Four years before he would be known as the master of the gimmick, William Castle directed this South of the border Western starring Glenn Ford, Cesar Romero, Abby Lane and Frank Lovejoy. In true William Castle style, tho let it be known it wasn't always his fault, The Americano was met with a number of problems. Not least that after being afforded a considerable budget by RKO standards, they ran out of money half way thru. With most of the shoot being in the Matto Grosso jungle in Brazil, where it's believed that Budd Boetticher took control of the shoot, they had to hop tail it back to Hollywood where the project sat in limbo for months. By the time of the reconvene, original choice for the role of Teresa, Sara Montiel, had moved onto Warner Bros and was no longer available after having her RKO contract cancelled for the film. In came Abby Lane and all the scenes with Teresa in had to be re-shot.The plot sees Ford as Texas cowboy Sam Dent who agrees to take on a job of delivering prize Bulls to a mysterious buyer down near the Amazon in Brazil. However, when he gets there he finds that the man he was meant to meet has been murdered. Quickly making friends with Manuel (Romero), Dent finds that there is a range war going on and that bandits run rife in the area. Trying to stay neutral he finds that he may have to pick a side after all. Does he trust Manuel, a well known bandit by all accounts, be loyal to Bento Hermanny (Lovejoy) who has given him a roof over his head, or pitch in with the lovely Marianna Figuerido (Ursula Thiess) who he is starting to get sweet on? Either way it possibly spells trouble for him.Amiable, if over used, story that becomes watchable due to the efforts of Ford (as cool as ever) and Romero (who walks away with the movie), The Americano is clearly not the movie the makers set out to make. It was a bold move to make a Western down by the Amazon, not least because the locale should have made for rich pickings. But the problems off screen are up there on the screen. It's photographed by William E. Snyder (Creature from the Black Lagoon/Flying Leathernecks) and the locale is not utilised at all. Shot in Technicolor, the jungle sadly looks grey and almost ashen. There's a little bit of good lens work for a fire sequence, but the majority of it is very poor. They may as well have just built a cheap jungle set at the California base where the rest of the film was shot. The editing is bad and some scenes are blighted by basic errors, watch as Ford is hand tied on his horse one minute then rides an escape in free hand the next! Then there is the awful performance of Thiess, so bad it's obvious why she didn't go on to have a career in Hollywood. This in spite of Howard Hughes manfully fighting her corner.However, this is a film I wouldn't hesitate to recommend to my Western loving friends on proviso they don't expect too much. Ford and Romero are worth it, as is a couple of scenes such as a pitch fork fight and a dandy piranha dangle sequence. While for the boys Lane warbles and wobbles in a very engaging way. So a big case of not what it should have been, but not without its merits either, and certainly fun enough to adequately fill a couple of hours of undemanding time. 5.5/10

I've seen Westerns set in Mexico and Australia, but this is the first one I've seen set in Brazil. Which wouldn't have been so bad, but this was so far south of the border that it turned into an extended siesta. Considering the principals, especially the reliable Glenn Ford (I'd say always reliable, but not after seeing this one), one would expect a far more interesting story to complement the South American geography. Much more could have been done to define the rivalry between Bento Hermany (Frank Lovejoy) and the opposing homestead ranchers, among them the lovely landowner Marianna (Ursula Theiss). It's probably only the appearance of Manuel 'El Gato' (Cesar Romero) and the shimmy shimmy Teresa (Abbe Lane) that gives the picture any life at all. The truly unusual touch here would have to be all the Amazonian wildlife on display - alligators, anacondas, toucans, macaws, cockatiels, even a South American tapir. The early tease with the piranhas actually gets wasted later in the film when riders are shown crossing the river without resorting to the same ruse required earlier to distract the little buggers. I'd really like to be more positive about the film, but ultimately, I don't think I've ever seen a film before where there's so much going on that when it's over, you feel like nothing happened at all.

Set in Brazil, this story of a range war between farmers and ranchers and the man caught between them could easily have been set in Texas or Oklahoma just as well. In fact, after a while, one wishes for Charlotte Greenwood to come out and sing a verse of "The Farmer and the Cowman" to just call the whole thing off! Ford plays the owner of 3 prize bulls en route to Brazil to sell them for $25,000 (which he intends to use to buy a spread with his brother back home.) Upon arrival, he finds one man dead and a range war in full swing between slick, but imperious Lovejoy and fiery, yet attractive Thiess. It shouldn't be hard to figure out which one Ford will gravitate towards. He befriends the ne'er do well Romero, a local man who attracts trouble wherever he goes, and the two form a tenuous alliance in the midst of plenty of violence and reprisals. The vast jungles of Brazil are treated like some small town as the participants of this convoluted story seem to always be running into each other or popping up in just the right spot at just the right time for the story. Lots of stock jungle footage is spliced into the picture to add "flavor" to the tale, notably some shots of piranha devouring alligators. The color photography is sometimes striking and other times poor with noticeable differences in quality from shot to shot. Ford seems to be slumming here in a pedestrian and very minor film (directed by the later-to-be-notorious Castle.) Lovejoy is solid, but lacks the charisma to really sell his questionable character. Romero is hammy, but welcome, as his presence adds a little life to the often drab proceedings. Thiess, advertised at the time as "The Most Beautiful Girl in the World" is actually outshone by Lane as a "housekeeper" who looks like she spends more time on her make up and her tan than on scrubbing toilet bowls. She provides a blatantly superfluous musical number (conducted by her husband at the time, Xavier Cugat) in which she sashays around in an off-the-shoulder blouse, hips swinging, while local musicians replicate the musical quality of a major orchestra! Made at a time when America was nuts for all things Latin American (see also "The Naked Jungle" and even "The Opposite Sex"!), it's really just an Old West story penciled into a new setting (though Ford's blue denim jacket does stand out nicely against the lush greens of the jungle.) There's nothing particularly special about it, but fans of the cast might enjoy passing an hour and a half with it.

The idea of giving a South American location as transfusion to an old formula doesn't really change much in this transplanted "western". Texan cowboy Glen Ford is commissioned to deliver three prime Brahma bulls to a Brazilian rancher, Frank Lovejoy, who has dreams of "Empire" even if it means ridding the area of any farmers who disturb the landscape. Nothing here in the story to suggest good or new idea, but the presence of TWO screen beauties, Ursula Theiss and Abbe Lane, do make for an occasional worthwhile focus while we romp through a variety of predicaments in the jungles and farmland of some vivid color filming. I recommend you see it just for Ms. Lane's song/dance around the wilderness campfire. Out of nowhere the jungle trek peasant workers pull out musical instruments and play as if they just finished their training of five years at Julliard. Her virtuoso performance is enticing enough to keep Caesar Romero grinning and puts Glenn Ford in the mood for something else with Ms Theiss besides the three Brahma bulls he's been courting throughout the movie. Abbe's luscious good looks and body teasing actions are not quite equal to Maria Montez in "Cobra Woman", but definitely puts her on the remember chart. Nature lovers will appreciate the throw-in shots of alligators, Parana fish, leopards, giant snakes, monkeys, exotic birds and big bugs. I kept thinking Frank Buck must be somewhere in the supporting cast.In a Brazilian nutshell the whole doesn't come close to equaling a few parts, but it's worth a look if you like beautiful ladies, and don't mind a passive Glenn Ford who seems to want it all to end as soon as possible...Maximus