PlanetMosh Keeping it Metal
With the imminent release of Quentin Tarrento’s new film ‘Django Unchained’ starring Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz and Leonardo DiCaprio . Arrow Video will release (on DVD Monday 14th January ) for the first time ever in the UK ,Ferdinando Baldi’s “Django, Prepare A Coffin” A long-lost and previously unavailable sequel to Sergio Corbucci’s 1966 Spaghetti Western classic Django.
According to the Spaghetti Western Data Base, Tarantino placed “Django, Prepare A Coffin” at #19 in his top-20 Spaghetti Western films of all time (the original Django is at #3).
Django is a mysterious gun for hire who finds work in an unnamed town, working as a hangman for the local politician.
However he soon learns that the politician is framing local innocent men, so he can seize control of their land.
Rather than go along with this plan Django comes up with an idea of his own, he cleverly fakes the deaths of the condemned men, saving them from the gallows and then assembles them into a loyal gang who help him take down the politician. This is a man who Django shares history with, though the politician doesn’t know it, until it’s too late.
Terence Hill plays the part of Django and Hill’s performance as Django is excellent from the beginning to the bloody end, this is classic B movie action, the fight scenes being melodramatic enough to the point of being funny, an example of this in one scene where the winner of the fight never ever gets hit, not even once, while all the time beating up the bad guys . With action like this you know it is never going to be anything other than a movie to let yourself be taken along for the ride. So sit back and enjoy it.
Most of the fight scenes are like this, very much in the “comic book action” style, lots of fun with a colorful feel. There is a strong central theme concerning honor and revenge running throughout the film, due to the fact the politician and his gang where responsible for the attack on a gold transport coach years ago in which Django’s wife was killed. As such this movie certainly makes the grade as a superior spaghetti Western winner.
The best scene is definitely the ending showdown in the cemetery, lots of bullets and lots of fun, with some great dialogue thrown in, but you already know who is going to win, and win he does in great style, he has to win, he has the biggest gun.
Gianfranco Reverberi’s title theme “You’d Better Smile” is one of those old Western songs that will stick in the head for days, in fact most people will already have heard it, having been sampled by Gnarls Barkley on their Grammy winning hit single “Crazy”.
A hugely enjoyable Spaghetti Western 8/10
The “Django, Prepare a Coffin” UK DVD release comes complete with an original trailer,reversible sleeve artwork and a collector’s booklet by Spaghetti Western expert Howard Hughes.
