30 Winchesters for El Diablo (1965)

Jeff Benson (Carl Mohner) and Jerry, a young man he’s rescued from a massacre at a nearby ranch, ride into Canyon City looking for work. They’re warned to ride out. Strangers aren’t typically fond of Canyon City because the area is under the thumb of a bandit named Diablo and his gang.

Unimpressed, Jeff, with Jerry in tow, hires on to help guide rancher Randall’s herd to market. It’s a dangerous job; none of the other cowboys in town will take the job for fear that El Diablo will try to rustle the cattle. But then, Jeff has some ideas about how to handle El Diablo.

He also has some reasons for sticking around Canyon City. There’s the confidential orders in his shirt pocket. There’s the hunch that someone in Canyon City is feeding key information to El Diablo. And there’s the sheriff’s pretty young daughter, Pamela.

Sure enough, El Diablo tries to rustle the herd. But Jeff’s ambush works. A tougher job comes next: A gold shipment bound for Mexico is headed for Canyon City. And whoever is behind all the mischief in Canyon City is bound to want that gold.

Review:

The downsides: As Jeff’s sidekick, the Jerry character is supposed to provide comic relief. It doesn’t really work. Jeff is unbelievably invincible in a barroom brawl. And the script is fill with purple prose.

The positives: If the character of Pamela is paper thin, Mila Stanic has a juicy part for a female in a Spaghetti. She’s the saloon girl who loves the sheriff’s corrupt son and plans to run off with him as soon as El Diablo’s banditry makes them both rich. But, in order for that to work, she also has to pretend to be in love with El Diablo.

Ivan Staccioli is suitably slimy as the sheriff’s son, and the film also features a rousing finale that helps explain the title and provides a couple of unexpected twists.

Directed by:
Gianfranco Baldanello

Cast:
Carl Mohner … Jeff Benson
Antonio Garcia … Jerry
as Anthony Garof
Alessandra Panero … Pamela Webb
as Topsy Collins
Ivano Staccioli … Victor Webb
as John Heston
Jose Torres … El Diablo
Attilio Dottesio … Sheriff Webb
as William Burke
Mila Stanic … Rosario
Renato Chiantoni … Mr. Randall
as Gary Gallwey
Guglielmo Spoletini … Blake
as William Spoletin
Franco Gula … Bill, the telegrapher

aka:
Gold Train
30 Winchester per El Diablo

Score: Marcello Gigante

Runtime: 92 min.

Memorable lines:

Rosario: “Those men make me laugh, the way they look at me when I dance and I sing. They don’t know that only you are my love.”
Victor Webb: “Those men are not so stupid. I’m sure they know what’s going on. Actually, when it comes to those others, try to restrain yourself.”
Rosario: “I forgot. I’m just a poor little saloon girl, born way on the wrong side of the tracks. And you are Victor Webb, the sheriff’s son, the prize catch for all the rich little girls in the county.”

Jeff to Pamela: “I’ve never seen a girl as pretty as you.”
Pamela: “You’ll make me blush.”
Jeff: “You’d look even better with red cheeks.”

El Diablo, after using bottles for target practice: “You know I can’t stand empty bottles.”

El Diablo to a man who dares question Rosario: “Do not doubt Rosario’s word, you filthy swine. Anything she says, it is the same as if I said it myself.”

Victor Webb: “You are the master of promising everything and giving nothing.”
Rosario: “You speak of me like you speak of a thing, an object that serves some use.”

Trivia:

Ivano Staccioli adopted the name George Heston or John Heston for films bound for overseas release. He graduated from sword and sandal flicks to appear in 11 Spaghetti Westerns. Post-Spaghetti, he found himself in exploitation films. A particularly bad year was 1977, when he starred as camp commander in “Woman’s Camp 119,” in which the captives were forced to try to revive frozen Nazi officers by rubbing their nude bodies over them, and “Queen of Sex,” in which the female lead turned into a nymphomaniac every time she heard a certain song.