Train for Durango (1968)

The Gringo (Anthony Steffen) and Luca (Enrico Maria Salerno) flee an adventure that left them worn out and penniless and, in the Gringo’s case, wounded in the behind. They decide to hop a train for Durango.

Turns out this train is carrying a beautiful passenger named Helena (Dominique Boschero) and a small fortune in gold, the result of an arms deal during the Mexican revolution. Turns out this train winds up being robbed by the men of Lobo. They make off with the girl and the safe full of gold.

But Gringo and Luca survive the attack. What’s more, they find the keys to open that safe. So they head off in search of Lobo’s men.

Luca wants the gold; Gringo wants the girl … and the gold, too, if it works out that way.

They soon discover they’ve got something of a guardian angle in a man who calls himself Brown (Mark Damon), and turns up to help them out at the most opportune times.

His motive, at least for the time being, is unclear. But his gun is effective and welcome considering the odds they’re up against.

Lobo has a lieutenant named Heraclio who wants to make Helena his own and a small army of gunmen ready to do his bidding. If only he could open that damn safe.

Review:

Uneven comedy Western that is funny in spots, tiresome in others and occasionally a little tough to follow with all the characters who come and go. But Boschero, in one of her only two Spaghetti appearances, certainly helps improve the scenery.

Among the scenes that work … Lobo’s men attempt to open the safe by dropping it from the top of the building to the ground. It sinks into the dirt. Then they fire a cannon at it. The building is blown to bits. The safe barely suffers a scratch.

In another scene, Lobo tests the courage of his men — and whether Gringo and Luca are being truthful in their desire to join his gang — with a little ring of death game. Thirteen officers huddle around a table, so close even a bullet couldn’t slip through. Someone blows out a candle and Lobo tosses a cocked six-gun into the air. Someone’s going to die. Will it be one of our heroes? By the way, who are the heroes?

Directed by:
Mario Caiano

Cast:
Anthony Steffen … Gringo
Mark Damon … Brown
Enrico Maria Salerno … Luca
Dominique Boschero … Helena
Roberto Camardiel … Lobo
Jose Bodalo … The Chief
Manuel Zarzo … Heraclio
Aldo Sambrell … Mexican captain
Lorenzo Robledo … Pinkerton man
Mirella Pamphili … The waitress
Tito Garcia … Don Pedro Artista
Jose Canalejas … Manuel

Other cast members: Rafael Albaicin, Simon Arriaga, Jose Manuel Martin, Goyo Lebrero, Francisco Nieto, Gonzalo Esquiroz, Joaquin Parra

aka:
Un treno per durango

Runtime: 92 min.

Score: Carlo Rustichelli

Memorable lines:

Helen: “You’re really in bad shape.”
Gringo, with tattered clothes and a bullet in his behind: “You mean it shows.”
Helen: “By the odor alone.”

Revolutionary to The Chief, after he’s shot down a man: “But he said long live the revolution.”
The Chief: “With all this noise, who can hear?”

Helen: “Heraclio, I killed those two men when they tried to attack me.”
Heraclio: “I was lucky. Me, you only punched in the stomach and the face.”

Brown, when the Mexican army catches up with him in his red car: “What’s the matter? Was I exceeding the speed limit?”
Mexican captain: “No, you were violating the laws of the country.”

Trivia:

Lovely French actress Dominique Boschero appeared in about 60 films in a career that spanned 20 years. One of her more bizarre roles was as Regina, queen of the bird men, in another Mario Caiano film, 1961’s “Ulysses Against the Son of Hercules,” in which she walks around in what amounts to a feather bikini, complete with an impressive array of tailfeathers.