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Navajo Joe, Kill Bill, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood...and Election

posted 4 years ago by ecarle (14979)
4 replies | jump to latest

Years ago in the 70s when he finally became a superstar, Burt Reynolds used to make hay on talk shows making fun of his own early career.

And he really liked to pick on "Navajo Joe" (1966) -- HIS spaghetti Western. The hook for his mockery was that he thought he was making a movie with Sergio LEONE(Clint's mentor on the Dollars trilogy) but ended up with "The Wrong Sergio" -- Sergio Corbucci. Burt also made fun of how he wore a "fright wig" in the movie, and how it "was only shown on airplanes and in prisons, so nobody could leave."

What Burt couldn't know back in the 70's is that in the 90's, a writer-director-film freak named Quentin Tarantino would hit the scene in a huge, influential way. And QT LOVED Sergio Corbucci -- thought he was one of the greats, right along with Leone. And QT LOVED Navajo Joe.

Most importantly...and I guess Burt didn't know this either -- but Navajo Joe had a score by the great Ennio Morricone -- except he used an American alias: "Leo Nichols"

Because...decades later...key part of the Morricone score ended up in QT's "KIll Bill"(2003 and 2004) AND in Alexander Payne's "Election"(1999.) Indeed, it looks like Payne got there first, yes?

Payne's sample from Navajo Joe for "Election" was this blood-curdling "war cry with music" that came up on the soundtrack anytime over-ambitious school politican Tracey Flick(Reese Witherspoon) went into a rage about the actions of her rivals.

"Kill Bill" went for another musical motif from Navajo Joe -- an excruciatingly long(overlong) build up to action as high notes and low screeches built...and built..and built...to action(in Kill Bill, the climactic trailer fight between Uma Thurman and Darryl Hannah; in Navajo Joe, an opening showdown between Burt Reynolds and two men sent to kill him in the desert.)

Finally: take a look at the poster on this page for Navajo Joe. It is copied for the poster from a "Rick Dalton movie" that stands mounted outdoors in the drive-way of Rick's home in "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood" (2019.) Leo DiCaprio plays Rick in the movie and on the poster.

So that's a lot of mileage for Navajo Joe. Burt Reynolds himself signed on to be IN "Once Upon a Time In Hollywood" but died before he could film his cameo as George Spahn, owner of the ranch where the Mansons hung out.

I'll bet Burt and QT had a great, long talk about "Navajo Joe."

PS. I've seen "Navajo Joe" and I agree with one poster who said: "its far from Burt's worst." Indeed. His looks and charisma are clearly there -- but not his humor. Its not allowed. Burt spends the movie killing a lot of people in a rampage of righteous revenge for killing his woman. Fernando Rey is in it -- he of The French Connection and Bunuel to come. The female lead is gorgeous as are two other women who get to play sexy comic relief.

[–] christomacin (4655) 4 years ago

It's a pretty good Spaghetti Western. I've always liked it. However, I don't agree with Tarantino that Corbucci is as a good a Sergio as Leone. He made too many of them too quickly and too cheaply and his direction lack any distinguishing features that set him apart from other directors. He was all over the place stylistically and in terms of quality in those 7 or so years between 1966 and 1972. The Great Silence is generally considered Corbucci's best western, however it is marred by very cheap production values and crude direction. The Mercenary is loud and head-ache inducing but has a fun pulpy attitude. My personal favorites by Corbucci are Django, Navajo Joe and The Hellbenders. His movies are pure pulp and have no real poetry. None of them are as good as A Fistful of Dollars, let alone GBU or OUATITW.

Django (1966)
Ringo and his Golden Pistol (Johnny Oro, 1966)
Navajo Joe (1966)
The Hellbenders (1967)
The Mercenary (1968)
The Great Silence (1968)
The Specialists (1969)
Compañeros (1970)
Sonny and Jed (1972)
What Am I Doing in the Middle of the Revolution? (1972)

Another Sergio, Sergio Sollima, only made three Spaghetti westerns ("The Big Gundown", "Face to Face", and "Run, Man Run"), but was a much better and more distinctive director. Sollima's post-western career in the 70s was interesting (Violent City, Devil in the Brain, and Revolver) while Corbucci dropped off the radar.

[–] Mrmojo4700 (21460) 4 years ago

Thank you for this detailed post. I haven’t heard of Devil in the Brain but will be searching it out now.

[–] Jones70 (6534) 4 years ago

I thought this was a really good western especially toward the end.

[–] swanstep (2715) 3 years ago

"Kill Bill" went for another musical motif from Navajo Joe -- an excruciatingly long(overlong) build up to action as high notes and low screeches built...and built..and built...to action(in Kill Bill, the climactic trailer fight between Uma Thurman and Darryl Hannah; in Navajo Joe, an opening showdown between Burt Reynolds and two men sent to kill him in the desert.)

The same NJ music is also used at the very beginning of KB V2, i.e., over the Miramax Logo, through the opening credits, and continuing over Uma's B&W process-screen driving monologue that opens the movie proper, *and* at the very end of KB V2 from the moment Beatrix Kiddo executes her 5 finger exploding heart trick to the moment when Bill finally collapses. In this way Navajo Joe *is* the controlling musical spirit of KB V2 (KB V1 doesn't have a single musical element that functions in this way). Say what you want about Tarantino (I'd give NJ about 3/10 myself - the most shoddily put together, amateurish Corbucci movie I've seen.), but the guy commits 100% to his own formed-in-childhood taste.

Somewhat relatedly, I've gap-filled quite a bit from relatively undistinguished '60s films recently, i.e., including Navajo Joe. It really can't be overstated what an advantage Morricone's score affords NJ. Without it, the film would be quite unmemorable I think, whereas no kid ever forgot Morricone's earworm score. Give indifferent, largely forgotten '60s films like Moon Two Zero (1969) and I Love You Alice B. Toklas (1968) a Morricone score and chances are *they'd* have hung around in people's consciousnesses too, and auteurs like QT and Payne would today be around drawing from them, charitably interpreting them, and so on.