Spaghetti Westerns Beyond Leone

Quentin Tarantino’s latest opus, The Hateful Eight, has recently hit our nation’s screens, for better or worse. It’s another homage to the Italian-made westerns that were hugely popular all over the world during the 60s and early 70s. Unfortunately, the only examples of these “spaghetti westerns” that really made any impact in the States were the films of director Sergio Leone, especially the trio of Man With No Name flicks he made with Clint Eastwood.

Leone was far from the only talented director working in the genre, however. There are plenty of great Italian westerns that have never gotten their due on this side of the Atlantic. So basically, I’m using The Hateful Eight as an excuse to spout off about some awesome spaghetti westerns that you may not have heard of, but should track down as soon as possible.

Django (1966)

A huge global hit, this film made Franco Nero an international superstar and provided Quentin Tarantino with the name for his own western hero. Director Sergio Corbucci’s film was banned from release in several countries for its “excessive violence,” largely due to a scene in which a captured spy gets his ear cut off. It went virtually unseen in the U.S. at the time of its release. Too bad, because Django is one of the best westerns of the decade. From the opening sequence of the duster-clad Django dragging a coffin through the desert, you know you’re watching something special. Later on, when Django finally reveals what’s inside that coffin, the action takes a leap into ridiculous, hyped-up perfection. Nero is great in the title role, delivering a variation on Eastwood’s brooding, close-lipped gunslinger. Django is one of western cinema’s great anti-heroes, a man with a mysterious (and never disclosed) backstory whose only motivation seems to be gold. His double-crosses and betrayals end up costing him the use of his hands after some brutal retribution. In the end, Django get his revenge, but the hollowness of his victory lingers as the final credits roll.

The Great Silence (1968)

Sergio Corbucci scored a giant hit with Django, and followed it up with a western that is, in my opinion, even better. This time, Corbucci sets the action in the snowy climes of Utah rather than the mud flats seen in Django. The wintry setting allows for some of the most breathtaking imagery in any western, starting with a hypnotic early chase through the snow and trees. Jean-Louis Trintignant stars as Silence, an avenging gunslinger who has been mute since a youthful run-in with bounty hunters who killed his father. Silence finds himself defending a group of Mormons who are being unjustly hunted down by bounty killer Klaus Kinski (in one of his all-time best performances). Kinski exudes a cold, cheerful menace throughout, while Trintignant’s wordless avenger stews and waits for his chance. The film builds to a shattering climax that always leaves audiences aghast with its unflinching nihilism. The Great Silence belongs on any list of the best westerns of all time.

The Big Gundown (1966)

After co-starring in a couple of Leone’s westerns, Lee Van Cleef became a huge European star in his own right. He starred in a string of Italian westerns, with director Sergio Sollima’s The Big Gundown ranking as the best of the bunch. Van Cleef plays a legendary bounty hunter who gets pulled into the search for an alleged child rapist. It turns out that the ‘rapist’ is actually an innocent Mexican scoundrel named Cuchillo (Tomas Milian, in a role he would return to often). Cuchillo’s only real crime is running afoul of the local power structure. As Van Cleef pursues him through a series of entertaining chases and scrapes, he edges closer to the truth. By the end, Van Cleef and Milian are working together to topple the corrupt landowners and discover the truth behind the crime. It all builds up to the big gundown of the title, with Van Cleef dueling a monocle-wearing German assassin out in the badlands. Van Cleef is at his taciturn, bad-ass best, and Milian delivers a winning performance as the wrongly accused peasant bandit.

Django Kill…If You Live, Shoot! (1967)

Director Giulio Questi’s one and only western earns its reputation as one of the strangest genre films ever made. In any genre. The oddball, virtually meaningless title gives you a clue to its uniquely unhinged nature. Django Kill… is filled with surreal tableaus, shocking violence and lots of flat-out weirdness. There’s not even a character named Django in it! Tomas Milian (again) stars as a peasant bandit who’s betrayed and shot by his gringo partners, only to climb out of the grave in search of vengeance. Milian ends up in a town known as The Unhappy Place, a xenophobic and insane little village filled with oddball shopkeepers and gold-crazed cowboys. How crazed? When one man is gunned down with gold bullets, the gathered crowd rips his body to pieces to dig out the bullets! Django Kill… is a truly insane, ultra-violent vision of the Old West as it never existed, complete with a gang of leather-clad gay “muchachos,” exploding horses, scalpings, crucifixions and lizard hallucinations. Great stuff.

Cemetery Without Crosses (1969)

The Italian western re-imagined as a French art film. Alright, that might not sound very promising, but Cemetery Without Crosses is a truly remarkable film. Director Robert Hossein also stars as a leather-clad gunfighter who is enlisted to avenge the murder of an old friend. The revenge-based plot is nothing special, but everything around it is exceptional. Hossein has trimmed the dialogue down to the purely essential. Whole scenes play out with no dialogue, emotions expressed simply with eyes and gestures. The gunfighter lives alone in the most art-directed ghost town of all time, a stunning vision of perfectly-stylized dilapidation. The cinematography is simply gorgeous—few westerns ever made contain so many memorable shots. It’s the sound design that really makes the film, though. Every creaking walkway, squeaky door and pregnant silence makes its presence felt, so even the dialogue-free scenes draw you in and hold you. A really unique movie experience.

A Bullet for the General (1966)

A Bullet for the General is the best example of the sub-genre of spaghetti westerns known as ‘Zapata westerns.’ These are generally set during the Mexican Revolution and focus on the struggles of the peasantry in the face of official corruption and repression. In this film, iconic Italian actor Gian Maria Volonte stars as peasant leader Chuncho. Chuncho crosses paths with an American arms dealer during a train robbery. The revolutionary band welcomes the American into the fold, unaware that he’s really an assassin sent by the government to kill the rebel general. Volonte is incredible as the conflicted peasant, full of revolutionary fervor one minute and selfish greed the next. Klaus Kinski steals the few scenes he’s in, playing a bomb-tossing monk named El Santo (the Saint). An action-filled meditation on ideals, loyalty and friendship, A Bullet for the General also features one of the most memorable closing lines of any Italian western.

Sabata (1969)

Lee Van Cleef was the coolest man in spaghetti westerns, but most of his flicks actually weren’t all that great. Sabata delivers the goods, though. Van Cleef plays the title character, a sweet-shooting gunslinger with a penchant for gadgets and trickery. The film has a much lighter tone than many Italian westerns and almost plays like a parody of the genre. Van Cleef is clearly having a ball as the wisecracking Sabata. He has a fun relationship with a rival treasure hunter named Banjo (played by genre mainstay William Berger). The two are constantly at odds and trying to one-up each other as they pursue $100,000 in stolen cash. Sabata is first and foremost a fun film—something that you certainly can’t say about many Italian westerns. The title character brings a bit of James Bond derring-do to the proceedings, while the tongue-in-cheek tone is a welcome addition to a genre that could be terribly serious and self-important.

Companeros (1970)

The dream team of Tomas Milian and Franco Nero star in this top-notch entry from director Sergio Corbucci. Milian plays (surprise!) a Mexican peasant fighting for his rights, while Nero is a Swedish arms dealer who’s come to town to sell guns to the revolutionaries. Of course, complications ensue, and the two men end up on a wild trek to break a safecracking professor out of jail. They’re pursued by one of the most memorable villains in the Italian western canon: a wooden-handed, pot-smoking, bird-loving mercenary played to the scene-chewing hilt by Jack Palance. The flick takes a while to get going, but once the pieces are in place, it careens from one fabulous action set-piece to another. Like many of the films on this list (and The Hateful Eight), it also features a stirring score by Ennio Morricone, with one of the catchier theme songs in the genre.

Face to Face (1967)

In one of his best starring roles, Tomas Milian once again plays–you guessed it–a lovable, rebellious Mexican rogue. Milian stars as Solomon ‘Beauregard’ Bennett, the charismatic leader of a local bandit gang. Gian Maria Volonte plays a bookish professor who finds himself kidnapped, then adopted by the group. The film revolves around the relationship between the two men as they become enmeshed in escalating mayhem. The peace-loving professor finds himself drawn to the power and violence, eventually taking over as the ruthless leader of the gang. Meanwhile, Milian begins to develop a conscience over the course of the film, questioning the morality and motives of the gang. It’s a powerful character study whose success lies in the gripping performances of its leads. Milian exudes a cheery charisma even while engaged in terrific violence, while Volonte masterfully portrays his character’s descent into debauchery.

Related: Django, Frontier Asshole