A gang of cattle thieves rescue a criminal from the gallows, and later rob a stagecoach loaded with gold. When they get the loot, he is betrayed and left dying in the middle of the desert. In the escape they reach a mysterious ghost town, where they perceive there is something strange about ...
Similar titles
You May Also Like
Reviews
You won't be disappointed!
Great movie! If you want to be entertained and have a few good laughs, see this movie. The music is also very good,
The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.
Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.
If you get the American DVD of this movie, you'll see on the back of the box that the manufacturer states that MATALO! is "...perhaps the strangest spaghetti western ever made and an exercise in style over content." To put it mildly! This movie seems to have been directed by an insane mind. There were a few things I liked about it. There are some striking images (the sun shining in the camera, a priest being surrounded by a ring of riders, etc.), and the electronic score by Mario Migliardi is very memorable with its electronic tones (including electric guitars) and traditional spaghetti western tones such as bells. The boomerang climax is also memorable.Unfortunately, despite a few good elements like these, I didn't overall care for this movie - and I usually like spaghetti westerns. The movie is very slow-moving, and the characters mostly act alike (and are also mostly confusing in their plans and schemes). Frankly, I was exhausted by the end by the movie's relying on flashy camera movements to cover up that nothing much was happening. Even if you are a spaghetti western lover like I am, you would be better off rewatching one of your favorite spaghetti westerns than take a look at this.
Six years after Sergio Leone's A Fist Full of Dollars created the term "spaghetti western" and the passing of the San Fransisco acid wave of the 60's, someone thought it would be a good idea to combine the two. It would be a showcase for the international talents of Bolivian born actor Lou Castel, Argentinian actor Luis Davila (a.k.a - Luis Devil), Zaire born actress Claudia Gravy, the Italian Corrado Pani and directed by Cesare Canevari. For those familiar with the sultry naiveté of Emmanuelle, Canevari was the director of the first. If you haven't guessed so far, this is all a recipe for disaster.Speaking with "J" (a friend and I don't mean the John Malkovich currently residing inside of Will Smith) about my reviews, he suggested I should make them my own somehow. I thought I had already done that, but it got me to thinking. I'm not sure if anyone has used this concept before, but here goes. I could rate movies based on a "shot scale". That would be the amount of shots required to enjoy or completely forget about the movie in question. It would only be in use for what I consider to be bad movies (also includes the "good-bad"). So for example, Matalo would require me to down 7 shots of Jagermeister, SoCo (minus lime) or Gentleman Jim D (or a combination of all 3 that would total 7 shots still). So the higher the "shot count", the worse the movie (inverse order to the normal scale). Now back to Matalo.The whole plot of the movie revolves loosely around the heist of a United States official luggage from a stagecoach in the middle of the desert. We don't get to this point until about 1/2 way through the movie, however. The main character loves the smell of gunpowder, money and women. From the predictable "gore" introduction, I was getting an uneasy feeling in my gut and it wasn't because of the two shots I had quickly guzzled. The "gore" is quite light (even by 1970 standards) and seems almost melodramatically over-theatrical. For an action western, the action is as lively as the ghost town backdrop ; squeaky, rundown, dusty, but with lots of water. I have never seen the desert and water concept/metaphor driven this much into the ground, yet with as little emotion (or sweat) as possible. The director was obviously very influenced by Chappaqua and other "psychedelic" films, as he over uses their effects ad nauseam (literally sometimes). I mean how many times can we show spinning, Outer Limit's tilted framings, and close-ups of thespians with goofy expressions? This is a poor, drunk, blind and deaf man's version of El Topo. It's an Italian import, but definitely not a Ferrari.90 minutes of that, mixed in with bare-bones dialog and acting (the dialog and acting in this movie share a border with pantomime) is too long I think. The plot could help, right? Not really. Characters coming out of the desert can't help this one, either. The acid rock soundtrack is actually not too bad, however, it is metaphorically alone in the desert with no water. I felt like I was watching Sergio Leone's evil hack clone remaking Tell Your Children (Reefer Madness) for posterity. It's really a smelly, decaying carcass that one million boomerangs cannot save, but it is still in the desert. If you're going to go there, bring the essentials (drugs/alcohol and a gun to shoot yourself afterwards). If you heed my advice, seek Django.
Fans of bizarre semi-psychedelic Westerns like "Keoma" should check this out. The cinematography and editing are wonderfully out of control, lotsa slo-mo sadistic violence and the movie is drenched in loud fuzzy acid rock. The simple plot deals with four ruthless thugs (incl. one ultra sexy but deadly femme fatale Claudia Gravy), gold, lust, murder and betrayal. These eccentric hardass Italian Westerns look way better than most contempoary movies.
i LIKE MOVIES THAT MAKE ME STRANGE SENSATION!According to Mereghetti's dictionary of movies, this western is "as a Leone at last in mescalina" and with some moments that reminds Monte Hellman's movies for the use of the empty moments. This movie seems to me an august nightmare, with the hot, the desolation and the wonderful state of madness that characterized the end of the summer. Also notable is the score of Mario Mingardi, a mix of Jimi Hendrix and Luciano Berio, with electronics that supplies dialogues. I think that in western there is nothing like the duel of Matalo, a pistol against boomerangs! Recommended for all who like strange movies in the heart of the night with a little drop of alcohol or something else!