The spaghetti western is a wonderful retelling of the
American west through the eyes of Italians who grew up watching classic
Hollywood films in the western genre and reading dime store western novels.
They interpreted these tales into a genre of their own creating some of the
greatest westerns ever made. So imagine my surprise to learn that they also
decided to turn their direction north to Canada with a western from that area
as well. Suffice to say there is a reason they didn’t do this more than once,
at least that I know of.
The story is incredibly basic. The Hudson River Company is
ripping off the trappers giving them less money than they deserve for the pelts
that they collect. Seeking independence from the company and the country it
represents the trappers become bandits, stealing the pelts back while being
tracked by the mounted police working for the company. Our hero tries his best
to stay uninvolved in the matters at hand until his brother is falsely accused
and hung. He joins the bandits and is later assigned the task of guarding their
captive, the daughter of the company representative. That’s about it. Wrap a
few gun battles, fist fights and jealous girlfriends and you have most of the
movie.
Let me say up front that I applaud MVD Classics for at least
saving this movie from obscurity. I’m a true believer that any and all things
set to celluloid deserve to be saved. Somewhere out there is someone who saw
this film when it was released and loved it from start to finish. Not many
perhaps but there is someone.
That being said this movie wasn’t that good. Not only was
the film itself lacking in quality when it came to things like film stock and
storage, the story is weak and feels like a combination of clichés around which
a story has been placed. The acting is far from credible and the direction is
so commonplace as to be completely unnoticed.
More time is spent standing around talking about the actions
being planned than the actions themselves. When the action does take place it’s
done with unconvincing choreography and multiple gunshots that almost always
fail to land anywhere near the intended victims. The love story here takes
place without progression and characters abandon their core beliefs to suddenly
fall in love.
All in all I’d find it hard to recommend this movie to any
but the die-hard Italian movie fans or western lovers that will watch anything
that involves buckskins and horses. For most this is one you’ll want to avoid.
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