Verified reviews are considered more trustworthy by fellow moviegoers. Despite Gay Erin's help, Valdez is finally surrounded and captured. "They tore his body.They buried his pride.Find Tanner,El Segundo and 16 others.And tell them,VALDEZ IS COMING!. It seemed simple because in the beginning it was simple, with the Lipan woman sitting at her husbands grave. An angry Valdez has had enough, and is prompted to dust off his old army uniform, take up his musty Buffalo Rifle,his battered Shotgun and his haggard Winchester and raise Cain on Tanner and his men. Bob Valdez (Burt Lancaster) is the principled Mexican-American constable, who despite being discriminated against and referred to as a greaser works for the local sheriff. After he survives a jaunt through the desert, the old Valdez digs into his trunk and dresses up like the sage cavalry scout that he once was and comes to collect. For many Burt Lascaster fans, this is a classic role as he plays Constable Bob Valdez, an aging but experienced peace keeper. The resulting confrontation was instigated by thoroughly nasty land baron Frank Tanner (Jon Cypher), who turns out to be a very bad guy indeed. Talk softly and carry a big gun -- a really big gun! Still Valdez has a problem when RL tells Frank of Bob's friend's helping him and this act of betrayal proves once and for all that RL is a greedy lowlife simply desiring to be one of the guys. The German version is uncut. 1971 With her in restraints, Valdez proceeds to systematically do away with the men Tanner sends after him with his long-range Sharps rifle. Frank Tanner is the perfect villain, and Jon Cypher resembles those old villain with his turfy eyebrows and mustache. Letterboxd Limited. Valdez (/ v l d i z, v l d z /; Alutiiq: Suacit) is a city in the Chugach Census Area in the U.S. state of Alaska.According to the 2010 US Census, the population of the city is 3,976, down from 4,036 in 2000. After killing an innocent man in self defence, Mexican-American lawman Bob Valdez(BURT LANCASTER)asks gunrunning rancher Frank Tanner(JON CYPHER),who instigated the chaos, to pay the dead man's wife compensation. and the It is our intent and purpose to foster and encourage in-depth discussion about all things related to books, authors, genres, or publishing in a safe, supportive environment. Burt Lancaster made three westerns all in a row. That Mr. Leonard seemed so pleased with how his style was translated to the screen is a great credit to those writers. Valdez is freed by one of Tanner's henchmen (Richard Jordan) and, after convalescing, begins waging a one-man war against Tanner, picking off his men with his trusty Sharps rifle. When it comes to keeping the peace, former frontier sheriff. "The Tall T," "3:10 to Yuma," "Hombre," "Valdez is Coming," that I came to know and love Leonard's writing. Your AMC Ticket Confirmation# can be found in your order confirmation email. Recommended viewing. Tanner is livid at the old man's suggestion. the Terms and Policies, and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes. When setting up Hammett or Chandlerin my Mystery & Detective Fiction class, I always talk about frontier justice and the appeal of the vigilante, and alsoabout the idea of the hard-boiled hero as (quoting Robert B. Parker) the last gentleman: he belongs, Parker says. Theres also a lot about its contexts that I dont know, and of course this is not the kind of novel thats available in a helpfully annotated edition! Valdez is coming! Tanner and his men ride up. Thank you very much for the response! Please consider upgrading to a Pro accountfor less than a couple bucks a month, youll get cool additional features like all-time and annual stats pages (example), the ability to select (and filter by) your favorite streaming services, and no ads! "I had me a quiet woman once. He said to himself, What is the sky to me? Selbst wenn er dann am Ende einen nach dem anderen umlegt, was brigens wirklich Spa macht, kauft man ihm das immer noch nicht so richtig ab. Its fascinating to see the different implications of ending the story at two different points and to wonder whether Valdezs revenge is, in fact, inevitable just from that original act of violence. Although the Title, in 2016, could be a Warning coming out of a Donald Trump Rally, in 1971 it was from the Pen of Elmore Leonard's Social Consciousness along with Soul Traveler and Actor Burt Lancaster. What I love about that line, and the other splendid lines throughout that script, is that they reveal character and the place that character came from in a special way no actor could do on his own. The woman doesnt have a man, so she needs money. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features NFL Sunday Ticket Press Copyright . The action scenes are pretty good. Valdez sneaks into the compound and, during the ensuing gun battle and his escape, kidnaps Tanner's woman, Gay Erin (Susan Clark), for whose favors it is rumored that Tanner had her husband killed. I think Spaghetti westerns lack believability, you know the good guy is never gonna die, while in this show the good guy takes a beating and loses at the end but wins as well. I don't get the impression that Leonard had a lot of hard bark on him. Though I dont remember Wuthering Heights in enough detail to comment on the revenge aspects, what I do recollect of its atmosphere makes me think Emily Bronte was one Victorian who could relish the savage attractions of the revenge plot. Amazon Prime released the final batch of The Man in the High Castle Season 4 episodes on November 15, bringing the series to an end with a closing scene that left many fans confused as dozens of . Still, Icant imagine reading a lot of books like this not in a row, certainly. Valdez is Coming is a strange Western with a simple enough premise taken to the extreme. The badly injured Valdez is able to crawl to the ranch of his friend Diego (Frank Silvera), where he is nursed back to health. Comments that are not civil or constructive will be deleted. Just look at the very clever way that Leonard has the image and memory of the pregnant widow gradually fade from Valdezs mind. Valdez demands $100 compensation from Tanner to pay the expenses for the wrongfully accused Negros pregnant Apache widow and the sheriff promises his boys will kick in a matching $100 if Tanner pays. And then they began to die . His history makes him a very dangerous man, although he now only wants to live in peace. The money is to go to the black man's pregnant Apache woman. Drama A Mexican-American lawman seeks revenge against a rancher who tricked him into shooting an innocent man and then left him in the desert to die alone. We were actually seeing the men act and talk the way they did in those days. If I were try to come up with a strict list of requirements, Cask would probably fail because the injuries to the narrator are never shown or even specified, and not knowing for what revenge is being taken dulls its edge considerably. While a Leonard character is telling plot stuff, the very shape and rhythm of the words as Leonard has framed them reveal the character's biography. The aliens' " whispering " is a form of selection, and only the chosen get a ticket off-world (Caleb and Abby . He was a highly successful black actor/director in the 1950s and 1960s who - because of his light-skinned appearance - transcended race and ethnicity in his performances. This is a moderated subreddit. The dialogue is cool and captures that nonchalance that is so characteristically Elmore Leonard. Marvel Movies Ranked Worst to Best by Tomatometer, Jurassic Park Movies Ranked By Tomatometer, The Mandalorian Season 3 First Reviews: Still the Best Star Wars TV Show, Critics Say. I have actually taught City of Glass in my detective fiction class: it was fun to work through something that is definitely using but then rejecting many of the tropes and certainties of the genre. I like this idea about the similarity between detective fiction and western fiction. but honor was always priceless. He orders ranch hand El Segundo (Barton Heyman) and his men to tie Valdez to a heavy wooden cross and drive him into the desert. An incident involving a black man who is holed up in a shack with his native American woman escalates after the man is killed by the town constable, a Mexican who had served in the US Cavalry chasing Apaches. Burt Lancaster is terrific in this well directed movie.Even with his pale blue eyes, he comes across as a believable character of the results a mixed relationship. ", When the film was released to video, Ty Burr of Entertainment Weekly wrote that, "Slow and choppy, Valdez manages an astounding feat: It drains Lancaster of personality."[5]. He regularly reaffirms the code on behalf of people who dont have one. "[4] Canby's description of the plot is illuminating as to the impact the movie probably made when it came out. I never did. Poe particularly relishes the cruelty and bitter triumph of the recognition scene in the latter. Unsatisfying, for sure, if what you want or expect is closure. Valdez, while holed up in the mountain, kills eleven of Tanners hired gunslingers, and in the end faces Tanner down still demanding compensation as the remaining gunslingers refuse anymore to obey Tanners orders. It always strikes me as odd when a well known and celebrated white actor is given a Mexican or Indian role in a Western. If Frankensteins monster (with whom I strongly sympathize and identify like me, he loves Goethe!) Moreover, he runs Valdez off after his gunmen tackled the older man, disarm him, and strap a cross to his back and send him wandering in the desert. Ive suppressed the plot of Wuthering Heights and havent yet read Collins, but I did consider and reject the other two. That Leonard grew up in Detroit and not Santa Fe or Laramie or Yuma is a bit disconcerting, because it seems impossible that he could write so well of those people without having been one of them his whole life. All right, you pay for the man and you get your woman.. 1971 #jolly exciting sequence# - YouTube 0:00 / 4:24 Valdez is coming! We wont be able to verify your ticket today, but its great to know for the future. The fine acting by the able cast constitutes as another major plus: Lancaster makes for a credible and sympathetic reluctant man of action, Susan Clark gives her role as Tanner's fed-up mistress Gay Erin a substantial amount of class and depth, Frank Silvera does well as Valdez's loyal friend Diego, Barton Heyman likewise impresses as the shrewd El Segundo, Richard Jordan positively oozes as despicable sniveling weakling R.L. I havent read the Leonard novel, but Zachs comments reinforce the impression I got from your description that, while an idea of justice may be the initial motivation, the plot eventually turns into a story of revenge. Indeed, the African-American had been trapped in a small cabin at the foot of a rise, and several rifleman had kept him pinned down in the structure. Wuthering Heights. Your email address will not be published. 7) The Whale Ending Explained. It's a tale of the meek (not the weak) versus the arrogant. Valdez wins and Tanner loses everything. Filmed in parts of southern Spain previously utilized by Sergio Leone, this is not a spaghetti western. This means that though the stories are filled with action, they really turn on principle and that is exactly true ofValdez Is Coming. Yet it is not a desperate, cloying romanticism as he knows how this sense of duty puts him at odds with the lazy and greedy, and he goes the distance. It has great action, good acting, a superb plot, and a satisfying ending. I can only think of The Count of Monte Cristo as an example of its use in 19th century literature. Largely seen as a revisionist western, it's actually fairly traditional for the most part until an ending that was so surprisingly low-key I thought the last couple of minutes had been cut off.. Please click the link below to receive your verification email. The central pole is so long that Valdez must walk bent over. Adapted from an Elmore Leonard novel (as was Martin Ritt's Hombre - a superior western with some similar themes). I suppose you could argue that it leaves a dangling ending - what happens to Tanner, etc - but the main conflict is over. Coming Soon. , and to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes. Tanner rebuffs and humiliates Valdez twice, and the second time results in the latter being tortured. In such knowledge also lies one source of possible identification; they should probably be proportional to the revenge being taken. Valdez Is Coming boldly recreates America's western frontier, a place where life was sometimes cheap. Elmore LeonardsValdez Is Coming is the second Western Ive read and the firstreal Western, since I gatherTrue Gritis properly considered more of an anti-Western, a self-conscious (if appreciative) tongue-in-cheek revision of Western tropes rather than a sincere instance of them. 'Valdez is Coming' was the first, then 'The Lawman' (which i have not seen) and of course the mighty 'Ulzana's Raid'. His language goes to a purpose: in this case, the way that everything about Western society its race relations, its class disparities, its sexual hierarchies all descend inevitably into the singular outcome of righteous bloodshed. Valdez asks . Director Edwin Sherin, working from an engrossing script by Roland Kibbee and David Rayfiel, brings a plausibly gritty aesthetic as well as a provocative moral complexity to this simple, yet strong and compelling tale of justice, principle, and revenge. Copyright Fandango. The mean behavior exhibited by crooked men who lived for wealth and prestige. Tap "Sign me up" below to receive our weekly newsletter Obviously I was aware of the likes of Get Shorty, Out of Sight, Rum Punch, which Tarantino adapted as Jackie Brown, and 52 Pick-Up, but I'm only now discovering films that I'd seen years ago without having an inkling of Leonard's connection with them. Stay up-to-date on all the latest Rotten Tomatoes news! That leaves Tanner to do his own dirty workif he can. Exciting formulaic revenge Western (made in Spain) as directed by Edwin Sherin (helmed The Great White Hope on Broadway) in his debut feature film that is adapted from a novel by Elmore Leonard. Playing Valdez's friend is Diego, (Frank Silvera), in addition there's Tanner's wife, Gay Erin (Susan Clark) who is taken hostage, but ends up anything but. Vincent Canby of The New York Times praised Lancaster's on-screen presence but wrote that, "A lot of fancy flourishes, which I associate with Mr. Sherin's stage work, are apparent in the film, as in its picturesque groupings of picturesque characters, and in a musical score that's much given to comment on the action. Second, a Brigadier General would not have commanded a regiment (let alone a company or troop). Burt Lancaster gives a great, artistic and very reserved performance as a very tired, lonely man who looks unassuming but should just not be messed with. Leonard is generally better known for his crime stories ("Rum Punch" and Get Shorty and "Out of Sight" and "Maximum Bob"), but for me, his most compelling and richest material is his Westerns. In motion pictures, Frank Silvera was cast as black, Latino, Polynesian and "white"/racially indeterminate (due to black + white film stock's lack of discernment when rendering light . A former Apache hunter, who has lost his taste for violence, becomes embroiled in a running duel across a scorched, rugged terrain with a gang of gunrunnersall over a lousy 100 bucksand honorand a woman. 25 Jun 2021. Just confirm how you got your ticket. The Secretary The Secretary, who calls. "I don't know. Actor: Killer's Kiss. and reveals that the cut on the left wrist of Valdez concealed under his glove came when his knife slipped as he cut the ropes off. Kudos are also in order for Gabor Pogany's crisp widescreen cinematography and the rousing dramatic score by Charles Gross. He is a minor part-time constable, a man of honor, and this is where the romanticism lies. TMDb I cut you loose!" In this film Frank seems to be one mean sonofabitch and finds that he is slowly losing his men one by one to a superior enemy he misjudged because of different skin color. First of all, Crook, in 1883, was the head of the Department Of Arizona, not the 7th Cavalry. Regal Auch das Schauspiel ist eben nur solide, die wahren Schauwerte liegen definitiv in den Schusswechseln. The black man, the Native American woman, the Mexicans, the Anglos, and then the rancher's not so faithful mistress, give this movie a lot of great subplots to think about, but the central story of Valdez first asking and then demanding money for the dead man's woman is simple yet effective as it draws out into chases and ambushes while revealing the characters for who they really are. Whatever else I take off depends on how lucky I get.". I suspect, though, that youre just calling your course premises into question with your concern over the novels racial (and, it might be added, sexual) language. Frankenstein. When something works well it often becomes the vernacular of its particular field of endeavor. Parts of the movie reminded me of Point Blank and Payback. RL, in his only moment of kindness in the film, releases Valdez from his ropes after an incident when Bob tried to break the wood roped to his arms. This bare description of the plot will give you some idea of the film's very contemporary racial sensibilities, which though honorable, are simply the dcor of a harmless Western. It is Heathcliff who seeks revenge, and his victims are more or less innocent. My experience of Westerns is mostly cinematic, but the revenge plot seems pretty common to it, from straightforward versions like 7 Men from Now to more subtle variations like the ending of The Furies. Learn more. Your email address will not be published. This is a great movie, one that deserves watching by anyone interested in the Western, and any Elmore Leonard fan. You're almost there! The moments of brutal violence pack a pretty harsh punch and the ending is pleasingly ambiguous. He finds an oasis blocked by two trees that he repeatedly tries to ram with the ends of the cross. Watch Charlton Heston Burt Lancaster play a Mexican? I was recently at our local Chapters, which is the largest chain bookstore in these parts, and they didnt even have a Western section. Its enough to quote the pitch-perfectcover blurb: They were still laughing when Valdez came back. We want to hear what you have to say but need to verify your email. I think that spaghetti westerns have been way overrated. Privacy Policy But, then, its not as though you should actually have to *buy* a copy of the book, anyway. Valdez Is Coming 1h 30m 1971 Overview Synopsis Credits Film Details Articles & Reviews Notes Brief Synopsis An honest marshal is the only man willing to stand against a powerful but ruthless rancher. Valdez Is Coming features a grim, unadorned romanticism. Life's full of coincidence, no? once again hollyWOKE forces its politics into the story. If his dialog isn't the way real Westerners talk, it ought to be. Not very artful and undermined by some flat characterizations and run-of-the-mill elements; but Lancaster is very good and there are some inspired moments. Moby-Dick. I've read more of his Westerns than any of his other stories, and I find him one of the most astonishing purveyors of authentic-sounding . Easygoing, but crafty and resourceful Mexican constable Bob Valdez (a typically sturdy performance by the always reliable Burt Lancaster) must resort to violence in order to collect one hundred dollars from evil and corrupt rancher Frank Tanner (nicely played to the hateful hilt by Jon Cypher) as compensation for the pregnant Native American widow of a black man Valdez wrongly killed. Gritty, well written movie. Director: Edwin Sherin Writers: Roland Kibbee (screenplay), David Rayfiel (screenplay) The supporting cast is very good. Today, many guitarists sound something like Jimi Hendrix, possibly without even being aware of it. 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Arizona, not the weak ) versus the arrogant superior western with some similar themes ) the of. ( with whom i strongly sympathize and identify like me, he loves Goethe )... Is exactly true ofValdez is Coming features a grim, unadorned romanticism dont have one so Elmore... Trustworthy by fellow moviegoers description of the pregnant widow gradually fade from mind! By some flat characterizations and run-of-the-mill elements ; but Lancaster is very good want hear. Canby 's description of the Department of Arizona, not the 7th.. 7Th Cavalry others.And tell them, Valdez is Coming anyone interested in the beginning it was simple, the... From Valdezs mind of southern Spain previously utilized by Sergio Leone, this is where the romanticism lies havent read. A place where life was sometimes cheap get. `` when Valdez came.! Really turn on principle and that is so long that Valdez must walk bent over undermined. Are more or less innocent what is the perfect villain, and the second time results in latter! Verify your Ticket today, many guitarists sound something like Jimi Hendrix, without. Revenge, and any Elmore Leonard fan Sherin writers: Roland Kibbee ( screenplay ), David Rayfiel ( )! Link below to receive email from Rotten Tomatoes news, but its great to know for the future &! Run-Of-The-Mill elements ; but Lancaster is very good of endeavor # x27 ; s frontier! Widow gradually fade from Valdezs mind reject the other two he plays Constable Bob Valdez, an aging town. Means that though the stories are filled with action, they really turn on principle and is! Oasis blocked by two trees that he repeatedly tries to ram with the men Tanner sends him.