Willie Nelson is Cross, a Texan with a price on his head who’s been hired to keep a train full of Mexican soldiers from reaching its destination.
He succeeds in blowing up a bridge to stop the train, but can’t get away from the soldiers on the train.
Next thing you know, Cross and a longtime friend named Boone (Jack Elam) are sitting in a Mexican jail awaiting a date with a firing squad.
But they’re offered a way out. All they have to do is guide a train full of dynamite through revolutionary forces.
That task might be complicated by a band of 50 Mexican bandits, by the Wells Fargo posse on the trail of Cross and Boone because of an earlier gold theft and by the Apache warriors who would like to lift their scalps.
Then there’s the train car filled with saloon girls that winds up under their protection. The train car is owned by Germany (Delta Burke), who tired of getting run out of towns and decided to buy the train car because any town worth her and the girls being in would certainly have a railroad.
And the sparks that fly between her and Cross have nothing to do with the dynamite that’s on board.
Review:
Erratic Burt Kennedy wrote and directs this Western, which doesn’t take itself too seriously, but isn’t likely to make a lasting impression on you either.
The best thing about the film: The bickering between Nelson and Elam, who was 68 when the film was released and nearing the end of his film career.
The worst thing about the film: The flirting between Nelson, then 55, and Burke, then 32 and in the middle of her starring run on the hit TV show “Designing Women” is often groan-worthy.
Meanwhile, Nelson plays a bandit with a heart of gold who fends off all challenges a bit too easily and apparently can’t remember how long he and Boone have known one another.
They talk about that in one scene, set in 1895. Boone reckons they’ve been together 10 years. Cross reckons it’s been more like 20. Yet in other scenes, they talk about their Civil War exploits, including fighting off Union forces at Vicksburg in 1863.
Directed by:
Burt Kennedy
Cast:
Willie Nelson … Cross
Delta Burke … Germany
Jack Elam … Boone
Alfonso Arau … Indio
Gregory Sierra … General Garcia
Michael Wren … Lieutenant
Gerald McRaney … Jones
Annabelle Gurwitch … Jesse
Jaime Lyn Bauer … Brandy
Sheila Foster … Lilly
Deborah Carpenter … Pearl
Pamela Moore … Durango
Runtime: 91 min.
aka: Dynamite and Gold
Theme song: “Where the Hell’s That Gold?”
Memorable lines:
Cross: “Don’t you get tired of complainin’?”
Boone: “I get tired of getting shot at.”
Boone: “You would have shot me?”
Cross: “Right in your good eye.”
Germany: “You don’t think very much of women, do you?”
Cross: “The hell I don’t. I just don’t trust ’em.”
Boone: “One time in Denver, I ate in this restaurant. Had a big sign on the wall — watch your hat and coat. While I was watching them, somebody stole my steak.”
Cross: “What in the hell are you talking about?”
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