the leading man is my tpye

Too much of everything

Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

RELEASED IN 1967 and directed by Sergio Corbucci, "Hellbenders" (Italian title: "The Cruel Ones") stars Joseph Cotton as Colonel Jonas, an unrepentant Confederate who led a regiment called The Hellbenders during the Civil War. Lee surrendered and the war's over, but not for Jonas and his three sons. They ruthlessly rob a Union convoy in the Southwest carrying $1 million. The money is placed in a coffin and disguised as the dead husband of Jonas' "daughter" (María Martín), really just a booze-guzzling saloon girl he hired to play a widow in case they're stopped. The group not only has to evade the Union Army, but also a posse, Mexican bandits, vengeful Natives, and even each other if they are to get back East with the money to re-start the Civil War. Julian Mateos plays the Colonel's outcast son, Ben, while Gino Pernice plays the maniacal son, Jeff. Norma Bengell is on hand as Claire, a second female they hire.The ratings for this film are all over the place. Some viewers say it's trash whereas others grant it a surprisingly high grade; and I can see why on both counts. Let's look at the positives and negatives respectively.While some complain about Joseph Cotton's supposedly wooden performance, his deadpan expressions superbly capture his character's single-minded vision. Jonas' family is nigh insane because they refuse to admit that the Civil War has been lost. His ultimate harebrained purpose is to finance a renewed Civil War. Everything else is secondary, including life itself. Hauling their loot around in a coffin is a symbol for the hopelessness of their cause. You'll hear Jonas talk about God & Scripture now and then, but it's all outward adornment, even while I'm sure he's sincere. He justifies killing Union soldiers on the grounds that they're still at war while he rationalizes murdering hirelings because their motivation is not the Confederate cause but rather filthy lucre. The man's brutal and despicable, but interesting nevertheless. He's a "Christian" fake, but just doesn't know it.I'm thankful for the characters of Ben and Claire without whom there'd be no one to sympathize with amongst the protagonists. In her prime Norma Bengell was one of the most stunning women to walk the earth and the filmmakers were sure to capture this in a pond-bathing sequence where she strips down to black stockings and modest lingerie.Another positive is that the movie's filled with action and generally maintains your interest even while glaring flaws regularly surface. For the family's nutty scheme to work they resort to nigh absurd deception; and you know what Shakespeare wrote: "O what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive." Something else I liked that can easily be overlooked takes place when the Indians come seeking justice for the death of the chief's daughter and it provokes brother against brother, the Civil War in microcosm.Ennio Morricone (as Leo Nichols) composed the score with a decent leitmotif. It's full of guttural sounds with interesting percussion, harmonica, trumpets and guitar. But it's pedestrian compared to "Death Rides a Horse" (1967) and "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" (1966).As far as shortcomings go, someone complained about the movie on the grounds that it comes across as if the producers just enlisted several actors & extras and a couple of babes, then got some horses, a couple of coaches, a coffin, some Mexican clothes and made the whole thing up in the Spanish desert as they meandered along. This is my main objection to the movie, particularly in the second half where the scriptwriters (term used loosely) awkwardly try to fit one episode after another into the story. At one point, for instance, Mexican bandits suddenly appear who had absolutely nothing to do with the plot up to this point. They disappear just as quickly when the Federals swiftly arrive. The worst example of this is the odd beggar who appears out of nowhere in the desert in the last act. This entire sequence is so badly done it horribly mars the movie.A technical cavil: Jonas and his three sons are the remnant of Confederate Hellbenders regiment and you see them equipped with Winchesters. This can be overlooked on the grounds that there were "Yellow Boy" Winchesters in 1866, but the six guns they carry are Colt 1873 Peacemakers, an anachronism that should have been corrected and is hard to ignore if you are familiar with the weaponry.The melodramatic climax reveals that good intentions were there, but the filmmakers just didn't have the funds to execute properly. If only they had the money "Hellbenders" would rank with the best Spaghetti Westerns. As it is, it's still worth catching for the highlights noted.THE FILM RUNS 90 minutes and was shot in Spain and Italy.GRADE: C+

I finally watched "The Hellbenders" on Saturday, got the Anchor Bay DVD off Amazon.com and sat down and watched this Joseph Cotton starring flick with Norma Bengell, Julian Mateos & Gino Pernice. It also has great cameos by Benito Steffenelli, Aldo Sambrel, and Al Mulock.This was a film that looked and felt very much like an American Western, which I wasn't quite expecting (though I shouldn't say that since I've come to expect the unexpected from Corbucci) though it did have SW twists. Basically it starts with a Union Cavalry detachement that is escorting a million dollars in old currency designated to be destroyed (ie., burned). We see this detachment struggling to cross a river and there are some great action shots of this segment alone.Joseph Cotton plays the part of an ex Confederate officer determined to take the money and make a new start, resurrecting the Confederacy. This is one of Hollywood's and 50's TV Westerns staple post Civil War "characters". You've seen variations of this depiction from the officer that goads the posse into stringing up Anthony Quinn and his compadres in "The Ox Bow Incident" to Edmund O'Brien's turn as one in living in a surreal southern mansion in "Rio Conchos" starring Richard Boone these come to mind. But Cotton is not restricted to just a few scenes at the climax but is present as a somewhat sincerely dedicated semi religious looney throughout the whole film. Great stuff! So the story concerns the stealing of the money and the treck to get it to safety through a countryside swarming with soldiers and civilian posses all looking for the perpetrators of the heist.This film is pretty much devoid of any SW style standoff gunfights and derives most of its tension from the various encounters and twists in the plot. It does have some of the familiar SW symbology though. All this is very well done. The actors that play Cotton's sons could have used a bit more fleshing out but thats a minor quibble. You don't quite react to them as well as you might have.It dose have some faults however, its supposed to be just after the end of the Civil War and here my "curse of Leone" rears its head.Now I don't know about you but ever since I've seen GBU and the rest of Leone's work I've been effected by the "curse" which is Leone emphasized the weaponry and ever since I've paid attention to this particular aspect of all Westerns, both AW's and SW's and even some of the classic AW's ie. "Red River" fall prey to it. I guess pre Leone nobody really cared a Western was a Western and not taken seriously.In Il Crudeli the ex Southerners of the "Hellbenders" Regiment are equipped with Winchesters. OK in 1866 there were "Yellow Boy" Winchesters so you can over look this, but the six guns they carry are Colt 1873 Peacemakers, a big anachronisim, that could and should have been corrected, and is not easy to overlook, if you are familiar with the weaponry. Other that this, this film is entertaining but it could have been great. Morricone's score is average, nothing that memorable, not bad but not outstanding either.Al Mulock has the biggest part I've ever seen and he does an excellent job, and its worth a look for this alone. He actually does a great job, check it out. Aldo Sambrel also makes an appearance, as does Steffenelli but his is brief.The Anchor Bay DVD has just a trailer and a printed bio for Corbucci, pretty sparce if you ask me. But I'm glad to have this film.Here is a film that could be remade with a slightly bigger budget more Western landscapes and a better attention to accuracy, its a great story won't need a lot of sets, and I can see a modern version of this somewhere down the line if Westerns come into vogue again.

Sergio Corbucci's "I Crudeli" aka. "The Hellbenders", is not one of his best Films, but nevertheless a great Spaghetti Western.A few months after the end of the Civil War, a former Confederate colonel, still a fanatic devotee to the old South, and his three sons rob a money transport of the US Army, and kill every witness in a bloody massacre. With the money they hope to realize the colonel's plan to reorganize the Confederate Army and to restore the old South.Although "The Hellbenders" doesn't come up to Corbucci's masterpieces "Django" and "The Great Silence", it is still a great, and in some parts unusual Spaghetti Western. Joseph Cotten is great as Jonas the colonel, a religious Southerner, a fanatic who, in a cold blooded manner, puts 'the cause' over everything else. Norma Bengell's performance is very good, and Julian Mateos, who plays another main character, the Colonel's son Ben, also does a good job. Some of the movie's best performances, however, are those of the supporting cast. Aldo Sambrell is great as a Mexican outlaw and Al Mulloch has one of the film's best roles as a tricky beggar. Benito Stefanelli has very short role as a card player, and Gino Pernice plays the Colonel's son Jeff. The music by Ennio Morricone is very good, of course, although it's not one of his best scores.Though it has some lengths "The Hellbenders" is a pretty brutal and very good Spaghetti Western, and should not be missed by my fellow Corbucci fans.

This not-so-dazzling entry from "Great Silence" director Sergio Corbucci appears to have been conceived with the intention of providing fans with every spectacle the western mythos has to offer, even at the expense of logic. This is especially evident about two thirds of the way through the film, when the protagonists, becoming unhinged and desperate in the middle of the desert, are suddenly assaulted from all sides by about fifty cookie-cutter banditos. Joseph Cotton exclaims, "Mexican Outlaws!" and a gun battle ensues (up to this point, Mexican outlaws have had absolutely nothing to do with the plot). Thirty seconds after that, the cavalry, bugle and all, comes to the rescue! Earlier in the film we've had the obligatory western bar fight, and later on our "heroes" (they're a bunch of murderous Civil War vets who want to re-establish the confederacy) will be confronted by angry injuns. "Companeros" this ain't.However, as a fan of Corbucci, who basically seems to subscribe to the Roger Corman school of just gettin' it done but who seems to manage to inject some of his own wierdness even into his worst films, I'm not sorry I saw it. I'll see it again. Certain moments make it all worthwhile. One of those moments is the whole finale sequence, which owes a lot to the bitter irony of film noir and also to the cheesiest episodes of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents." Another is the aforementioned barfight, which displays some typical Corbucci camera technique (handheld cameras, zooms) that is so unsettlingly out of place that it elevates the scene above its otherwise cliche status.Like most Corbucci westerns, there is blood when guys get shot (not always the status quo for the genre) and a decent helping of various brutality. There's a booze-guzzling femme fatale, a wierd-ass theme song with a trumpet that sounds more like it belongs in some European art film, and an atmospheric grave-robbing scene.However, there are plenty of slooooow moments and some REALLY bad dialogue that almost sink the whole thing. There's also a cheesy sub-plot involving a member of the Confederate gang who's questioning the evil ways of his father (Joseph Cotton as the gang's leader) and half-brothers falling in love with the woman they've coerced into helping them with their evil scheme. It could all work with better writing, grittier characters and better pacing; it doesn't have those things.It's probably a two out of five star movie that's worth seeing for a few scenes and twisted ideas if you're willing to sit through the rest of it. Definitely worth renting if you're a Corbucci fan.