Review by Roger Carpenter
With the huge popularity of the Leone-Eastwood spaghetti westerns featuring Eastwood’s iconic The Man with No Name character, it was inevitable that other characters would be rolled out to cash in on the craze. Django, Trinity, Ringo, and Sabata all had series of their own. But perhaps the most popular spaghetti western character after The Man with No Name is Sartana.
And, much like Django, there were both official and unofficial sequels to the Sartana films. These unofficial “sequels” bore no real resemblance to the original Sartana films other than tacking the name Sartana onto the title in an effort to cash in on the popularity of the character. Arrow is now releasing, in one complete, deluxe box set the five official films in the Sartana series.
The basis of the Sartana character actually derives from a completely different spaghetti western that had huge box office in Germany in 1967. The film, Blood at Sundown, included genre character actor Gianni Garko as Sartana and was retitled Sartana for German distribution. The filmed proved to be so popular that Garko and producer Aldo Addobbatti retooled the character to become a hero—he was a bad guy in Blood at Sundown–before releasing the first Sartana film.
Similar to Eastwood’s iconic poncho in the Leone westerns, Sartana wears a black cape lined in red. Some viewers have noted a similarity with Dracula’s cape in numerous vampire films. And, just as Eastwood was rarely seen without the poncho and a cigarette, Sartana is rarely seen without his black suit, cape, and cigarillo. Another similarity between these two characters is their ability to be clever enough to play different groups against each other, thereby clearing out nearly everyone the characters would typically have been forced to deal with in order to obtain what they desired (here you may insert money, gold, treasure maps, etc.).
But that’s really where the similarities end. While the Leone westerns were more serious in tone and a bit more violent, the quintet of Sartana films are played much more broadly and are lighter in tone. And, while the body count in each series is relatively high, the vast majority of deaths in the Sartana collection occur in classic American western fashion: a shot or two, someone grabs their chest, and the character falls bloodlessly to the ground. In fact, these films insert quite a bit more comedic elements than your typical “serious” western To be sure, these aren’t comedies in the vein of the Trinity films, starring the comedy duo of Terence Hill and Bud Spencer. Rather, they are fantasy-westerns infused with some comedy—they aren’t meant to be taken too seriously. Some viewers have noted the more fantastical elements of these films can be bothersome to more serious viewers who pay attention to such things as continuity and geography during viewing. Sartana routinely appears from locations he couldn’t possibly have been, seemingly dissolving into thin air and reappearing in a location completely opposite of where he had originally been. Indeed, at least one character calls him out: “Do you ever enter a room through the door?” he says as Sartana climbs through a window. Sartana also seemingly possesses an otherworldly sense of detection akin to that of Sherlock Holmes himself. He’s able to tease out facts where there really aren’t facts and he’s also able to put isolated bits of information together that leaves the viewer confused. In fact, I had to laugh out loud during the finale of the final film when everyone stands around a room so Sartana can explain how he discovered the missing gold. The explanation was so confusing yet all the characters were so agreeable, I was both completely lost and cackling with laughter at the absurdity of it all.
Sartana has other superpowers as well. He is certainly a man of many, many talents, including being the first (only?) screen character in the history of cinema who can use playing cards as instruments of death, similar to a throwing star in Asian action flicks. He’s so good he can actually throw a card at 20 paces, split the pages of a bible, and actually mark the page with the biblical quote he just used. Incredible. But we aren’t done—not by a long shot. Sartana is such an excellent shot he can kill a man with a rifle slung upside down over his shoulder while walking away from the other person. He is such a good shot he can shoot off the burning fuse on a stick of dynamite…or start a fuse burning, if he desires. And no good screen icon can be without some totally original weapons of his own. Sartana’s weapon of choice, which he keeps hidden in his jacket sleeve, is a small, four-shot revolver. But he uses the aforementioned deck of playing cards, knives, a pipe organ with cannons and a machine gun, and even…a robot. Yep, a robot. I am not kidding.
All this film craziness adds up to pure escapism and fun. If Leone’s westerns are for high-minded cowboy connoisseurs, the Sartana films are the equivalent of drive-in junk food. But they are a great deal of fun and just tremendously enjoyable.
In If You Meet Sartana…Pray for Your Death (1968), Sartana plays rival gangs and crooked bankers against each other for a stagecoach full of gold. In I am Sartana, Your Angel of Death (1969), Sartana is framed for a bank robbery and must locate the real culprits before he hangs. The last three installments, all made and released in 1970, include Sartana’s Here…ere Trade Your Pistol for a Coffin, in which Sartana is hired to protect a shipment of gold, which he must defend from an old enemy who’s just arrived in town; Have a Good Funeral My Friend…Sartana Will Pay sees Sartana playing detective when he must solve a murder to discover why everyone wants to buy up the victim’s land; and the final installment, Light the Fuse…Sartana is Coming, in which Sartana is again seeking a large cache of gold as well as millions of dollars in counterfeit bills.
While Gianni Garko originated the character and played the titular role in four of the five films, veteran genre actor George Hilton sat in for Garko in the third installment. Both actors are good in the role, but Garko is most identified as Sartana and is the fan favorite. The films are populated by a host of well-known character actors from Italy and around Europe and America, including several special appearances by Klaus Kinski, as well as Charles Southwood, William Berger, Sydney Chaplin (Charlie’s son), Sal Borgese, Nieves Navarro, Daniela Giordano, Helga Line, Erika Blanc, and many others. Veteran spaghetti western director Gianfranco Parolini (as Frank Kramer) directed the first installment (he also directed the Sabata series) while Giuliano Carnimeo, as Anthony Ascott, directed the rest. You may know him from his directing turns for The Case of the Bloody Iris and Exterminators of the Year 3000.
So, while we all love to eat steak, sometimes you just get a hankering for a big ol’ greasy burger…and the Sartana series is the greasy burger to Leone’s—and Corbucci’s—spaghetti westerns. They may not always make perfect sense but they sure are fun. This is a limited edition (2500 copies) set, all Blu-Rays, and all 2K restorations. The films themselves are beautiful to look at and the sound is great as well.
This splendid box set comes packed with extra features, including audio commentaries for three of the films, tons of interviews, video essays, galleries, and a collector’s booklet with new writing by Roberto Curti and a spaghetti western timeline. All told, these extras have a running time that exceeds the collective running time of all five films, so there are literally hours of special features, if that’s your thing.
You can purchase the film directly from Arrow Video at http://www.arrowfilms.co.uk/category/usa/ or from Amazon.
