Shalako
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Movie Reviews of Shalako
Movie Review: Go Shalako Go!
Summary: 2 Stars
I'm not sure the exact moment "Shalako" became a comedy, but by film's end, I was laughing out loud. I'm usually lenient with older films, and this 1968 western most certainly falls into that category. Based on Louis L'Amour's novel "Shalako" and directed by dependable veteran Edward Dmytryk (who gave us the great unheralded western "Warlock"), "Shalako" should have been one of those interesting finds one discovers when wading through anti-hero westerns of the era.
Fresh from his turn as James Bond in "You Only Live Twice," Sean Connery plays the title character, a cynical, buckskin-clad tracker who has little use for civilization. Well, society arrives in the form of an arrogant clique of British aristocracy traveling across the wilds on a hunting trip. They stop their wagons to sit at dinner tables adorned with candelabras while sipping champagne and dining with the shiniest of cutlery. Unbeknownst to them, they've crossed into Apache territory. Shalako rides up all dusty and essentially says (add Scottish accent), "You're going to get keeled."
The English troupe is a hip, colorful lot, including the likes of Brigitte Bardot, Jack Hawkins, Peter Van Eyck, Honor Blackman and even a smirking Stephen Boyd as a corrupt tracker. They all have stories, endless stories, in this overly-plotted film. Bardot, a sexy dame no doubt, prances around with go-go hair and goth eye shadow perfectly applied throughout the duration of the movie. She's surrounded by some Injuns whom Shalako reluctantly kills. Shalako has a pow-wow with the Apache leader, played by the great Woody Strode ("Goal Dust: The Warm and Candid Memoirs of a Pioneer Black Athlete and Actor"), who delivers a line straight from the Jay Silverheels' era, "Shalako good. Leave by sun-up or we kill white man." Yes, even in 1968 black actors were still playing Native Americans.
If the Brits were to leave, there would be no film. So they stay, believing superior intellect and well-oiled hunting rifles should more-than-suffice against the untamed savage. They hole up in an old fort and after the deaths of many men, realize the error of their ways. In an exhausting roundabout way, the aristocracy find themselves on foot in the desert, with Shalako leading them to hills and water. Filmed on the plains of Spain, we have yet another European western possessing awkward topography, dubbed supporting casts and Caucasian men in wigs trying to appear Native American (I know, Sergio Leone got away with this).
Anyway, while our desperate crew hikes across the sunny slopes of endless sand, they appear to be hot, but clothes remain unruffled and there's not a drop of sweat to be found. Connery and Bardot find time to make googly eyes, consummating their attraction next to a waterhole with the threat torturous death hanging over them. Go Shalako Go! Death eventually arrives, but the Indians have the good sense to charge one at a time, making for easy target practice. I will give "Shalako" credit for one scene, surprisingly brutal, when Indians surround a female captive and tear her clothes away, forcing her to swallow her own diamond necklace. The scene, usually edited for family TV, is included on the DVD.
Things come to a fatigued head when Sean and Woody meet face-to-face and decide to duel to the death...with spears! I realized we had entered Mel Brooks territory, and the laughs began. The film's peculiar final shot, almost purposefully flat, appears to show Bardot leaving her troupe and joining Sean. I suppose she had a mighty good time next to that waterhole. They could live next to it, dining nightly on prickly pear, but where is she going to buy mascara?!
To see this film done right, check out "The Law and Jake Wade" or "Hombre" instead.
Movie Review: Shalako
Summary: 2 Stars
Edward Dmytryk is one of my favorite directors. Thanks to the miracle of dvd technology I've been allowed to watch good prints of such classic dark crime dramas as `Crossfire' and `Murder, My Sweet' (a movie that some claim invented what is now known as `film noir.') I've seen maybe his most famous movie, `The Caine Mutiny,' as well as a handful of western gems, including `Broken Lance' and that great, underrated and too-often overlooked masterpiece `Warlock.'
Saturated as I was in such cinematic excellence I wasn't quite prepared for SHALAKO, a stagnant horse opera adapted from what must have been a better book by Louis L'Amour. I'm inclined to blame it on the sixties. Or Brigette Bardot, who is little more expressive than a pouting china doll and possessed of an accent thick enough to cut a week old baguette. Maybe Jupiter wasn't yet aligned with Mars.... To be fair, though, I think my hero Eddie D. has to held accountable for this yawner. SHALAKO is not the best work, or anywhere near the best, of any of the participants.
Sean Connery plays Shalako (the name rhymes with `calico') and Bardot plays Countess Irina Lazaar, a wealthy European who travels with other European royalty to hunt wild game in the great, unsettled southwest. Stephen Boyd plays a grungy galoot who leads the Euro royals - replete with white-gloved butlers, comely maids and formal attire - through the wilderness. That Boyd has led them deep into the heart of an Apache reservation we learn early on. The Apaches' less-than-enthusiastic reaction to this intrusion is established soon after. Although made in 1968, a year by which most movies knew better, the natives in SHALAKO are the whooping, hollering, blood thirsty savage kind, although a couple of Apaches wade out of the gore for speaking parts. African American actor Woody Strode plays Chato, a young chief with a gun in his mitts and a chip on his shoulder. Strode was a good actor who was in a ton of westerns, and casting him in the part diffuses, or at least confuses, accusations of casting non- Natives as American Indians. Still, Strode's chief is of the if-I-kill-Shalako-my-soul-will-walk-free ilk. In other words, after a quick, obligatory mumble about broken treaties the film hustles back to the reliable same old, same old.
Shalako spends most of the movie leading the Europeans away from Chief Woody and his blood thirsties, and, I think, falling in love with Countess Bardot. I think. Beyond the pout Bardot isn't terribly expressive, and her thick accent didn't help. She was either falling in love or asking for a limburger sandwich. I think they were falling in love. With his rugged charm and ironic wit Connery has always been more than capable of throwing a movie on his shoulders and carrying it to the winner's circle on his own. Unfortunately, here he plays it grim and laconic, more or less depriving this movie of any chance it might have had. SHALAKO isn't a terrible movie, but it's an uninspired and uninspiring one.
Movie Review: Another Euro-Western Bites the Dust
Summary: 1 Stars
After escaping Bondage for the first time, Sean Connery utilized his box-office clout to star in a dreadful Louis L'Amour adaptation. "Shalako" (1968) managed to round up director Edward Dmytryk and a fine international cast for a two-hour exercise in Euro-Western boredom. Zero chemistry between Connery and Brigitte Bardot - both hopelessly lost in the Almeria landscape. Not even the presence of Woody Strode can redeem this turkey.Movie Review: It Stinks
Summary: 1 Stars
This was an all European production based on a Louis Lamour novel and that's the most decent thing I can say. Well, to be fair Connery does acquite himself well as a western hero. Everyone else is truly wasted. An oddity as a film at best.