real jerk who abuses his wife and the director has decided to put us in a love story. The love story between Testi and Agutter never works for several reasons. One reason is that the two have no chemistry and one can't help but roll their eyes at the love banter they give at each other. The screenplay mentions that Agutter is shy and "changes her clothes in the barn" but that doesn't keep her from being nude in this thing at least six different times. The nude scenes are only available in the R-rated cut (most boots are of the TV print) and are the main reasons to watch this thing. Agutter is an incredibly beautiful woman so seeing her nude is about the only thing that keeps this sucker moving. However, even the sex scenes are messed up by Hellman as he decides to film them in a slow-motion fashion with an incredibly bad score over them and a couple even has some sort of weak pop song. Why on Earth Hellman decided to do this is anyone's guess but it doesn't work. I also didn't believe Testi in his role too much but then again this could be due to the fact that Hellman seemed more interested in showing off his body than anything else. Oates is always dependable and he turns in a good performance even though the screenplay does him no favors. Agutter's role is pretty thankless but she gives it all she can. Look quick for Sam Peckinpah as a writer.

This moves at an unhurried pace, and you may feel as if you've seen much of it before, especially if you're a spaghetti western fan. But it's worth seeing for the character played by Warren Oates, a former gunfighter whose behavior swings from the sympathetic to the unforgivable and almost back again. In a modest Western like this, it's a pleasant surprise to see ambiguous characters. So that his conflict with Fabio Testi, a younger gunfighter who steals Oates' wife, is full of uncertainty. For all the familiar trappings, you're uncertain how it will end; and that should keep you watching. As the object of desire, Jenny Agutter is constrained by a mumbling Irish brogue and an under-written part. But you can see why Testi is smitten with her. Bottom line: see this for Oates, a great actor in a worthy role.

Named after a mysterious signpost in Beaumont, southeast Texas, set between U.S. 90 and the adjacent Southern Pacific railroad tracks, that inexplicably reads "China 9 Liberty 37", with the genre fading quick into obscurity in both sides of the Atlantic, this, Monte Hellman's and Warren Oates' final western, seems to be trying to succeed despite itself, setting pitfalls for itself and falling into them but still somehow remaining a formidable picture, not just worthy of bearing Monte Hellman's name (a vastly under-appreciated American auteur with an incredible run in the early 70's that saddly never took off) but doing justice to it.

If the movie can work despite Fabio Testi's unintelligible Italian accent, then it can overcome almost everything. I say almost because Pino Donaggio's score (a jumbled mess of muzak apart from the fitting opening credits theme that seems to be consciously channeling Morricone) defies overcoming and Hellman's inexplicable fixation to not only squeeze a heartfelt romance out of two actors (Testi and Jenny Agutter) who simply don't have it in them to look "in love" but to go ahead and film not one but two long "making love" scenes, y'know, the ones where the two lovers are lost passionately in each other's eyes, kiss like fishes and rock back and forth in a rhythmic staccato all of which is played to horrible "making love" muzak, threaten to throw the whole thing permanently off.

But just when you think he's lost control, all Hellman needs to do to suck the viewer back in is cut to Warren Oates. A man not only made from that late 60's mold of cinematic badass but also a naturally charismatic actor who gave some truly electrifying performances for Hellman (COCKFIGHTER and TWO-LANE BLACKTOP), Oates, as the grizzly homesteader fighting the railroad company he once worked for that is now trying to steal his land, makes the movie, has the gravitational pull to keep everything together. Even in his early 50's he has so much charisma he can spare some for bland hunk Fabio Testi.

With the spaghetti western dead by 1978 (the last major release was MANNAJA the previous year - and the Italian genre industry moving on to a not-so-eclectic mix of MAD MAX and JAWS rip-offs to sustain itself in its waning years, before the advent of home video and movies opening worldwide killed it off) and Clint Eastwood continuing to carry the American western on his shoulders almost single-handedly, China 9 Liberty 37 is more of a throwback to Hellman's previous westerns, a particular niche unto themselves that take from both national western schools but subscribe to neither, than anything contemporary, certainly not as violent and cynic as most 70's westerns. Seen with regards to an overall oeuvre, China takes its proper place somewhere between THE SHOOTING and RIDE THE WHIRLWIND. More the sum of their author's fixations, clearly works bearing a distinct auteurial mark, Hellman's westerns seem like the late 60's equivalent of Budd Boetticher's Ranown westerns. The minimalism of the plot, the isolated settings, the lone female characters... but that's for another post.