Shalako (1968)

This is a most peculiar oddity -- a British Euro-Western shot in Spain by veteran American director Edward Dmytryk. It should come as no surprise that everything, especially the casting, seems a bit off. A group of snooty European aristocrats, and a U.S. senator, goes on a fancy hunting expedition in the Old West. They haul along all the cumbersome trappings of civilization: servants, fine wine, expensive silverware, etc. But their unscrupulous cowboy guides, led by Bosky Fulton (Stephen Boyd), foolishly encamp on Apache land. When a French Countess (Bardot) wanders off, she is attacked by the Indians. Fortunately, Shalako (Sean Connery), an experienced cowboy known by the Indians, happens along. He rescues the Countess and brokers a truce with the Indians. The hunting party is given till dawn to leave Indian territory. But the Europeans, led by a German Baron (Peter van Eyck), arrogantly refuse to be run off by a gang of savages. They decide to make a stand, trusting their superior firepower and breeding to win the day. The next morning the expected Indian attack is just barely repelled. To make matters worse, their guides run off with most of their supplies (and Honor Blackman). This is the first of many lessons in humility for the hunting party as they struggle to survive. Shalako must now lead them to safety through a hostile landscape.The story, based on the book by Louis L'Amour, is essentially a study of class divisions. This is what must have appealed to the British producers in the first place. It is the opposite of "Zulu", in which the besieged Army of the British Empire nobly held out against a massive native attack. In "Shalako" a group of seemingly superior Europeans are trounced and harassed by savage Indians and must turn to a working class saddle tramp for salvation.Sean Connery, with his thick Scottish accent, is woefully miscast as Shalako -- a role originally intended for Henry Fonda. A fine actor in most roles, Connery simply isn't believable as an American cowboy. His presence only serves to derail the film. Plus, playing him against a group of European co-stars destroys the contrast that is at the heart of the story. Connery had just quit the James Bond series and was eager to establish himself as a versatile actor. He could not have picked a worse film to demonstrate his range. With a dark tan, longer hair, and sideburns, Connery was never more handsome, but he never seems comfortable in this setting. Brigitte Bardot, with her trademark heavy eyeliner, looks like a sexy French raccoon. She and Connery are given a brief romantic interlude, but even that doesn't work. The lack of chemistry between the two stars is obvious.Honor Blackman (who was in "Goldfinger"), as English lady Julia Daggett, was clearly a bit of stunt casting. The fact that she has no scenes with Connery makes her being in the film all the more absurd. But the oddest casting choice in this off-kilter film is Woody Strode as the Apache leader. Strode is the imposing African-American actor best known for "Spartacus" and "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance".All of this had a chance of working with a different cast and a better script. As it is, this is an unfortunate misfire of a film in which its obvious flaws are its only points of interest.

See it – Let's be honest, the main reason you'll want to watch this movie is to see Sean Connery as a cowboy. But this is a surprisingly good rip-roaring western. In fact, the strangest thing about this movie is that it revolves around a group of British hunters on a big game hunt, and none of the British characters are played by Connery. He plays the American. The only western he ever did, Connery doesn't even attempt to change his accent, but it's okay. This is an action movie, and it is as exciting and action-packed as they come. The hunting party is attacked by Indians, and James Bond…I mean Shalako, has to save the day. This movie is a mix between "Duel at Diablo" and "Last of the Mohicans." Plus, the story was written by the legendary Louis L'Amour himself, so that should be enough right there. 4.5 action rating

A group of arrogant European hunters takes to the North American West to pursue game. Apaches? Am I about to say, little do they know that they will have to encounter hostile Apaches? Nope. Actually, it is, once they find out there are hostile Apaches, the more they want to stay. That is the tone set by the group's arrogant leader, Baron Frederick Von Hallstatt (Peter van Eyck). He and his haughty group, a German and a bunch with supercilious British accents, do not want to yield to "savages," but desire to teach them a lesson, even though the Apaches have treaty rights on their side.Sean Connery plays Carlin, a hunter and tracker, but he is known as Shalako, a name given to him by the Indians. The tracker who leads the group, however, is Bosky Fulton (Steven Boyd). Rivaling Connery's celebrity in the film are those beautiful European actresses Brigitte Bardot (Countess Irina Lazaar) and Honor Blackman (Lady Julia Daggett). The Countess is supposedly being matched with the Baron, but she and Shalako later have eyes for each other. As for Lady Julia, she is married to Sir Charles Daggett, who loves her, but Lady Julia and Fulton have something cooking. The other leading couple is Senator Henry Clarke (Alexander Knox) and his wife Elena (played by the also-beautiful Valerie French). There are a few others in the Europeans' coterie, and Fulton leads a slightly larger group of American frontier types who escort them. Toward the start of the movie, when the Countess is hunting on her own, the Apaches kill the Countess' companion but let her and Shalako, who was passing by, go. This is after Shalako promises to tell the group to get off Apache territory. The group does not cooperate, and the Apaches attack the Europeans' encampment, and I will stop my narrative.By and large, the characters, including Shalako, are uninteresting. As the protagonist, he continues to make the right moves, in contrast to the loser Baron, but is given no character development and is not a compelling presence. Yes, Sean Connery is miscast and boring here. His character is not even worthy of the mediocre eponymous score. The Europeans have their boring and condescending say; sometimes, one gets the sense that director Edward Dmytryk deliberately has them muttering or whispering inaudibly to emphasize their emptiness, nothing to listen to anyway. Still, I like the movie, and the reason is its atmosphere. I am not aware of other movies in which Indians are fighting not white American settlers but aristocratic Europeans. Not only is the tension grounded more tightly because the supercilious Europeans add the level of snobbery to the typical superior attitude of whites, but we also know they are unfamiliar with Indians. Like the men, Lady Julia thinks the Indians are savages. She has the stereotypical terror of them one might think a member of 19th-century European nobility might feel. Such a group is not made up of people of the land in the sense of American whites, but people with a silver spoon in their mouth. Perhaps the tension in "Shalako" is comparable to the tension in some flicks in which well-to-do Europeans go to African jungles. Here, the backdrop is instead the wide open expanses of Western plains and mountains, shot well by the cinematographers, who do very well with the distance shots as well as the closer-up action scenes.Also, the story involves some intrigue, if uncomplicated, including the treachery of Fulton and Lady Julia. Honor Blackman is not a femme fatale Pussy Galore, but she is a traitoress of sorts. Some fairly graphic combat scenes are included, as was beginning to be the trend in the late 1960s in American and European films; Lady Julia screams in a gruesome scene involving a spearing, and in another, suffice it to say she is "handled" by the Indians. That is quite an intense one, worth seeing. However, as a final note, don't expect much from the ending, which as one might expect involves a face-off with the Indians. It befits the mediocrity of the overall script and characters, except it is perhaps worse.

Given its director (Edward Dmytryk) and its cast (Sean Connery and Brigitte Bardot) it is rather odd that 'Shalako" (1969) is such an obscure film and that so many of the comments/reviews are totally negative. "Spaghetti" westerns (filmed in Italy or Spain) were quite the rage in the late 1960's and "Shalako" is about what you would get if "Hombre" (1967) had been given a mild "Spaghetti" treatment. While not even remotely on the level of Monte Hellman's stuff, "Shalako" is an entertaining and comprehensible western that most viewers will get into and enjoy until about the ¾ mark when the wheels fall off and it drags along to a less than spectacular resolution. Dmytryk was a veteran action director who occasionally ("Eight Iron Men" and "The Young Lions") even did a good job of directing actors for the camera. This was one of his last efforts and he seems to have stayed focused on the action and paid little attention to the performances themselves. Connery plays the title character, an experienced frontiersman who (like Paul Newman in "Hombre") is forced by circumstances into guiding a bunch of clueless civilians to safety. "Hombre" had Newman (a white man raised by Indians) in the moral dilemma of having to assist a group of people for which he has total contempt. Shalako ' s situation is simpler: he must extract a European aristocrat's hunting party who have ticked off the Apache's by coming onto their reservation and who have been betrayed by their cowboy hunting guides. Although he has little use for most of this group he has developed a grudging respect for a plucky countess (Bardot). There is decent chemistry in the early Connery-Bardot scenes but it does not sustain itself as the relationship begins to turn romantic. As in "Hombre" there is an interesting twist with the young wife (Honor Blackman) of one of the aristocrats deciding to leave her husband for the dangerous cowboy (Stephan Boyd) who has just placed the group at the mercy of the elements (and the Indians). Blackman is excellent in this part , the only really challenging role in the production. Dmytryk does an excellent job with his first three action sequences, including a surprisingly credible dawn attack on the camp of the hunting party and a more traditional stagecoach chase sequence. But as already mentioned, the film is extremely front-end loaded and he has dissipated all the tension before the climatic sequence even begins. "Hombre" on the other hand withheld its best sequence until the end and managed to pack some nice irony into its resolution. You won't find this in "Shalako", in fact the final 20 minutes are so listless your mind begins mulling over the plot holes. Like how did Boyd's character manage to walk all the way to the top of the plateau without being detected by the Indians? When you have to insert a detailed verbal explanation for something totally inexplicable (that has happened "off" camera) a competent editor knows that it is time for some major trimming and a focused director begins revising his script. Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.