Alive or Preferably Dead

1969 "Booze, Banks & Broads! They Had Their Hands in Everything!"
Alive or Preferably Dead
5.3| 1h37m| en| More Info
Released: 17 September 1969 Released
Producted By: Hesperia Films
Country: Spain
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Synopsis

Two brothers, Monty and Ted, will inherit $300,000 if they manage to live together for six months.

... View More
Stream Online

The movie is currently not available onine

Director

Producted By

Hesperia Films

Trailers & Images

Reviews

Bezenby Oh great: another Italian Comedy Western that's low on laughs and everything else to boot. This is even more disappointing as it was directed by Duccio Tessari of Tony Arzenta fame, and it stars Guilliano Gemma of loads of great films fame. Sometimes these tongue-in-cheek comedies work (like Run Man Run and Fistful of Lead) but most seem to rely on lame slapstick that you've seen Charlie Chaplin do several hundred years previously. This one involves two brothers who hate each other, but who also have to spend six months living together in order to receive an inheritance from a dead Uncle. Don't ask me why. There's a bunch of bad guys who are harassing Gemma's brother who periodically turn up throughout the film to ruin Gemma's increasingly dumb attempts at crime sprees (including robbing a bank where everyone who enters the bank trips over the same step…hmm).Gemma does get to show off his trapeze skills and there's an axe fight on a train that results in an entire carriage being destroyed, but no one in their right mind is ever going to want to watch this unless they are obsessively watching their entire collections of Italian films. Ahem.Other comedies not being reviewed any time soon: My Name is Trinity, My Name is Nobody, Cry! Onion, Life is Tough, Eh, Providence, Trinity is Still My Name etc etc.
spider89119 This is a comedy western, but it isn't one of those totally awful ones that are more annoying than funny. This one genuinely provides some good laughs. Some of the slapstick in this film even reminds me of The Three Stooges. Especially one particular fight scene in a flooded hotel room.I would probably have given this movie seven or eight stars if the music score was better. It isn't terrible or anything, but it just isn't spaghetti western style music. What we have here instead is the kind of music one would expect from a Hollywood western, with some vocals thrown in here and there. To me, the musical style is a very important component in the spaghetti western genre, and it can definitely make or break these films.The acting is above average, and the quality of this film is decent. Giuliano Gemma always delivers a fine performance. The action scenes are well done, and the film features what would have been a very fancy and unique looking early automobile. I don't know what make it was.Overall I found this movie to be quite entertaining. It is worth watching for fans of the genre.
FightingWesterner In order to claim an inheritance, fancy-pants Giuliano Gemma, a problem gambler, must go west and live with his brother for six months. Though they don't like each other very much, the two use the time to embark on an inept crime spree that keeps getting interrupted by a gang of real criminals.A genuinely likable and often times really funny western comedy, this is a good showcase for Italian western superstar Gemma, who gets to show off his charisma, as well as his prowess as an action star, doing all or most of his own stunts.There's some good action action sequences here too, including a rowdy bath-time punch-out/gunfight and an exciting train robbery climax, all leading to a finale that actually rips off the final scene of The Graduate!
azjimnson Not all of the slapstick works, but there are more hits than misses. Frankly I think the humor and production values are better here than all but the first of "Trinity" western-comedies. The English dubbing is not "awful," as one reviewer stated. It's actually better than in many spaghetti Westerns. I liked the attention to detail in the depiction of even minor characters, like the bank employees & dishonest doctor who encases one brother in a total body cast. While I agree the American distributors were guilty of giving this film an terrible "let's cash on on a better movie" title, I don't think seeing the prelude would have added much.The picture already seems a bit too long, with a throw in the kitchen sink approach to the screen writing ("Then's let's have them try this and fail, an then this..."), when a plot more focused on one or two criminal acts might have been better. I also watched this as part of the Mill Creek 20 pack, mostly to get Monte Hellman's "China 9, Liberty 32" and "The Big Gundown" I have only found one (so far) that was truly unwatchable ("Apache Blood"). My main complaint is being deprived, in most cases, of seeing the films in the original Techniscope widescreen process (similar to Superscope but invented at Technicolor's Italian lab), which, through setting the number of frames per inch of film higher in the camera, used only half as much film as Cinemascope or Panavision did. Some complained they could see more grain in the projected image in theaters, but in many cases that worked to the film's advantage, contributing to a gritty washed out look. As with Superscope (now called Super 35), the anamorphic squeeze was done in the lab on an optical printer, enabling the directors to use normal rather than expensive anamorphic lenses in shooting these movies. Unlike Techniscope, Superscope used a normal frame in the camera, so did not save any film stock. The price of film stock was a large part of the cost of making feature movies back then. Now, with digital video, it's not an issue.