Sergio Garrone's "Django Il Bastardo" aka. "Django The Bastard" of 1969 is referred to by many as a great, creepy and particularly original Spaghetti Western. I am a Spaghetti Western enthusiast, and although "Django The Bastard" is certainly not a bad film, it is in my opinion overrated by many of my fellow fans of the Italian Western. Furthermore it is neither the only, nor the first, nor the best Spaghetti Western with Horror elements. This film also has the reputation of being the inspiration to Clint Eastwood's great "High Plain's Drifter" of 1973, and it might be true that parts of this movie inspired Eastwood, but "Django the Bastard" does in no way reach the quality and style of Eastwood's film.First of all - "Django The Bastard" (such as most of the other unofficial 'sequels') has nothing at all to do with Sergio Corbucci's 1966 masterpiece "Django" with Franco Nero in the lead. While the original Django is a former Union soldier, the central character of the same name in this movie, which plays in 1882, has formerly served in the confederate army. "Django The Bastard" is a movie that has its highs an lows. There are some excellent, stylish and creepy moments, one of my favorite scenes in the film is right in the beginning, when Django sticks a cross with a name on it in the muddy ground of a Western town. However, the movie sometimes just gets too boring in the middle. Most of the dialogue is not too refreshing either. There is one character i loved, that is the character of Luke Murdoch (played by Luciano Rossi), the hideous and utterly insane younger brother of the local crime boss and rich landowner Rod Murdoch (Paolo Gozlino). Luke, who is desperately in love and obsessed with a woman named Alethea (Rada Rassimov) and often has a fit of extreme rage and insanity, can only be calmed down by Alethea, which is the reason why his brother keeps her locked in his mansion.Anthony Steffen (Antonio De Teffe) fits pretty well in his leading role of the creepy silent stranger, although his performance is a little too stiff. As I mentioned above, Luciano Rossi also does a great job as the crazy villain. Rada Rassimov (whom you might recognize for her small role in "The Good, The Bad And The Ugly") also plays her role pretty well."Django The Bastard" is certainly an entertaining little Spaghetti Western, but nonetheless I think it is overpraised by some of my fellow Spaghetti Western fans. Fans of the genre will certainly have a good time watching "Django The Bastard" but, in my opinion, it is not a must-see. If you want to watch a truly great Spaghetti Western with horror elements and topics like resurrection in it, I recommend Giulio Questi's surreal and excellent "Se Sei Vivo Spara" aka. "Django Kill... If You Live, Shoot!" of 1967, with Tomas Milian in the lead, before watching this. Still, "Django The Bastard" is certainly not a bad film. It does have some very stylish, and some pretty creepy moments, and it is certainly worth the time. Recommended to enthusiastic Spaghetti Western fans.

I'm used to seeing cheap Italian films ripping off popular American movies, but this may be the first time that I've seen it the other way around. In 1973, Clint Eastwood made a film called 'High Plains Drifter', and it's practically the same as this entry in the Django series! Well, I say this entry in the Django 'series' - even though the central character is actually called Django this time; the film still doesn't follow on from Sergio Corbucci's original, and is more of a cash-in on the name. Even so, it's still a worthy Spaghetti western and one that is more than likely to delight said style of film-making's fans. Like Eastwood's later film, Django the Bastard has a streak of horror running through it, which stretches from small things such as the crosses Django leaves to his victims, all the way down to the major plot points. The film follows a mysterious stranger who turns up in a small town. A man who is surprised to see him is promptly shot and killed, and soon we learn that this stranger may not be among the living...Anthony Steffen takes the lead role as Django and delivers a performance that I don't like very much. The character is obviously meant to be enigmatic and brooding, but Sheffen is really flat and it's hard to believe that this is a man who would even bother to take revenge. After having seen the likes of Franco Nero and Thomas Milian in the lead role, Steffen's performance becomes even less enjoyable. However, the story he finds himself embroiled in more than makes up for the actor's lack of emotion. The small town setting makes for a great claustrophobic atmosphere as Django seeks out and shoots his enemies. The gun battles are impressive, and make for great entertainment. The dialogues can be a little clumsy at times, but you can't go into a film like this expecting great writing. This film may have been a big influence on High Plains Drifter, but in fairness; Django the Bastard does take its own fair share from Eastwood's partnership with Sergio Leone. Several shots of Django are extremely derivative of Eastwood's Man with No Name and it was Sergio Leone and Clint Eastwood that were responsible for immortalising the lone drifter character in the first place. Still, this western is well worth seeing for fans of Italian cinema.

This is the movie that got me into spaghetti westerns. I have been a huge fan of horror movies ever since I can remember, and I especially love the Euro-horror of the 60's and 70's. I also love horror-westerns like Curse of the Undead, and the infamous "bad" movie Billy the Kid vs. Dracula. There are only 2 or 3 other films that I would consider true horror-westerns, and I like those as well. Naturally, when I found out about this movie, I knew I had to have it.I don't really think of this movie as a horror-western, since we never really know whether the stranger is supernatural or not, but it is a spaghetti western with a strong Gothic Euro-horror feel to it. This is the closest thing there is to a Euro-horror spaghetti western. It's a shame there was never a full-blown Euro-western horror film with an obvious ghost, vampire, zombies or the like. It could have have been incredible. Especially if Barbara Steele was in it. Anyway, I digress.I don't consider this movie to be a sequel to the original Django film either. The stranger here is a man named Django, but we know he is not the same Django as the one in Sergio Corbucci's film, because this Django is a former confederate soldier. Corbucci's Django fought for the Union Army. This Django is like the grim reaper, a tall, emotionless, shadowy figure in black who calls himself a "demon from hell," and he is here to take the three officers who betrayed his regiment back down with him. He doesn't just kill, he does it with a macabre sense of style, which we first see in the opening scene of the film, where there is some great camera work as Django strolls into the middle of town, sticks a grave marker cross with the date and his first victim's name on it into the dirt in front of the saloon, and waits for the doomed man to come out and see it. It's an incredible scene, and that's just the beginning of Django's ghastly revenge. There are many more cool scenes after that one, but I won't spoil them.The music is very creepy and atmospheric. It's an excellent score that could fit right into a Euro-horror movie, yet it is totally appropriate for a spaghetti western as well. There is even a part where it sounds like they are using a theremin. The constant sound of howling wind is also a nice touch.In addition to the macabre, there is also some classic spaghetti western craziness in this film. Luke Murdoch, the brother of one of Django's targets, is one of the highlights of the movie. He is wildly insane, violent, over-the-top, and very entertaining to watch. There is also a scene near the beginning of the film where two men are playing catch with a lit stick of dynamite, and there is a crowd of people watching them, betting and cheering like it's America's favorite pastime. You've just gotta love this stuff.There's some bad editing that makes me think that the original Italian version may have been longer, but it's a unique and interesting film in spite of whatever minor flaws it may have.This was my first spaghetti western, and now I'm hooked on the genre. Need I say more?

A most unusual item for an Italian western - or for a western from any source. There were probably two-dozen films featuring the Django character first made famous by Franco Nero in Sergio Corbucci's DJANGO in 1966 - and that's just counting the ones with Django in the title. That film spawned as many imitators as the Sergio Leone film FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, and while not all featured the name "Django" in the title, there was a character with that name doing all of the shooting. From what I've seen of a sample of them, they all appear to have the commonality of a hero clad entirely in black. This one stars Anthony Steffen (Antonio De Teffè) who was previously in A FEW DOLLARS FOR DJANGO - thus proving the inspirational sources, or at least the desire to repeat their respective successes. Whatever Steffen lacks in the terms of Eastwood's or even Nero's charisma, he makes up for in his having co-authored the very original screenplay with director Sergio Garrone.Coincidentally, what this may lack in terms of originality of being yet another Django outing, it is actually more of an inspirational venture than an imitation. A gunman apparently returns from the dead to seek vengeance on those who betrayed him. Sound familiar? Does HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER come to mind? Other characters have flashbacks of him in his final moments - in the Eastwood film it is his character who has the flashbacks. Both films feature the gunman spinning around in a chair to shoot a few enemies, but actually that was more an homage on the part of Eastwood and this film's director, Sergio Garrone, to a similar scene in FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE. The final shot of both THE STRANGER'S GUNDOWN and HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER is most similar in theme if not in actual execution - in here Django walks rather than rides away.This Django appears in rooms and locales out of nowhere, adding to the horror content - along with a music score similar to the both the Eastwood film, and especially to some Hammer horror outings. One of his calling cards is to announce his arrival with a cross designed as a tombstone - the next victim's name and his date of death is marked on it. Unlike most vengeance seekers, Django is clearly here to avenge his own death. In another scene, he sends three dispatched villains back to town propped on horses with cross-like supports behind them in order that no one realizes until they are close that these men have gone to that great round-up in the sky. The performances are what one would expect - and after all, hard to gauge via the often flat English dubbing. While Paolo Gozlino makes little impression as the head bad guy Rod Murdoch, the character's nutty brother Luke does, here Luciano Rossi provides the film's best performance with a character reminiscent of Klaus Kinski's hunchback in FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE - minus the physical affliction. Luke is considered to be so stupid that his brother Rod had to pay a woman to marry him. But Luke isn't so dumb as he's able to capture Django twice - if only momentarily, but that's more than any other character manages to accomplish. Luke is clearly more crazy than dumb, but so are the guys in the Murdoch gang who play a game of catch with a stick of lighted dynamite.Much of the daylight cinematography is poorly lit, yet Gino Santini does an admirable job in the night scenes of which there are plenty. It has its slow spots, and the Civil War scenes appear to be done on the cheap, but overall the "few dollars" appear to have been spent wisely. Not that the VCI transfer helps any - there are lines and scratches, and some color distortion, but at 10 bucks for the DVD, I was happy enough just getting a widescreen transfer.