A Bullet for the General

Mexico, the years of the revolution. El Chuncho and his men rob a train; they will sell the weapons they take to the rebel general Elias. There is a foreigner on the train. Bill is American, calm and good with a gun; he takes part in the robbery and joins the group. Chuncho trusts him. The group moves village to village, gathering arms and making money. Bill is patient; the weapons are not his real aim and he is waiting to meet Elias. Damiano Damiani directs. Gian Maria Volonté plays Chuncho and Lou Castel plays Bill; Klaus Kinski is in the cast. The film belongs to the political strand of Italian westerns; that subgenre treated class and exploitation directly against the ground of the Mexican revolution. Franco Solinas worked on the screenplay and the writer's other films carry the same frame. The matter the narrative builds is consciousness; Chuncho loves money and understands late what he is inside. The character played by Klaus Kinski is a priest, the strangest and most memorable figure in the narrative. The film closes on a directly political statement and does not hide it. Ennio Morricone and Luis Bacalov worked on the music. Who it is for: viewers who like Italian westerns and political genre cinema. Who it is not for: the violence is explicit, it is long, and the political register is direct.