The Hellbenders (Sergio Corbucci, 1967)

7/10
I love Spaghetti Westerns and haven't watched one in a while. So tonight I watched The Hellbenders from Sergio Corbucci (director of two of my favorites, Djano and The Great Silence). The Hellbenders is sort of a SW-come-road movie, about a man played by Joseph Cotten and his 3 sons (the Hellbenders) killing a convoy of Union soldiers and stealing the million dollars in cash they were carrying, to bring it back to the South to reform the Confederacy. The movie was made after Django but before The Great Silence and it feels caught between the two indeed - you don't get the in-your-face violence of Djano, nor do you get the artistry of The Great Silence. So it's somewhat unsatisfying in that regard. The best part of the movie is the psychological wars between the father, his sons, and the "widow" brought in to keep the ruse of 4 men lugging a coffin through the desert alive. Joseph Cotten is great and most of the acting is well done, and Ennio Morricone's score is good too. But the dubbing (English-on-English, mostly) really hurts this movie, which is unfortunate.

Minnesota Clay (Sergio Corbucci, 1964)

6.5/10
Sergio Corbucci's first Spaghetti Western still has one foot planted firmly in the "older" Western traditions (and bears almost none of Corbucci's signature violence and grit) but despite a brutal start, the movie picks up steam as it goes, and it culminates in a pretty good shootout between the titular hero and his nemesis Fox (who looks like an 'if they mated' between Lee Van Cleef and Revolver Ocelot). Alex Cox gave this a pretty merciless review in his book 10,000 Ways to Die and it deserves it sometimes but overall the movie turned out better than I expected.

The Great Silence (Sergio Corbucci, 1968)

9/10
Fulfilled everything I'm a sucker for in a Spaghetti Western - Corbucci at the helm, Morricone doing the music (even if it wasn't his best/most memorable work), off-the-beaten-path format (a Western in a blizzard? Hell yeah), a sketchy/shady/gimmicky anti-hero in Silence...and as an extra-awesome bonus, Klaus Kinski as the villain Loco. What's not to love? Well the dubbing wasn't great and the ending was a huge downer, though a bit of a nice change from the usual Western offerings...but overall I was pretty much destined to love it.