Django (1966)

User Rating:

7.3/10   

Director:

Sergio Corbucci

Writers:

Sergio Corbucci (story) and
Bruno Corbucci (story) ...

Release Date:

December 1966 (USA)

Genre:

Western

Tagline:

The movie that spawned a genre.

Plot:

A coffin-dragging gunslinger enters a town caught between two feuding factions, the KKK and a gang of Mexican Bandits, and is caught up in a struggle against them.

Plot Keywords:

Bandit | Coffin | Gold | Saloon | Machine Gun

Cast

Franco Nero	...	Django
José Bódalo	...	Gen. Hugo Rodriguez
Loredana Nusciak	...	Maria
Ángel Álvarez	...	Nataniele (Bartender)
Gino Pernice	...	Brother Jonathan (as Jimmy Douglas)
Simón Arriaga	...	Miguel
Giovanni Ivan Scratuglia	...	Klan member (as Ivan Scratuglia)
Remo De Angelis		(as Erik Schippers)
Rafael Albaicín	...	Member of Hugo's gang (as Raphael Albaicin)
José Canalejas	...	Member of Hugo's gang (as José Canalecas)
Eduardo Fajardo	...	Maj. Jackson
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Cris Huerta	...	Mexican officer

Also Known As:

Django (Spain)
Jango (USA) (dubbed version)

Runtime:

Spain:87 min (censored version) | USA:91 min | Italy:93 min | West Germany:88 min (censored version)

Country:

Italy | Spain

Language:

Italian

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Singapore:PG | Iceland:16 | Norway:(Banned) (theatrical rating) (1968) | UK:15 (video rating: 2004) | UK:18 (video rating) (1993) | UK:R (original rating) | Canada:13+ (Quebec) | West Germany:18 (nf) | Brazil:16 (re-rating) | Brazil:18 (Original rating) | Argentina:13 | UK:(Banned) (1966) | France:U (1966, uncut) | Italy:VM18 | Finland:(Banned) (1968) | Finland:K-16 | Sweden:(Banned) | USA:Unrated | Australia:M

Filming Locations:

Colmenar Viejo, Madrid, Spain

Company:

B.R.C. Produzione S.r.l.

Trivia:

The graphic violent content of the film led the film to be banned in several countries, and it was rejected by the UK until 1993. It was not rated in the USA.

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: When Django first brings out the machine gun and it begins firing, his fingers are nowhere near the trigger mechanism (the gun was probably activated electronically by the special effects crew).

Quotes:

Nataniele: I sure never thought I'd end up grave-digging and not even getting paid for it, either. Anyhow, it's better to be above ground doing that than below ground doing nothing.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Indio Black, sai che ti dico: Sei un gran figlio di... (1971)

Soundtrack:

Django

Mystical central figure

At least in Europe, this other spaghetti western variation of Kurosawa's Yojimbo was probably even more influential than the film that created the genre, A Fistful of Dollars, with countless imitations, rip-offs, sequels, remakes. The title hero is again very different from traditional Western heroes, but this time he is a much more mystical (almost religious) figure than even the man with no name, and the places he goes to are even dirtier and more desperate and downtrodden than any place we would find in a Leone Western.

The impressive opening sequence shows Django dragging a coffin behind him through a muddy and featureless landscape, accompanied by Bacalov's title song (not Morricone, for a change), heading for his first battle. The coffin, his dark coat, and the mystique around him make him appear like an angel of death, invoking associations with the Red Death character in Roger Corman's Masque of the Red Death. Django is not quite as untouchable and supernatural, but the body count in his trace is comparable.