The Four of the Apocalypse... (1975)

Four petty criminals, three men and a woman, wander through the trackless terrain of the Wild West Utah and are hounded by a sadistic bandit.

Director:

Lucio Fulci

Writers:

Ennio De Concini (adapted for the screen by), Bret Harte (stories) (as Francis Brett Harte, Brett Harte)

Stars:

Fabio Testi, Lynne Frederick, Michael J. Pollard

Cast

Cast overview:
Fabio Testi	...	Stubby Preston
Lynne Frederick	...	Emanuelle 'Bunny' O'Neill
Michael J. Pollard	...	Clem
Harry Baird	...	Bud
Tomas Milian	...	Chaco
Adolfo Lastretti	...	Rev. Sullivan
Bruno Corazzari	...	Lemmy
Giorgio Trestini	...	Saul
Donald O'Brien	...	Sheriff of Salt Flat

Storyline

Follows the adventures and travels of four petty criminals in 1873 Utah whom include gambler and swindler Stubby Preston, pregnant prostitute Bunny O'Neal, drunkard Clem, and a mental disturbed man, named Bud, who's obsessed with the dead. The quartet travel aimlessly through the Utah Badlands looking for food, water and people to swindle, while they are harassed by a villanous Mexican bandit, named Chaco, whom Stubby vows revenge after the bandito sexually assaults Bunny.

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Plot Keywords:

topless female nudity | italo western | pregnant prostitute | revenge | gambler | 

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Genres:

Fantasy | Western

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Certificate:

Unrated

Did You Know?

Trivia

The film is loosely based on two short stories by Bret Harte, "The Luck of Roaring Camp" and "The Outcasts of Poker Flat". Fabio Testi's character, Stubby, is the "John Oakhurst" character from "The Outcasts of Poker Flats", and Lynne Frederick's "Bunny" is named "Duchess" in the original story. The outlaw Chaco, played by Tomas Milian, was not in either short story, and the action in the film is considerably more violent than in the stories.

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Goofs

The opening narration states that the story is set in 1873. However, when Bud is wandering through the cemetery, reading tombstones aloud, he says, "Mary Donahue, died in childbirth, February 1884."

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Quotes

Chaco: Chaco is the name my friend, and I would be very happy to join your group.
Stubby Preston: Nobody invited you.
Chaco: But I did. I'm a damn good hunter you know. Wherever you go you'll have a piece of meat every day.

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Alternate Versions

The original US release cut the most graphic moments from a scene in which Tomas Milian cuts some skin off of a man's stomach, as well as cutting some dialogue from the climactic scene in which Milian taunts Fabio Testi about Milian's earlier rape of Lynne Frederick. Both scenes have been restored in Anchor Bay's recent DVD release. However, because neither scene was ever dubbed into English for the original release, these scenes are in Italian with English subtitles.

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Connections

Referenced in Cannibal Holocaust (1980)

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Soundtracks

Movin' On
Music by Franco Bixio, Fabio Frizzi, & Vince Tempera
Words by Rink Greenfield & Peter Cook
Sung by Rink Greenfield (as Greenfield) & Peter Cook (as Cook) and Benjamin Franklin Group

User Reviews

A Little Bit Of Gore & Not Much More.

A Card shark, a mad slave, the town drunk & a pregnant prostitute escape a town massacre only to find themselves at the mercy of sadistic bandit Chaco.

Directed by Lucio Fulci a familiar name to fans of Italian horror movies this is a Spaghetti Western made at the tail end of the genres lifespan & it shows. The premise is intriguing & on paper the characters are interesting, particularly the transformation of the central protagonist gambler Stubby Preston, but in execution it is not so good.

Most of the acting is as flat as the direction which slows the pace right down as do the bizarre kitsch musical interludes. There is nothing wrong with a slow pace but this film almost comes to a stop. The highlights are few & far between with the excellent Tomas Milian woefully underused as is the great American character actor Michael J Pollard & the remaining cast are left with little to work with. Of the highlights are the notorious torture scenes which have a strong sadistic streak much like the excellent Django & the results of where the protagonists food came from in a rainsoaked ghost town.

Unfortunately this film appears to have been made by a director who is not familiar with Westerns. Sometimes this can be good breathing fresh live into a stale genre but here it just emphasizes the inadequacies of the film. As mentioned the Spaghetti Western was on its way out in the seventies, its short but excellent international heyday being the mid to late sixties. Four Of The Apocalypse highlights the way in which a lack of imagination was compensated for by just making the films more violent. This is a shame, the film could have been great if more attention was placed upon the script & acting.

In closing Four Of The Apocalypse has an interesting movie hidden somewhere in the script if only one of the masters of the genre such as Leone or Corbucci had been given the material to work their magic on.

Details

Country:

Italy

Language:

Italian

Release Date:

12 August 1975 (Italy)

Also Known As:

The Four of the Apocalypse...

Filming Locations:

Cinecittà Studios, Cinecittà, Rome, Lazio, Italy

Company Credits

Production Co:

Coralta Cinematografica

Technical Specs

Runtime:

104 min (uncut)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technospes)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1