Zapata Westerns
Encyclopedia
Zapata Westerns is a nickname given to a subgenre of Italian "Spaghetti Westerns", dating largely from the mid 1960s to early 1970s, which were set in and around Mexico
and dealt with overtly political themes. They were named after Emiliano Zapata
, the famous Mexican revolutionary from the Mexican Revolution
of 1913, during which most of these films are set. The term is also sometimes used for American films set during this conflict.
and Sergio Corbucci
, dealt with some subtle political themes, particularly a criticism of Western capitalism
and the "dollars" culture of America; however, as a general rule they were secondary to the main plot of the films in question during the early stage of the genre's development in the mid-'60s. However, in the late '60s a number of directors began to shoot Spaghetti Westerns as political allegories, often using the Western setting to mask (to an extent) the intended political outlook, in order to make them more acceptable (to some extent).
One of the first popular political Westerns, still highly regarded as one of the genre's best, was Sergio Sollima
's 1966 film The Big Gundown
, with Lee Van Cleef
and Tomas Milian
. The original screenplay had originally involved an Italian police detective, ordered to chase down a Communist revolutionary accused of raping and killing an industrialist's wife, only to find that the revolutionary had been framed by the industrialist - but he kills the revolutionary anyway. Sollima took the story line, transplanted it to 1880's Colorado
, and changed the film's ending to a considerably happier one.
In the same year, Damiano Damiani released A Bullet for the General
(also known as Quien Sabe?), with Gian Maria Volonté
, Lou Castel
, and Klaus Kinski
, which dealt with an American agent of the Mexican government (Castel), during the Mexican Revolution
of 1913, being hired to manipulate a bandit leader (Volonte) into helping him assassinate a revolutionary general. The movie made overt references to the ongoing Vietnam War
, and Castel's character was meant to represent the CIA's interventions in Latin America. The movie was extremely popular in Europe, though butchered both for political and content reasons in overseas markets, and set the precedent for the development of the subgenre.
Virtually all political Westerns, Zapata or not, were made from a Marxist point of view, and extensively referenced the fascist regimes of Benito Mussolini
in Italy
(under whom most of the film makers had lived) and Adolf Hitler
in Germany
. They also frequently criticized contemporary US foreign policy, particularly the Vietnam War and the role of the US military and intelligence in Latin America, Africa, and elsewhere. The films are parables of the relationship between the capitalist First World
, as represented by the outsider character, and the Third World
represented by Mexico.
Some of the most popular examples of this subgenre include Sergio Corbucci
's films with Tomas Milian
and/or Franco Nero
, particularly A Professional Gun (1968) and Compañeros
(1970), though these films were often criticized for using the political issues being portrayed as plot devices, rather than a serious attempt to make a point. A similar story structure was used in Gillo Pontecorvo
's non-Western Burn!
, with Marlon Brando
playing William Walker (filibuster), which takes place on a fictional Portuguese island colony in the Caribbean in the 19th century.
Sergio Leone's contribution to the Zapata Western was Duck, You Sucker! (1971), with Rod Steiger
and James Coburn
, which played almost paradoxically as both an endorsement and criticism of the revolutionary politics of some of its peers, as it portrayed the revolution in a less romanticized manner than a lot of other films in the genre.
's The Price of Power
(1969), and Enzo G. Castellari
's Keoma
(1975) - are different types of films, though all of them follow the general outline of the storyline. Face To Face concerns an American history professor (Gian Maria Volonte), dying of tuberculosis, who moves west and becomes fascinated in the outlaw way of life, eventually joining and taking over an outlaw gang led by Tomas Milan, and driving it to destruction. The movie made overt fascist parallels, but took place in the Arizona
desert in the 1860s and contained no definite references to contemporary events such as Vietnam. The Price of Power, starring Giuliano Gemma
and Van Johnson
, was an interesting Western take on the assassination of John F. Kennedy
, replacing JFK with James Garfield
in 1881 Dallas (the fact that Garfield was assassinated in Washington makes little difference to the allegorical storyline). Keoma, with Franco Nero
and Woody Strode
, dealt largely with issues of civil rights
and discrimination, and played as a sort of commentary on the American Civil Rights Movement
of the early-to-mid '60s.
Other Spaghetti westerns, namely, Sergio Leone's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
(1966) and Once Upon a Time in the West
(1968), contained more subtle political elements which were not the driving part of the main story. Though most Spaghettis had at least some degree of politics to be found in them, the majority of them were not, by nature, political Westerns.
's Viva Villa!
(1934), with Wallace Beery
, Elia Kazan
's Viva Zapata!
(1952), with Marlon Brando
and Anthony Quinn
, Robert Aldrich
's Vera Cruz
(1954), with Gary Cooper
and Burt Lancaster
, The Treasure of Pancho Villa
(1955), Robert Mitchum
in Bandido (1956) and The Wonderful Country
(1959), The Professionals (1966), with Lancaster, Lee Marvin
, Robert Ryan
, and Woody Strode
. Guns of the Magnificent Seven
(1969) and Mitchum again in Villa Rides
(1968) though these films rarely dealt with significant political themes, as did their later Italian counterparts.
By contrast to political ideas, the films featured American soldiers of fortune
going South to Mexico hiring themselves out to factions in Mexican Revolutions. As the Wild West of America became more settled, action seeking filmgoers could see the Americano's use of technologically advanced automatic weapons and explosives taking such a high body count of Mexicans that the genre was nicknamed "chili con carnage
" by critic Jenni Calder
. The popularity of the genre may have been a factor in the Frito-Lay
corporation adopting the cartoon Frito Bandito
as a television advertising spokesman. Complaints from the Mexican American community led to the replacement of the Frito Bandito with the Muncha-Bunch and W.C. Fritos cartoon spokesmen.
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and dealt with overtly political themes. They were named after Emiliano Zapata
Emiliano Zapata
Emiliano Zapata Salazar was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution, which broke out in 1910, and which was initially directed against the president Porfirio Díaz. He formed and commanded an important revolutionary force, the Liberation Army of the South, during the Mexican Revolution...
, the famous Mexican revolutionary from the Mexican Revolution
Mexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a major armed struggle that started in 1910, with an uprising led by Francisco I. Madero against longtime autocrat Porfirio Díaz. The Revolution was characterized by several socialist, liberal, anarchist, populist, and agrarianist movements. Over time the Revolution...
of 1913, during which most of these films are set. The term is also sometimes used for American films set during this conflict.
Overview and origins
Most of the early Spaghetti Westerns, such as the early works of Sergio LeoneSergio Leone
Sergio Leone was an Italian film director, producer and screenwriter most associated with the "Spaghetti Western" genre.Leone's film-making style includes juxtaposing extreme close-up shots with lengthy long shots...
and Sergio Corbucci
Sergio Corbucci
Sergio Corbucci was an Italian film director. He is best known for his very violent yet intelligent spaghetti westerns...
, dealt with some subtle political themes, particularly a criticism of Western capitalism
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
and the "dollars" culture of America; however, as a general rule they were secondary to the main plot of the films in question during the early stage of the genre's development in the mid-'60s. However, in the late '60s a number of directors began to shoot Spaghetti Westerns as political allegories, often using the Western setting to mask (to an extent) the intended political outlook, in order to make them more acceptable (to some extent).
One of the first popular political Westerns, still highly regarded as one of the genre's best, was Sergio Sollima
Sergio Sollima
Sergio Sollima is an Italian former film director and script writer.Like many Italian cult directors, Sollima started his career by directing mostly sword and sandal movies that were very popular in the early 1960s. After the genre's popularity quickly died out, Sollima was among the first ones to...
's 1966 film The Big Gundown
The Big Gundown
The Big Gundown is a 1966 spaghetti western directed by Sergio Sollima and starring Lee Van Cleef and Tomas Milian...
, with Lee Van Cleef
Lee Van Cleef
Lee Van Cleef was an American film actor who appeared mostly in Western and action pictures. His sharp features and piercing eyes led to his being cast as a villain in scores of films such as High Noon, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance and The Good The Bad and the Ugly.-Early life:Van Cleef was...
and Tomas Milian
Tomas Milian
Tomás Milián is a Cuban-American actor best known for having worked extensively in Italian films from the late 1950s to the 1980s.-Career in Italy:...
. The original screenplay had originally involved an Italian police detective, ordered to chase down a Communist revolutionary accused of raping and killing an industrialist's wife, only to find that the revolutionary had been framed by the industrialist - but he kills the revolutionary anyway. Sollima took the story line, transplanted it to 1880's Colorado
Colorado
Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...
, and changed the film's ending to a considerably happier one.
In the same year, Damiano Damiani released A Bullet for the General
A Bullet for the General
A Bullet for the General , is a 1966 film which stars Gian Maria Volonté, Klaus Kinski, Lou Castel and Martine Beswick. Originally entitled El Chucho, quién sabe?, it is the story of El Chucho, the bandit, and Bill Tate who is a counter-revolutionary in Mexico...
(also known as Quien Sabe?), with Gian Maria Volonté
Gian Maria Volontè
Gian Maria Volonté was an Italian actor. He is perhaps most famous outside of Italy for his roles as the main villain in Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More.-Early life:Volonté was born in Milan, and graduated in Rome in 1957...
, Lou Castel
Lou Castel
Lou Castel is a Colombian actor known primarily for his work in Italian films.Born Ulv Quarzell in Bogotá, Castel moved to Europe as a young man. Interested in acting from an early age, he attended the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia, but was quickly kicked out. His first movie role was an...
, and Klaus Kinski
Klaus Kinski
Klaus Kinski, born Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski , was a German actor. He appeared in more than 130 films, and is perhaps best-remembered as a leading role actor in Werner Herzog films: Aguirre, the Wrath of God , Nosferatu the Vampyre , Woyzeck , Fitzcarraldo and Cobra Verde .-Early...
, which dealt with an American agent of the Mexican government (Castel), during the Mexican Revolution
Mexican Revolution
The Mexican Revolution was a major armed struggle that started in 1910, with an uprising led by Francisco I. Madero against longtime autocrat Porfirio Díaz. The Revolution was characterized by several socialist, liberal, anarchist, populist, and agrarianist movements. Over time the Revolution...
of 1913, being hired to manipulate a bandit leader (Volonte) into helping him assassinate a revolutionary general. The movie made overt references to the ongoing Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
, and Castel's character was meant to represent the CIA's interventions in Latin America. The movie was extremely popular in Europe, though butchered both for political and content reasons in overseas markets, and set the precedent for the development of the subgenre.
Regular plot devices
A general outline of a standard Zapata Western plot went as follows:- The two main characters would be an ignorant Mexican bandit peon who knows nothing about the politics of revolution, and an outsider — American or European — who is in some way involved in the revolution. The bandit would usually, though not always, have a large gang of followers who would be used as expendable fodder for the movie's action scenes, and to represent his ties to his friends and families, rather than to any abstract idea of revolution.
- The setting would most often be the Mexican Revolution of 1913, particularly during the reign of General Victoriano HuertaVictoriano HuertaJosé Victoriano Huerta Márquez was a Mexican military officer and president of Mexico. Huerta's supporters were known as Huertistas during the Mexican Revolution...
. - In most films, the outsider manipulates the peon and his gang into joining the revolution, for his own personal gain, for the benefit of an outside influence, or often for the outsider's own amusement.
- The villain is usually an American mercenary (often the foreigner), a fascist-like Mexican general, or an American or otherwise foreign corporation.
Virtually all political Westerns, Zapata or not, were made from a Marxist point of view, and extensively referenced the fascist regimes of Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
(under whom most of the film makers had lived) and Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. They also frequently criticized contemporary US foreign policy, particularly the Vietnam War and the role of the US military and intelligence in Latin America, Africa, and elsewhere. The films are parables of the relationship between the capitalist First World
First World
The concept of the First World first originated during the Cold War, where it was used to describe countries that were aligned with the United States. These countries were democratic and capitalistic. After the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, the term "First World" took on a...
, as represented by the outsider character, and the Third World
Third World
The term Third World arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either capitalism and NATO , or communism and the Soviet Union...
represented by Mexico.
Some of the most popular examples of this subgenre include Sergio Corbucci
Sergio Corbucci
Sergio Corbucci was an Italian film director. He is best known for his very violent yet intelligent spaghetti westerns...
's films with Tomas Milian
Tomas Milian
Tomás Milián is a Cuban-American actor best known for having worked extensively in Italian films from the late 1950s to the 1980s.-Career in Italy:...
and/or Franco Nero
Franco Nero
Franco Nero is an Italian actor.-Early life:Nero was born Francesco Sparanero in San Prospero Parmense , the son of a sergeant in the...
, particularly A Professional Gun (1968) and Compañeros
Compañeros
Compañeros is an Italian Zapata-themed spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Corbucci in 1970. The film stars Franco Nero, Tomas Milian, Jack Palance and Fernando Rey...
(1970), though these films were often criticized for using the political issues being portrayed as plot devices, rather than a serious attempt to make a point. A similar story structure was used in Gillo Pontecorvo
Gillo Pontecorvo
Gillo Pontecorvo was an Italian filmmaker. He worked as a film director for more than a decade before his best known film La battaglia di Algeri was released...
's non-Western Burn!
Burn!
Burn! is a 1969 film directed by Gillo Pontecorvo; starring Marlon Brando. The plot is loosely based on events in the history of Guadeloupe.The main character is named after William Walker, the famous American filibuster...
, with Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando, Jr. was an American movie star and political activist. "Unchallenged as the most important actor in modern American Cinema" according to the St...
playing William Walker (filibuster), which takes place on a fictional Portuguese island colony in the Caribbean in the 19th century.
Sergio Leone's contribution to the Zapata Western was Duck, You Sucker! (1971), with Rod Steiger
Rod Steiger
Rodney Stephen "Rod" Steiger was an Academy Award-winning American actor known for his performances in such films as On the Waterfront, The Big Knife, Oklahoma!, The Harder They Fall, Across the Bridge, The Pawnbroker, Doctor Zhivago, In the Heat of the Night, and Waterloo as well as the...
and James Coburn
James Coburn
James Harrison Coburn III was an American film and television actor. Coburn appeared in nearly 70 films and made over 100 television appearances during his 45-year career, and played a wide range of roles and won an Academy Award for his supporting role as Glen Whitehouse in Affliction.A capable,...
, which played almost paradoxically as both an endorsement and criticism of the revolutionary politics of some of its peers, as it portrayed the revolution in a less romanticized manner than a lot of other films in the genre.
Other political Westerns
Not all political Spaghetti Westerns came from the Zapata mould, however. Three of the most popular - Sollima's Face to Face (1967), Tonino ValeriiTonino Valerii
Tonino Valerii is an Italian film director, most known for his Spaghetti Westerns. Valerii started his film career as an assistant director on Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars, before moving on to direct by himself...
's The Price of Power
The Price of Power
The Price of Power is an Spanish-Italian Spaghetti Western directed by Tonino Valerii.-Political references:The film has many political overtures, most notably drawing similarities between the assassinations of two American presidents James Garfield and John F. Kennedy...
(1969), and Enzo G. Castellari
Enzo G. Castellari
Enzo G. Castellari is an Italian film director. He became famous during the 1960s by directing several spaghetti westerns with such titles as Go Kill and Come Back Enzo G. Castellari (born July 29, 1938) is an Italian film director. He became famous during the 1960s by directing several spaghetti...
's Keoma
Keoma (film)
Keoma, also released in various counties under the titles Django Rides Again and The Violent Breed, is a 1976 Spaghetti Western film directed by Enzo G. Castellari and starring Franco Nero and Donald O'Brian...
(1975) - are different types of films, though all of them follow the general outline of the storyline. Face To Face concerns an American history professor (Gian Maria Volonte), dying of tuberculosis, who moves west and becomes fascinated in the outlaw way of life, eventually joining and taking over an outlaw gang led by Tomas Milan, and driving it to destruction. The movie made overt fascist parallels, but took place in the Arizona
Arizona
Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...
desert in the 1860s and contained no definite references to contemporary events such as Vietnam. The Price of Power, starring Giuliano Gemma
Giuliano Gemma
-Biography:Born in Rome, Gemma first worked as a stuntman, then was offered real acting parts by director Duccio Tessari, starting with the film Arrivano i titani . He also made an appearance in Luchino Visconti's Il Gattopardo as Garibaldi's General...
and Van Johnson
Van Johnson
Van Johnson was an American film and television actor and dancer who was a major star at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios during and after World War II....
, was an interesting Western take on the assassination of John F. Kennedy
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
, replacing JFK with James Garfield
James Garfield
James Abram Garfield served as the 20th President of the United States, after completing nine consecutive terms in the U.S. House of Representatives. Garfield's accomplishments as President included a controversial resurgence of Presidential authority above Senatorial courtesy in executive...
in 1881 Dallas (the fact that Garfield was assassinated in Washington makes little difference to the allegorical storyline). Keoma, with Franco Nero
Franco Nero
Franco Nero is an Italian actor.-Early life:Nero was born Francesco Sparanero in San Prospero Parmense , the son of a sergeant in the...
and Woody Strode
Woody Strode
Woodrow Wilson Woolwine "Woody" Strode was a decathlete and football star who went on to become a pioneering black American film actor. He was nominated for a Golden Globe award for best supporting actor for his role in Spartacus in 1960...
, dealt largely with issues of civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
and discrimination, and played as a sort of commentary on the American Civil Rights Movement
Civil rights movement
The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...
of the early-to-mid '60s.
Other Spaghetti westerns, namely, Sergio Leone's The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is a 1966 Italian epic spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Leone, starring Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef, and Eli Wallach in the title roles. The screenplay was written by Age & Scarpelli, Luciano Vincenzoni and Leone, based on a story by Vincenzoni and Leone...
(1966) and Once Upon a Time in the West
Once Upon a Time in the West
Once Upon a Time in the West is a 1968 Italian epic spaghetti western film directed by Sergio Leone for Paramount Pictures. It stars Henry Fonda cast against type as the villain, Charles Bronson as his nemesis, Jason Robards as a bandit, and Claudia Cardinale as a newly widowed homesteader with a...
(1968), contained more subtle political elements which were not the driving part of the main story. Though most Spaghettis had at least some degree of politics to be found in them, the majority of them were not, by nature, political Westerns.
American Zapata Westerns
The term is also occasionally applied to the American Westerns with the same setting which were produced in rising number in the late 1950s and 1960s. These included Jack Conway and Howard HawksHoward Hawks
Howard Winchester Hawks was an American film director, producer and screenwriter of the classic Hollywood era...
's Viva Villa!
Viva Villa!
Viva Villa! is a 1934 American film starring Wallace Beery as Pancho Villa and was written by Ben Hecht, adapted from a biography by Edgecumb Pinchon and Odo B. Stade. The picture was directed by Jack Conway. There was special, uncredited help with the script by Howard Hawks, James Kevin...
(1934), with Wallace Beery
Wallace Beery
Wallace Fitzgerald Beery was an American actor. He is best known for his portrayal of Bill in Min and Bill opposite Marie Dressler, as Long John Silver in Treasure Island, as Pancho Villa in Viva Villa!, and his titular role in The Champ, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Actor...
, Elia Kazan
Elia Kazan
Elia Kazan was an American director and actor, described by the New York Times as "one of the most honored and influential directors in Broadway and Hollywood history". Born in Istanbul, the capital of the Ottoman Empire, to Greek parents originally from Kayseri in Anatolia, the family emigrated...
's Viva Zapata!
Viva Zapata!
Viva Zapata! is a 1952 fictional-biographical film directed by Elia Kazan. The screenplay was written by John Steinbeck, using as a guide Edgcomb Pinchon's book, 'Zapata the Unconquerable', a fact that is not credited in the titles of the film...
(1952), with Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando
Marlon Brando, Jr. was an American movie star and political activist. "Unchallenged as the most important actor in modern American Cinema" according to the St...
and Anthony Quinn
Anthony Quinn
Antonio Rodolfo Quinn-Oaxaca , more commonly known as Anthony Quinn, was a Mexican American actor, as well as a painter and writer...
, Robert Aldrich
Robert Aldrich
Robert Aldrich was an American film director, writer and producer, notable for such films as Kiss Me Deadly , The Big Knife , What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? , Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte , The Flight of the Phoenix , The Dirty Dozen , and The Longest Yard .-Biography:Robert...
's Vera Cruz
Vera Cruz (film)
Vera Cruz is a 1954 American Technicolor Western starring Gary Cooper and Burt Lancaster, and featuring Denise Darcel, Sara Montiel, and Cesar Romero. The movie was directed by Robert Aldrich from a story by Borden Chase...
(1954), with Gary Cooper
Gary Cooper
Frank James Cooper, known professionally as Gary Cooper, was an American film actor. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Westerns he made...
and Burt Lancaster
Burt Lancaster
Burton Stephen "Burt" Lancaster was an American film actor noted for his athletic physique and distinctive smile...
, The Treasure of Pancho Villa
The Treasure of Pancho Villa
The Treasure of Pancho Villa is a 1955 western film directed by George Sherman and starring Rory Calhoun, Shelly Winters and Gilbert Roland...
(1955), Robert Mitchum
Robert Mitchum
Robert Charles Durman Mitchum was an American film actor, author, composer and singer and is #23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male American screen legends of all time...
in Bandido (1956) and The Wonderful Country
The Wonderful Country (film)
The Wonderful Country is a 1959 Technicolor Western film based on Tom Lea's novel of the same name that was produced by Robert Mitchum's DRM Production company in Mexico. Tom Lea has a cameo as a barber.-Plot:...
(1959), The Professionals (1966), with Lancaster, Lee Marvin
Lee Marvin
Lee Marvin was an American film actor. Known for his gravelly voice, white hair and 6' 2" stature, Marvin at first did supporting roles, mostly villains, soldiers and other hardboiled characters, but after winning an Academy Award for Best Actor for his dual roles in Cat Ballou , he landed more...
, Robert Ryan
Robert Ryan
Robert Bushnell Ryan was an American actor who often played hardened cops and ruthless villains.-Early life and career:...
, and Woody Strode
Woody Strode
Woodrow Wilson Woolwine "Woody" Strode was a decathlete and football star who went on to become a pioneering black American film actor. He was nominated for a Golden Globe award for best supporting actor for his role in Spartacus in 1960...
. Guns of the Magnificent Seven
Guns of the Magnificent Seven
Guns of the Magnificent Seven is a Zapata Western and the second sequel to the 1960 western film, The Magnificent Seven ....
(1969) and Mitchum again in Villa Rides
Villa Rides
Villa Rides is a 1968 film starring Yul Brynner in toupee in the title role and Robert Mitchum as an American adventurer and pilot of fortune. The supporting cast includes Charles Bronson as Fierro, Herbert Lom as Huerta, and Alexander Knox as Madero...
(1968) though these films rarely dealt with significant political themes, as did their later Italian counterparts.
By contrast to political ideas, the films featured American soldiers of fortune
Mercenary
A mercenary, is a person who takes part in an armed conflict based on the promise of material compensation rather than having a direct interest in, or a legal obligation to, the conflict itself. A non-conscript professional member of a regular army is not considered to be a mercenary although he...
going South to Mexico hiring themselves out to factions in Mexican Revolutions. As the Wild West of America became more settled, action seeking filmgoers could see the Americano's use of technologically advanced automatic weapons and explosives taking such a high body count of Mexicans that the genre was nicknamed "chili con carnage
Chili con carne
Chili con carne is a spicy stew. The name of the dish derives from the Spanish chile con carne, "chili pepper with meat". Traditional versions are made, minimally, from chili peppers, garlic, onions, and cumin, along with chopped or ground beef. Beans and tomatoes are frequently included...
" by critic Jenni Calder
Jenni Calder
Jenni Calder is a Scottish literary historian, and arts establishment figure. She was formerly married to Angus Calder, and is the daughter of David Daiches. She also once ran the Edinburgh Book Festival.-Some works:...
. The popularity of the genre may have been a factor in the Frito-Lay
Frito-Lay
Frito-Lay North America is the division of PepsiCo that manufactures, markets and sells corn chips, potato chips and other snack foods. The primary snack food brands produced under the Frito-Lay name include Fritos corn chips, Cheetos cheese-flavored snacks, Doritos and Tostitos tortilla chips,...
corporation adopting the cartoon Frito Bandito
Frito Bandito
The Frito Bandito was the cartoon mascot for Fritos corn chips from 1967 to 1971. The Bandito was created by the Foote, Cone & Belding Agency, and animated by Tex Avery. The character was voiced by Mel Blanc, who used an exaggerated Mexican accent not unlike another character of his, Speedy...
as a television advertising spokesman. Complaints from the Mexican American community led to the replacement of the Frito Bandito with the Muncha-Bunch and W.C. Fritos cartoon spokesmen.
See also
- OsternOsternThe Ostern or Red Western was the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc countries' take on the Western.It generally took two forms:...
, also known as "Red Western" - Revisionist WesternRevisionist WesternThe Revisionist Western, Modern Western or Anti-Western traces to the mid 1960s and early 1970s as a sub-genre of the Western movie....
- Partisan film, also known as "Gibanica Western"
- Red Dead Redemption, an American "Zapata Western" video game