So what was it that made this filmmaker so influential? The answers lie in that original, 1966 Django<\/em> (currently streaming on several ad-supported streamers<\/a>, and out in a gorgeous new 4K Blu-ray from Arrow<\/a>). It is, per the opening titles, \u201cAn Italo-Spanish Co-Production,\u201d one of the many, many Spaghetti Western hustled into production after the astonishing success of Leone\u2019s A Fistful of Dollars<\/em>. The distaste for the subgenre articulated by DiCaprio\u2019s Dalton in Once Upon a Time <\/em>was not uncommon, particularly among those, like him, who had spent the careers making \u201ctraditional\u201d Westerns, white- and black-hat tales the whole family could enjoy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What Leone was doing to the genre, with his grime and grit and morally malleable antihero, was disreputable; what Corbucci was doing was the disreputable version of that, <\/em>sleazier and bloodier and nastier than even his friend Leone\u2019s reinvention. And the spirit of Corbucci\u2019s Westerns (particularly in later titles like The Great Silence <\/em>and The Specialists<\/em>) was darker \u2013 Leone\u2019s protagonist (played, memorably, by Clint Eastwood) is a rouge, but he also doesn\u2019t seem to go looking for trouble. Django does, and the picture is defined by the ruthless brutalism of all <\/em>of its characters (particularly its grotesque supporting players), which give the proceedings a semi-nihilist, Peckinpah-ish vibe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Like Leone, Corbucci is particularly skilled at playing up the charisma and cool of his leading man. We don\u2019t see Franco Nero\u2019s Django for the first few minutes of the picture; he enters with his back to camera, dragging (as he always will) a coffin, as the film\u2019s earworm of a theme song fills the speakers and blood red titles fill the frame. He stumbles upon a trio of Mexican renegades, whipping a local sex worker (or \u201cmuchacha\u201d) who \u201ctried to escape\u201d; she is rescued, but alas, it\u2019s by a group of Confederate rebels who have bad intentions of their own. Our hero saves her from that<\/em>, and she brings him back to her town as a thank-you, and we\u2019re off and running, with (like Fistful<\/em>) a Yojimbo<\/em>-inspired story of double-crosses and allegiances for hire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Italians were demystifying the Western well before the film brats of the 1970s, and not just in terms of morality and messaging. The mere aesthetics are different, partially because of the international locations, but also because they weren\u2019t shooting on long-standing, clean, studio backlot \u201cWestern Towns.\u201d The streets of this town are wet, muddy, and all but abandoned; watching our hero slog and slosh through them does not look like a good time, and the friendly barkeep informs him that it\u2019s not exactly a tourist destination: \u201cIf you\u2019re a coffin maker, you sure did pick a good town to settle in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n But what\u2019s most compelling \u2013 and probably influential \u2013 about Spaghetti Westerns is how they view their heroes. American Westerns of the era and before certainly didn\u2019t slouch when it came to romanticizing their leads, but filmmakers like Corbucci tested the validity of that perspective but applying that ultra-cool lens to men who were often outright amoral. And then, just to underline the point, they\u2019d amp those archetypes up into the realm of mythology. Django never <\/em>misses a shot, never wastes a bullet, and barely breaks a sweat, and Corbucci plays it like what it is: a juicy gag, a pre-Waco Kid wink, as his hero shoots vaguely in the direction<\/em> of a guy, and then said guy plus a couple more hit the deck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And yet, paradoxically, Django is also vulnerable. In the film\u2019s third act, he gets the absolute snot beaten out of him, his hands reduced to bloody mitts \u2013 and what\u2019s most shocking about the scene (aside from the savagery of the violence) is the realization that we\u2019d never see John Wayne get his ass handed to him in a movie, not like that<\/em>. But Corbucci knows how to write a character arc: when we see him struggling to use his pistolero in that considerably weakened position, it grants him a degree of sympathy he might not\u2019ve otherwise earned, and thus when he triumphs, it lands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s been a big spring for fans of Spaghetti Westerns, with Arrow\u2019s crackling 4K of Django<\/em> following KL Studio Classics\u2019 release of The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly<\/em> on the format a few weeks back, and there\u2019s something kind of delightful about these low-budget foreign genre movies getting the deluxe treatment and HD spit-polish. But these films play so well on 4K because the format is great for textures, and the textures of Spaghetti Westerns \u2013 both in landscapes and in faces \u2013 are so striking. And frankly, that goes for their storytelling as well. \u201cDjango\u201d is currently streaming on Tubi<\/a>, Vudu<\/a>, and Plex<\/a>, and available on 4K Blu-ray<\/a> from Arrow Video.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/django3-1024x620.jpg\")
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