John Watts This is one of my favourite films. I can't quite say why but it has a more powerful effect on me than most films. On the one hand the film is blunt and lacking in subtlety - the executions it starts with and Nino's (lack of) reaction, his disdain for Mexico and Mexicans and the dilemma with the captain on the tracks. Maybe the subtlety is lost in translation but it's pretty clear there are points being made.But then there's the scene where the bandits are massacred and Adelita just leaves when these days you'd expect floods of tears.The soundtrack obviously deserves a mention particularly the way it's blended into the film a couple of times at the start (guitar player on the train and Chuncho banging his drum).I'm sure this film should get higher ratings than it does. I wonder if the fact that it's overtly anti-American is responsible for that: if I was American I'd probably feel a bit put out by the end of the film.

merklekranz "A Bullet For the General", exceeded my expectations, and is the best of five DVDs in the "Once Upon a Time in Italy" set. There is no mistaking that this is Gian Maria Volonte's movie. He has way more screen time than in either "A Fistful of Dollars" or "For a Few Dollars More". Klaus Kinski admirers might be disappointed as his screen time is limited in a supporting role. Lou Castel's character seems to barely be breathing in what can only be described as the lowest key performance ever. Martine Bestwick is somewhat livelier, but her appearance is flawed by a Mexican makeup job that can only be described as dreadful. The Ennio Morricone score is above average. Though not quite as good as "The Big Gundown", "A Bullet For the General" must be considered one of the better non-Leone "spaghetti westerns". - MERK

jaibo Wham-bam spaghetti Western set during the Mexican civil war. A morally ambiguous gun-runner finds assistance from a mysterious American, who is rather too keen to get the cache and one particular bullet to the rebel general. Gian Maria Volonte is astounding as the outlaw, torn between commitment to the cause of the peasants and his own immense appetites; Kinski is his barmy apocalyptic preacher of a brother. Lou Cassel is properly cold as the internally dead gringo American.The narrative leaps forwards in great bounds, with each sequence establishing it's progression from the next with punchy visual clarity, and there's a plenty of memorable encounters and images along the way. The radical and committed script is by Pontecorvo-collaborator Franco Solinas, and the portrait of the morally decrepit white man bears a lot of similarity with Brando's character in Burn! The final sequence, with Volonte realising just how much of his soul he has sold, is one of the greatest denouements around.

Cambronne An Italian crude version of west and an Italian vision of the reality of late sixty years of XX century The late sixties were the same year of first feeble Italian crime/police films that explained the crude real life of the period named as "lead years", terrorism, murders and kidnapping. This film is the prelude to all these fact. Gian Maria Volontè superb acting piece also in a low cost production, dialogs very essential and with a little bit of anarchy sense. I saw this film at 7 - 8 years old with my grandpa in an old smoky cinema and was for me not bloodiest not like other actual films. A real must for all kids mature and experts. Note also the presence of a less known Klaus Kinsky as El Chuncho's brother.