DVD Review by Lee Broughton

It Can Be Done... Amigo!. Widescreen (2.35:1). Directed by Maurizio Lucidi. 103 minutes. 1972.

Wild East, USA. Format: NTSC Region 0.

A strongman drifter, Coburn (Bud Spencer), promises a dying man that he will escort his small nephew, Chip (Renato Cestie), to their new farm at Westland. Unfortunately, Coburn is being tailed by the sharp-shooting manager of a troupe of itinerant dance hall girls, Sonny (Jack Palance), who has vengeance on his mind. Coburn inadvertently deflowered Sonny's sister, Mary (Dany Saval), and Sonny wants Coburn to make an honest woman of her before he kills him. Complications arise when it becomes clear that Westland's corrupt Preacher-cum-Sheriff-cum-Judge, Franciscus (Francisco Rabal), wants Chip's land and Sonny's plans go awry when he discovers that Mary is pregnant.

I have a real fondness for the genre work of both Bud Spencer and Jack Palance but I've managed to avoid It Can Be Done... Amigo! up until now. I've read reviews of this show over the past decade that made it sound like the worst Spaghetti Western ever made. I can only assume that the extremely poor quality of earlier panned and scanned DVDs of this title had some influence on the film's adverse reception because fans of both Spencer and Palance -- and the Spaghetti Western genre itself -- are pretty well served here in my opinion. Coburn is a slightly softer, gentler and more easy going variant of Spencer's usual screen persona but this remains a classic Spencer performance. Highlights for Spencer fans include a number of the big man's trademark one-against-many brawls, a dispute over an out-sized plate full of turkey, a ham-fisted attempt to get close to an amorous widow and a tussle or two with Jack Palance. Palance also turns in an interesting performance here as the unforgiving and mean-spirited Sonny. While he has a noticeably wicked glint in his eyes at all times and gets quite physically rough when he's pushing people around, this remains an uncharacteristically subdued but none-the-less enjoyable turn from the veteran scenery chewer.

Spencer's regular screen partner Terence Hill doesn't appear in this show but the kind of antagonistic relationship that Hill usually shares with Spencer is reproduced here in part by the presence of young Renato Cestie. Cestie's Chip is wise beyond his years and so he is able to convincingly hold his own in arguments with Coburn and the boy's acts of defiance and his contrary outlook manage to convincingly prompt the kind of exasperated responses from Spencer that Hill's characters traditionally provoke. Similarly, Chip can be likened to Hill's characters in the way that he manipulates the events unfolding around him to some extent. Within the skewed internal logic of the film this works fine, thanks in no small part to the fact that Chip's activities are never telegraphed in an overly cute or overly sentimental way. As far as comedy Spaghetti Westerns and Bud Spencer flicks go, It Can Be Done... Amigo! is a good-looking, enjoyable and largely inoffensive dalliance. Cinematographer Aldo Tonti's inch perfect framing, stylish camera angles and fluid camera movements result in a classy looking film and the show's noteworthy art direction and costume designs bring with them an aesthetic look that is pleasingly "revisionist" in nature. There are lots of familiar faces amongst the film's bit part players and genre legend Roberto Camardiel appears in a brief but effective guest spot. Genre stalwart Luis Enriquez Bacalov provides the show's pleasant soundtrack score.

Previously only available as ropey panned and scanned presentations, the long awaited rehabilitation of It Can Be Done... Amigo!'s unfairly tarnished reputation can surely now begin thanks to Wild East's new release of the film. This isn't quite a perfect presentation picture-wise but it isn't far off. Picture quality does fluctuate a little in a couple of places but it remains generally very good and there's very little in the way of print damage present here. The presentation's sound quality suffers from the odd bit of background noise in spots but this doesn't pose a major problem.

Extras: U.S. trailer, German trailer, an image gallery and two alternate credits sequences

More detailed reviews of It Can Be Done... Amigo! and Death Rides a Horse can be found at: http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s3698lee.html

© 2011 Copyright Lee Broughton.

Johnny Balines and the Sacred Feather

Johnny Balines y la pluma sagrada - Spanish title
Johnny Balines and the Sacred Feather - English title

A 2008 Spanish production [Blau Eventos (Madrid)]
Producer: Mónica Pérez
Director: Alberto Gutiérrez
Story: Mónica Pérez
Screenplay: Mónica Pérez
Cinematography: ? [color]
Music: Lucas Miralpeix, The Vickyleytones
Song" Johnny Balines" sung by "The Vickyleytones"
Running time: 23 minutes

Cast:
Johnny Belines - Felipe del Campo
Susy Pistolas - Cristina Benavides
Sheriff of Benichigan City - Jaime Guardiola
Chief Red Lizard - Miguel Gil
Ramon Placton - Juan Manuel Abellán
Placton Brothers - Mario Saiz, Enrique Alegría, Mario Arenas, Juan Gilaber, Potro Ramiro
with: Begoña Sánchez, Miguel Such, Manuel Pérez, Carmen González

A western made to inspire those with physical and mental disabilities. Johnny Belines, Susy Pistolas and the Sheriff of Benichigan City face the evil Placton Brothers in a showdown after they are helped by an Indian chief Red Lizard who  gives them a magical feather.

YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fveXdHsZ7s

Remembering Charles Bronson

Charles Dennis Buchinsky was born in Ehrenfield, Pennsylvania on November 3, 1921. Of Lithuanian decent he spent his childhood days in a coal mining town. Charles’ father died when he was ten and so he was forced to go to work in the coal mines. Wearing hand-me-downs and working in the mine’s office he still managed to be the first in his family to finish high school. In 1943 he enlisted in the Army, served as an aerial gunner serving in the South Pacific and received a Purple Heart for wounds received during his service. After the war he joined a theatrical group in Philadelphia then moved to New York where he shared an apartment with future TV actor Jack Klugman and found stage work. In 1950 he married and moved to Hollywood, taking acting classes and receiving small roles. He changed his name to Bronson, from the Bronson Entrance Gate at Paramount Studios, during the McCarthy hearings because he thought Buchinsky sounded too Russian. In 1954 he landed a substantial role as a Modoc warrior opposite Alan Ladd in "Drum Beat". He made many TV appearances in the ‘50s landing his own show "Man With a Camera" (1958-1960). His big break came when he was hired as one of the gunfighters, Bernardo O’Reilly, in the "Magnificent 7" (1960). He continued to appear in TV roles and films like "The Dirty Dozen" (1967). In 1968 he appeared as "Harmonica" in Sergio Leone’s western "Once Upon a Time in the West" and became an international star. Bronson would appear in five more Euro-westerns, "Guns for San Sebastian" (1967), "Villa Rides" (1968), "Chato’s Land", "Red Sun" (both 1971) and "Chino" (1973. He found a cult following in the U.S. with his series of "Death Wish" pictures directed by Michael Winner. He married actress Jill Ireland in 1968 and they remained married and appeared in several films together until her death in 1990. Bronson, a very quiet and secretive man, spent the rest of the decade working on his farm in Vermont and out of the public eye. He remarried in 1998 to Kim Weeks and died of pneumonia on August 23, 2003 in Los Angeles. Today we remember one of the Euro-westerns stars Charles Bronson on what would have been his 90^th birthday.

"Rome" to become a film

Dangermouse Album "Rome" Becoming A Film.

October 30, 2011

Music video director Chris Milk is working on his first feature film as reported by Variety which was inspired by Dangermouse/Daniele Luppi’s 2011 collaboration album Rome (Parlophone/EMI). The film will also be an adaptation of author Alden Bell’s post-apocalytic novel The Reapers Are the Angels. Rome was inspired by the soundtrack’s featured on Italian Spaghetti Western flicks, and as such features composers featured in classic films like "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" and "Once Upon a Time in the West". It was recorded in Rome at Forum Studios - a cathedral-turned-studio was recorded using vintage instruments and features contributions from Jack White, vocalist Norah Jones and Ennio Morricone’s 40 piece orchestra among many other unique guests.

"I’ve always watched a lot of spaghetti westerns, and I got a bit obsessed with tracking down the soundtracks. Everyone knows Morricone, but Piero Umilaini, Bruno Nicolai, Piero Piccioni - some of these guys had amazing stuff going on as well."

Dangermouse told the Guardian. "Back in the early 60s, more experimental composition was looked down on, so the movies were a great vehicle to get away with doing all that."

Milk is known for his innovative combinations of technology, art and media. He recently releases "3 Dreams in Black" as visual director for Rome, which uses WebGL 3D technology to create a navigable birtual environment in your Goggle Chrome browser and features music from Rome.

Lee Van Cleef - Primus

From the time they hit the streets of 1991 with the cutting-edge art-funk of their breakthrough single "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver," it was clear that Les Claypool and Primus were on the alternative fringe of alternative music, much closer in spirit to a young Frank Zappa than, say, Kurt Cobain.

Twenty years later, they've have a new album called "Green Naugahyde," their first full-length release since 1999, with Jay Lane, who drummed for them briefly before they were famous.

Here's Claypool, their bass-playing front man, on how Lane's return paved the way for "Green Naugahyde" and why they're ignoring their previous effort, "Antipop," on this tour.

When asked about the album and the new record "Lee Van Cleef".

Claypool replied, "Good old Lee Van Cleef. I've just always had a soft spot for character actors. That's why (Frank) Capra, the Coen brothers, (Elia) Kazan, all these different directors, I love their work because they tend to have extraordinarily colorful characters throughout their films. And guys like Walter Brennan, Lee Van Cleef, Strother Martin, Slim Pickens and these different people that I see pop up in these films when I'm flipping the channels, it tends to make me stop when I see them because it makes me smile. So Lee Van Cleef, I just had this notion of "Whatever happened to Lee Van Cleef?"

YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqnaLoy1Sh8&feature=related

The Garner Files book review

James Garner is His Own Worst Critic

By Richard Horgan on October 31, 2011 12:30 PM

Like most actors, James Garner is not particularly fond of a lot of his work. As he tell CBS News ahead of Tuesday’s (11/1/2011) arrival of his autobiography The Garner Files, he rates only two of his big screen efforts as being excellent.

What is atypical however is the way the 83-year-old and co-author Jon Winokur have chosen to convey this information. As New York Post critic Lou Lumenick was one of the first to note, Garner has basically gone Leonard Maltin on himself.

This is the first movie star biography I’ve seen where an actor provides capsule reviews of all his movies. Even more unusually. Garner rates all but one of them from zero to five stars. The ones he rates most highly are "The Americanization of Emily" (1964) and "The Notebook" (2004) with five stars.

Garner is not stingy with zingers for those films he grades at the other end of the spectrum. "Mr. Budwing" (1966). Zero stars ("Worst picture I ever made. What were they thinking? What was I thinking?").

There’s other juicy stuff in the book, like doing cocaine with John Belushi and finding "Great Escape" co-star Steve McQueen to an insecure poseur. Bot Fishbowl LA has to agree with Lumenick; Garner’s most lasting book legacy may be a review template that others can use for their own tell-alls.

JOHN THE BASTARD

John il bastardo - Italian title
Johnny le batard - French title
John Bekart - Polish title
Billy Boy - English title
A Man Called Johnny - English title
His Name was Johnny - English title
John the Bastard - English title

A 1967 Italian production [Hercules Compagnia Cinematografica (Rome)]
Producers: Francesco Genesi, Vincenzo Genesi
Director: Armando Crispino
Story: Lucio Manlio Battistrada, Armando Crispino
Screenplay: Lucio Manlio Battistrada, Armando Crispino
Cinematography: Sante Achilli [Eastmancolor, Cromoscope]
Music: Nico Fidenco (Dominic Colarossi)
Song: "The Ballad of John" sung by S. Moriones

Cast:
John Donald Tenorio - John Richardson
Don Francisco Tenorio - Claudio Camaso (Claudio Volonte)
Dona Antonia - Martine Beswick
Don Diego Tenorio - Claudio Gora (Emilio Giordana)
Sara - Luisa Della Nocce (Maria Della Nocce)
Papa Buck - Men Fury (Furio Meniconi)
Danite - Gordon Mitchell (Charles Pendleton)
Morenillo - Glauco Onorato
Gertrude - Gia Sandri
Chica/Linda - Nadia Scarpita
Edith - Patrizia Valturri
priest - Piero Vida (Pietro Vida)
Gertrude’s brother - Roman Ariznavarreta
with: Thelma Anderson, Loredana Giustini, Margherita Horowitz, Vittorio Manfrino, Mirella Pompili (Mirella Pamphili), Remo De Angelis, Claudia Gravy (Marie-Claude Perin)

Johnny Donald Tenorio, a cynical seducer of women, who has led a tortured life, discovers he is actually the son of Don Diego Tenorio, a wealthy Mexican landowner. He decides to claim his rightful heritage and usurp his half-brother Don Francisco. Avoiding a shotgun wedding, John accompanied by his trusty servant Morenillo, travels south to Mexico and along the way he spurns some Mormon women who then hire a Danite to kill him. In search of vengeance and riches Johnny manages to deflower women and make enemies all along the way until he finally meets his match when the Mormon Danite assassin catches up to him. With the help of a stone statue John gets his comeuppance in the end.

YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvLtCe3m2Vo