THE PROUD AND THE DAMNED is an odd, zero-budget western that was filmed in Colombia. That novelty value is about the only thing this has going for it as otherwise it's a completely routine oater that feels like a low-budget, low-effort riff on THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN. The storyline involves a group of rather dull mercenary types who hole up in a small village during a revolution and soon find themselves getting involved in the action.Although there's plentiful action in this movie, none of it is very good. It doesn't help matters much that the quality of the print I saw was absolutely pitiful, one of the worst-looking westerns ever. The Colombian locations are effective but the direction is very poor and this feels like an old 1930s-era film rather than a '70s movie. Chuck Connors and Cesar Romero co-star.

Chuck Conners (who's always great) leads his group of good old rebels all the way to South America, into a nameless country where they're paid by a tyrannical general (and Charles Manson lookalike) to go to a rival town and report back whether or not the place will roll over easily if invaded.Once there, they realize the place is quite peaceful and defenseless, tempting some of Conner's men to stay.This is low-budget but well made with good locations, though it's soon hijacked by a silly subplot involving one of Chuck's nitwit boys becoming lovesick (after a minute or so) over a local girl, despite the fact that neither of them speak each other's languages!To further ruin things, Chuck Conner's is then banished from the town by mayor Caesar Romero due to a second silly subplot involving a gypsy girl and then promptly hung by the evil general! Did his contract run out before shooting ended?!This is well directed throughout but the final battle between the towns is poorly staged and not worth seeing since Chuck got killed!

The Proud and the Damned is an historical-fiction western starring Chuck Conners and a relatively unknown, but not bad, cast. The film appears to have been filmed in the Chihuahuan Desert, though the setting is inexplicably identified as South America early-on.Conners leads a group of refugee confederate soldiers traveling through a country in the middle of its own civil war. Apparently, Conners' boys have taken a few odd jobs as mercenaries en-route, and both sides in the present conflict want their help.The film is essentially an American-made spaghetti-western, without the plot convolutions and tension (or Clint Eastwood) that made this genre so interesting. About mid-way through the story, the film meanders and seems fated to fizzle into oblivion rather than going out with a bang, but it does eventually wander back to its track. The script is occasionally bloated, but not bad. Once in a while, the film actually presents some interesting anthropological points. The acting is surprisingly OK. And the sets, scenery and cinematography are good.It won't kill you. This is a much more entertaining western than I had anticipated. However, I will limit my recommendation to fans of western movies.

"The Proud and The Damned" is a western that should be seen by any big western fan. You know the good guys from the bad guys by the way the dress (Good guys wear different clothes and the bad guys wear a funny-looking blue uniform with a red scarf around their necks). This film should have won an award for "best costume design" because every time i saw the bad guys running around in those unique, blue, western leisure suits, I laughed my head off and was immediately blown away with the artistic talent and creative efforts in thinking of those uniforms. We all know mexicans didn't wear those kind of clothes. The film has it's "shoot-outs" with cannons, it's original dialogue ("Hey Will, do you think they'll be waiting for us over by that hill of mud?...."You bet your tail!"), and it's daring anti-climax (The good guys lose) that makes it a very realistic piece of american/mexican cinema. Watch for Cesar Romero's final scene as he demands that Chuck Connors pays for the food that he and his men has eaten in a mexican whorehouse....( Cesar Romero)- "Pay for your food mister!" (Chuck Connors) - "The women and the sex we pay for but the food's free, Mr. Mayor cuase I say so." Marvelous