Hannie Caulder Hannie Caulder (1971) is a British western starring Raquel Welch with quotes from spaghetti westerns by Sergio Leone, it can also be attributed to exploitation films. And of course this is the story on the basis of which Tarantino shot his Kill Bill dilogy. Our heroine is both a Bond girl and the first cavewoman in a Million Years BC (I watched it in the cinema as a child!) Despite the fact that the film is already 50 years old and the Western genre is very niche, I certainly recommend it for viewing.
The film is about revenge, the plot of the film is very simple, it was also shot quite simply and unpretentiously, but with taste. It looks easy and in one breath, the main thing is not to rush anywhere and not to wait for modern action. Under a couple of glasses of wine, the film comes in just like that.
"It's a .45 caliber, it hits you dead from this distance."
Hannie Caulder lives at the station with her husband. Three bandits take her husband’s life, and she herself is beaten and raped, after which they set fire to the house, leaving the woman to die. When bounty hunter Thomas Luther Price accidentally rides by, Hannie persuades him to teach her how to shoot so that she can take revenge on the villains. At first, he refuses, knowing that if she takes the path of murder once, it will change a person forever. But he gives up under Hannie’s persistence, realizing how cruelly she was treated. Price professes his Zen, he dreams of returning to a peaceful life, but does not know how.
A man has to leave something behind… not just the tombstone. Just like a woman..
The main male role is played by Robert Culp, and Christopher Lee plays a Confederate gunsmith. There is also a mysterious Preacher character played by Stephen Boyd. The roles of the Clemmens brothers, the dirty trinity, were performed by Nikulin-Vitsin-Morgunov Ernest Borgnine (Emmett), Jack Ilam (Frank), Strother Martin (Rufus). Colorful real villains, who, despite all their disgust, are shown somewhat comically.
Director Bert Kennedy, before Hannie Caulder, shot more than a dozen westerns, where stars of the List A played: Henry Fonda, Yul Brynner, John Wayne, Kirk Douglas, Robert Mitchum and even Frank Sinatra.
Thomas Luther Price is an assassin and... a humanitarian
Another reason to watch Hannie Caulder is music! Excellent soundtrack by Ken Thorne, tex-mex instrumentals with orchestrations. The film also features a cameo by Paco De Lucía, an unsurpassed virtuoso musician, legendary flamenco guitar! The final song is performed by Bobby Hanna.
Bobby Hanna – Life Never Is Peaceful
The film was shot in the south of Spain (mainly in Almeria and Andalusia). Culp’s technical advisor was Rodd Redwing, a specialist in fast shooting and snatching weapons from the holster. It is sad that on the plane returning to the USA from the filming of the film, Redwing had a heart attack and died in Los Angeles shortly after landing.
Critics noted that the film combined the classic period of westerns starring John Ford and John Wayne with postmodern paintings by Peckinpah, Corbucci and Leone. That there is a mixture of styles and qualities that should not cope together, but still works: lyricism coexists with cruelty, black humor intersects with arguments about morality and feminism.
The film about Hannie Caulder collected a good box office in the UK and was also a success in the USA. In the German box office, the film was called In einem Sattel mit dem Tod (In the saddle with death), in French: Un colt pour trois salopards (Colt for three bastards), in Italian La Texana e i fratelli Penitenza (Texas woman and retribution to the brothers).
It's not hard to guess who leads this duo.
Of course, Robert Culp and Ernest Borgnine shine here. Quentin Tarantino on Culp: “In this movie, he’s just great! I think there are some similarities between Sonny Chiba with Uma Thurman in Kill Bill and Robert Culp with Raquel Welch in Hannie Caulder.”
Borgnine about Culp:
“One of the actors really shines is Bob Culp. This guy is just a national treasure. He’s convincing in everything – like Gary Cooper, he’s one of the great actors you can just listen to. I wish I had at least half of his talent!”
Raquel Welch is also trying and her game embodies the right image. A kind of Clint-Eastwood girl who wears a hat and a poncho, under which there is nothing. About the movie, film critic Kim Morgan wrote an essay “Sympathy for Lady Vengeance”, hello Park Chan-wook. The theme of revenge was and remains one of the most relevant topics in feature films.
