The Stranger and the Gunfighter (1974)

Lee Van Cleef is Dakota, a bandit who breaks into a Chinaman’s safe expecting to find a small fortune.

Instead, he finds photos of a series of women displaying their bare behinds.

When the safe’s owner interrupts the robbery, he’s accidentally killed.  Dakota finds himself locked in jail, awaiting a date with the hangman’s noose.

Over in China, Ho Chiang is in trouble, too. Seems his uncle left for the U.S. with a small fortune he was supposed to invest.

The only return his benefactors have seen on that investment is a wooden Indian, and they aren’t amused.

So Ho Chiang is dispatched to the U.S. to retrieve the money; if he isn’t successful, his family will be killed.

Once in America, Ho Chiang is shown the same photos. And he figures the secret to the money’s whereabouts has been tattoed on those behinds.

He has addresses for the women; he needs a guide. Who better than Dakota?

So he rescues Dakota from the hanging and off in search of those behinds they go.

But they won’t be alone in the search for the treasure.

A mad preacher named Yancey Hobbitt has learned of the missing money, so he wants a glimpse of those behinds, too.

Review:

Certainly the most unusual of the Lee Van Cleef Westerns. In fact, with all the kung fu stunts, this often comes off as more of a martial arts film than a Spaghetti Western.

The fact that Wang has tattooed clues to the location of his fortune on the behinds of four lovely ladies lends the opportunity for a few added laughs.

The fact that one is traveling with Yancey, one is married to a railroad tycoon and another is supposedly married to the owner of a gambling house forces our heroes to come up with some imaginative ways to encourage them to bare their bottoms.

One of those lovely ladies isn’t bashful at all about sprawling across a bed and showing off all the signatures on her tush. She encourages Dakota to sign. He does so with an “X.”

All that said, this can’t match Shanghai Noon for laughs. And Lo Lieh’s acrobatic leaps into the air, accompanied by cartoonish sound effects, quickly grow tiresome.

Directed by:
Antonio Margheriti (as Anthony Dawson)

Cast:
Lee Van Cleef … Dakota
Lo Lieh … Ho Chiang
Femi Benussi … Italian mistress
Karen Yeh … Chinese mistress
Erika Blanc … American mistress
Betty Sheppard … Russian mistress/twin
Julian Ugarte .. Yancey Hobbitt
Al Tung … Wang
Goyo Peralta … Indio (Hobbit’s helper)
Ricardo Palacious … Calico

Also with: Bernabe Barta Barri, Paul Costello, Manuel de Blas, George Rigaud, Wang Hsieh, Shen Chan, Lo Wai, Cheng Miu, Lui Hung, Cheng Ping, Aai Dung-Gwa, Kong Yeung, Miguel del Castillo, Alfred Boreman, Jaime Doria, Anita Farra, Mariano Martin, Ernesto Vanes

aka:
El karate, el Colt y el imposter
Blood Money
Dakota

Score: Carlo Savina
Runtime: 105 min. (video version); 96 min. (DVD version)

Memorable lines:

Russian mistress: “More tea, Wang?”
Wang: “No thank you.”
Russian mistress: “I must say I’d like some after all that tattooing. What’s written on my rear?”

Sheriff to Ho Chiang: “You don’t want me to arrest you?”
Ho ChiangL “Oh, yes, please sir.”
Then he karate kicks the sheriff.

Saloon owner: “Let’s get the bottom of all of this.”
Ho Chiang: “Yes, I want bottom. I desire to see ass of your wife.”
Wife: “Aahhh!”

Ho Chiang, after inspecting the bare behind of a saloon owner’s wife: “But there’s no writing.”
Saloon owner: “What did you expect? The New York Times?”

Russian mistress, showing her oft autographed behind: “Original, isn’t it?”
Ho Chiang: “Yes, but it resembles guest book at Peking Palace.”

Trivia:

Lo Lieh appeared in more than 200 films, but this was his only Spaghetti outing. During the 1960s and ’70s, he was one of the most popular action stars in Hong Kong. He died in China of a heart attack at age 63 in November 20002.

Director Antonio Margheriti, often working under the pseudonym Anthony Dawson, also wrote and directed “Take a Hard Ride,” which starred Van Cleef and Jim Brown.

Patty Shepard goes by the name Betty Sheppard here and plays two roles, that of the Russian mistress and her twin sister, who’s married to saloon owner Palladine. She also appeared in “Frenchie King,” “Boldest Job in the West” and “The Man Called Noon.”