B.B.K. (Baby Bounty Killer)

B.B.K. (Baby Bounty Killer) – International title

A 1996 Italian production [Film Trust Italia (Rome)]
Producer: Bernadette Carranza
Director: Alessandro Valori
Story: Alessandro Valori, Marco De Candia
Screenplay: Alessandro Valori, Marco De Candia
Cinematography: Dante Della Torre (Dante Dalla Torre) [color]
Music: Vito Abbonato, Andrea Ridolfi
Running time: 9 minutes

Cast:
Mexican - Mario De Candia
with; Marco Stefanelli, Stefano Abbati, Maner Capone, Pierfrancesco Favino, Valeria Benedetti Michelangeli


A gang of Mexican bandits attack a train and then find themselves in the middle of a modern intercity and captured by a child.

Remembering Rafael Albaicin

Born Ignacio-Rafael Garcia Escudero in Madrid, Spain on June 5, 1919, he had a thorough education and enjoyed playing the piano and the violin. Speaking both French and English, he travelled a good deal through Holland, France and Belgium in his youth. Rafael wrote music and was an accomplished artist who designed costumes for the bullring. He became a torero and appeared in many of Spain’s greatest bullrings from 1942 until 1948. After his bullfighting career and because of his name recognition in Spain he became a character actor and appeared in over 30 Euro-westerns during his career some of his most recognizable titles are “Savage Guns” (1961), “Django”, “Navajo Joe” (1966), “A Long Ride from Hell” (1968), “Catlow” (1971), “Sonny and Jed” (1972), his last appearance was in 1978’s “China 9, Liberty 37”. Albaicin died in Madrid on September 3, 1981. We remember Rafael Albaicin today on what would have been his 90th birthday.

RIP David Carradine

Actor David Carradine, star of the 1970s TV series "Kung Fu" who also had a wide-ranging career in the movies, was found dead in a Bangkok hotel room. A news report said he was found hanged in his hotel room closet and was believed to have committed suicide.

A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy, Michael Turner, confirmed the death of the 72-year-old actor. He said the embassy was informed by Thai authorities that Carradine died either late Wednesday or early Thursday, but he could not provide further details out of consideration for his family. Carradine was in Bangkok to shoot a movie “Stretch”, and had been staying at the hotel since Tuesday.

Carradine was a leading member of a venerable Hollywood acting family that included his father, character actor John Carradine, and brothers Keith and Robert. In all, he appeared in more than 100 feature films with such directors as Martin Scorsese, Ingmar Bergman and Hal Ashby. One of his prominent early film roles was as singer Woody Guthrie in Ashby's 1976 biopic "Bound for Glory." But he was probably best known for his role as Kwai Chang Caine, a Shaolin priest traveling the 1800s American frontier West in the TV series "Kung Fu," which aired in 1972-75. He reprised the role in a mid-1980s TV movie and played Caine's grandson in the 1990s syndicated series "Kung Fu: The Legend Continues." He returned to the top in recent years as the title character in Quentin Tarantino's two-part saga "Kill Bill." The character, the worldly father figure of a pack of crack assassins, was a shadowy presence in 2003's "Kill Bill — Vol. 1." In that film, one of Bill's former assassins (Uma Thurman) begins a vengeful rampage against her old associates. In "Kill Bill — Vol. 2," released in 2004, Thurman's character comes face to face again with Bill himself. The role brought Carradine a Golden Globe nomination as best supporting actor.

After "Kung Fu," Carradine starred in the 1975 cult flick "Death Race 2000." He starred with Liv Ullmann in Bergman's "The Serpent's Egg" in 1977 and with his brothers in the 1980 Western "The Long Riders." One thing remained a constant after "Kung Fu": Carradine's interest in Oriental herbs, exercise and philosophy. He wrote a personal memoir called "Spirit of Shaolin" and continued to make instructional videos on tai chi and other martial arts.

David Carradine appeared in three Euro-westerns:
On the Line – 1983 (Bryant)
Arrivano i vostri (TV) – 1984 [himself]
Queen of Swords (TV) – 2001 (“The Serpent”) [episodes 1:10 “The Serpent”, 1:21 “End of Days” (guest appearance)]

Remembering Dennis Weaver

Dennis Weaver was born on June 4, 1924 in Joplin, Missouri. He grew up on a farm and was an outstanding athlete on the University of Oklahoma track team. He tried out for the U.S. Olympic decathlon team in 1948 and placed 6th. The eventual winner that year was track legend Bob Mathias.

A struggling actor for years he got his first break from actress Shelley Winters who helped get a role in the stage play “Come Back, Little Sheba”. His first film role was as a cowboy in “Horizons West” (1952).

In 1955 he tried out for a part of the deputy on TV’s “Gunsmoke” and added the limp and twangy accent to offset being cast against the towering actor James Arness who was cast as Matt Dillon. He would play deputy Chester Good for the next 9 years and won an Emmy. Weaver left the show in 1964 to star in the ill-fated series “Kentucky Jones”. This didn’t keep him down for long as he would star in several series among them “Gentle Ben” and the long running “McCloud” from 1970-1977. During this time he starred in the cult classic Steven Spielberg film “Duel” (1971). Weaver was president of the Screen Actors Guild from 1973-1975 and was inducted into the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in 1981. He later received attention for the construction of his environmentally friendly homes made of recycled materials in Santa Fe, NM and Colorado. Dennis Weaver was survived by his wife of 60 years Gerry Stowell Weaver and three sons.

Dennis Weaver appeared in the Euro-western “A Man Called Sledge” with many of his friends and fellow former Warner Brother actors. Today we remember him on what would have been his 85th Birthday.

European Western Essential Library

Das große Lexikon der DDR-Stars
Author F.B. Habel, Volker Wachter
Publisher: Schwartkopf & Schwartzkopf
Printed: 2002, German language
Paperback, 441 pages, photos

This book is invaluable when researching the East German DEFA films.
It covers all the main actors and actresses along with many of the
character actors who appeared in these films, many of which were
westerns starring Gojko Mitic. It gives biographical information and a
DEFA filmography for each person covered. A handy index helps find
names you’re not familiar with or there spelling. A must for your library
shelf if you are at all interested in these East German films.

RIP Waldemar Matuška

Czech pop singer and actor Waldemar Matuška died after a long illness at the age of 76 in Miami, Florida on May 30, 2009. The singer died of pneumonia and heart failure after suffering from asthma for a long time, his son Waldemar said. Matuška was one of the most popular Czech singers from the 1960s to the 1980s. He won the Golden Nightingale for the best Czechoslovakian singer twice in the 1960s. He also played in a number of films and film musicals, including All "My Good Countrymen" (1968), "Lemonade Joe" (1964) and "If a Thousand Clarinets" (1964). He left the country and asked for asylum in the United States in 1986. The Czech public learned about his emigration from an article in the Communist party's daily Rude pravo, entitled "The moral fall of a singer." After the fall of the Czechoslovakian communist regime in 1989, Matuška frequently visited his homeland. In 2007, Matuška sang in Prague for the last time when he celebrated his 75th birthday there. A farewell ceremony will be held in Prague at a date to be determined.

THE AVENGER

Texas, addio – Italian title
Adiós, Texas – Spanish title
Texas, Adiós – Spanish title
Adues, Texas – Brazilian title
Texas Adios – Brazilian title
Django i Kamp Mod Terrorbanden - Danish title
Django Skyd Først - Danish title
Texas Adios – Finnish title
Texas, addio – French title
Django, der Rächer – German title
Django 2 – German title
Adeus, Texas – Portuguese title
Texas Adios – Swedish title
A Fistful of Bullets – English title
Texas Goodbye – English title
Wanted Dead or Alive – English title
The Avenger – U.S.A. title

A 1966 Italian, Spanish co-production [B.R.C. Produczione S.r.l. (Rome), Estela Films
(Madrid)]
Producer: Manolo Bolognini
Director: Ferdnando Baldi [Ferdinando Baldi]
Story: Franco Rossetti, Ferdinando Baldi
Screenplay: Franco Rossetti, Ferdinando Baldi
Cinematography: Enzo Barboni [Eastmancolor, Ultrascope]
Music: Anton Garcia Abril
Song: “Texas Goodbye” sung by Don Powell
Running time: 93 minutes

Cast:
Burt Sullivan/Django - Franco Nero (Francesco Sparanero)
Jim Sullivan - Cole Kitosch (Alberto dell’Acqua)
Cisco Delgado - José Suárez (José Sanchez)
Mulatta girl - Elisa Montés (Elisa Perella)
Alcalde Miguel - Livio Lorenzon
McLeod - José Guardiola
Pedro - Hugo Blanco (Hugo Galiasso)
Dick - Ivan Scratuglia
Fernandez - Luigi Pistilli
banker - Gino Pernice (Luigi Pernice)
bounty killer - Mario Novelli
saloon girl - Silvana Bacci
with: Antonella Murgia, Remo de Angelis


The Continental cast and scenes of intense violence may earmark “Texas, Addio” as a Spaghetti Western, but the plot of this Italian/Spanish production unspools very much like its Hollywood counterpart. “Django” star Franco Nero's character provides the link; his two-fisted, taciturn Texas sheriff, Burt Sullivan, is cut from the same unwavering in-his-duty cloth as Gary Cooper's lawmen as he crosses the border to bring wealthy and sadistic Mexican crime boss Cisco Delgado (José Suárez) to justice for the murder of his father. Sullivan's body count may be staggeringly high by the film's fade-out, but his kills are strictly in defense of himself, his greenhorn brother, Jim (Cole Kitosch, aka Alberto Dell'Acqua or Robert Widmark), or later, a group of Mexican revolutionaries led by lawyer Luigi Pistilli that attempts to overthrow Delgado's corrupt regime. Director Ferdinando Baldi (whose Western curriculum vitae includes the more European-flavored “Blindman” [1971] and “Get Mean” [1975], with American ex-pat actor Tony Anthony) makes excellent use of the Almeira, Spain, locations (well photographed by future “Trinity Is Still My Name” director Enzo Barboni); and if his pacing is occasionally draggy, he more than makes up for it with a wealth of well-staged brawls and shoot-outs. His script (written with “Django” co-scribe Franco Rossetti) is lean and solid, with a hint of noir in its central dark secret regarding Delgado's relationship with Sullivan's family. ~ Paul Gaita,

You Tube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL4Qe2Z-OCc