''El Condor'' is a 1970 American

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

film directed by

John Guillermin Yvon Jean Guillermin (11 November 192527 September 2015), known as John Guillermin, was an English film director, writer and producer. Working both in the United Kingdom and the United States, he was most active in big-budget, action-adventure f ...

Jim Brown James Nathaniel Brown (February 17, 1936 – May 18, 2023) was an American professional American football, football player, civil rights activist, and actor. He played as a Fullback (gridiron football), fullback for the Cleveland Browns of the ...

and

Lee Van Cleef Clarence LeRoy Van Cleef Jr. (January 9, 1925 – December 16, 1989) was an American actor. He appeared in over 170 film and television roles in a career spanning nearly 40 years, but is best known as a star of spaghetti Westerns, particularly t ...

lead a band of

Apache The Apache ( ) are several Southern Athabaskan language-speaking peoples of the Southwestern United States, Southwest, the Southern Plains and Northern Mexico. They are linguistically related to the Navajo. They migrated from the Athabascan ho ...

s (including

Iron Eyes Cody Iron Eyes Cody (born Espera Oscar de Corti, April 3, 1904 – January 4, 1999) was an American actor of Italian descent who portrayed Native Americans in Hollywood films, including the role of Chief Iron Eyes in Bob Hope's '' The Paleface'' ...

) against a fortress commanded by Patrick O'Neal. The fortress is said to contain the gold reserves of Emperor Maximilian. The movie was shot in

35mm 35 mm may refer to: Film * 135 film, a type of still photography format commonly referred to as 35 mm film * 35 mm movie film, a type of motion picture film stock * 35MM, a "musical exhibition" by Ryan Scott Oliver that features music ...

Technicolor Technicolor is a family of Color motion picture film, color motion picture processes. The first version, Process 1, was introduced in 1916, and improved versions followed over several decades. Definitive Technicolor movies using three black-and ...

Almería Almería (, , ) is a city and municipalities in Spain, municipality of Spain, located in Andalusia. It is the capital of the province of Almería, province of the same name. It lies in southeastern Iberian Peninsula, Iberia on the Mediterranean S ...

, Spain, and involved the construction of the huge

adobe Adobe (from arabic: الطوب Attub ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for mudbrick. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is use ...

fortress set that was re-used in later films, including ''

Conan the Barbarian Conan the Barbarian (also known as Conan the Cimmerian) is a fictional sword and sorcery hero created by American author Robert E. Howard (1906–1936) and who debuted in 1932 and went on to appear in a series of fantasy stories published in ''We ...

'' (1982) and '' March or Die'' (1977). ''El Condor'' was among the first movies

rated R Rated R refers to movies (and also to TV shows and video games in certain systems) that have been given a "restricted" rating according to one of the following film rating systems or classification boards: * Australian Classification Board * Canadi ...

(for violence, explicit language, and nudity).

Plot

In 1860s Mexico, Luke, an escaped convict, and Jaroo, a gold prospecting hermit (who bounty hunts would-be claim jumpers on the side), team up with a band of

Indians to capture a heavily armed fortress for the thousands of gold bars said to be stored within. The fortress is commanded by the sadistic Chavez, whose mistress, Claudine, Luke becomes attracted to the moment he sees her.

Cast

Production

The film was financed by National General, who in October 1968 announced they had purchased Steve Carabatsos' original script and would make the film the following March. Filming was pushed back; in April 1969, National General announced the movie as part of a slate of 13 films they would make, costing $35 million in all.

was attached to direct. The studio had recently made a film called ''Daddy's Gone A-Hunting'' based on a script by Larry Cohen. Cohen says the studio decided to make the movie, built a fort and town in Almeria, Spain, then decided they disliked the script; they paid Cohen to travel to Spain and write a new film around the existing sets. Cohen wrote a script they were happy with, and Jim Brown and Lee Van Cleef were cast. According to Cohen, Van Cleef then changed his mind about doing the film on the advice of

Alberto Grimaldi Alberto Grimaldi (28 March 1925 – 23 January 2021) was an Italian film producer. Biography Grimaldi was born in Naples and studied law. In 1962 he founded his own production company, P.E.A., and released his first feature film, '' The Shadow ...

who said the actor's character was ridiculous; Cohen persuaded van Cleef to do it, arguing it was a comic role along the lines of Humphrey Bogart's character in ''The African Queen''. The casting of the two leads was announced in July 1969. Filming started in October 1969. Swedish actress

Ewa Aulin Ewa Birgitta Aulin (born 13 February 1950) is a former Swedish actress who appeared in a number of Italian and some American films in the 1960s and 1970s. She is remembered for playing the title character in the cult film ''Candy'' where she appea ...

, who had been in ''Candy'', was originally meant to play the female lead. However, she quit the film, refusing to film nude scenes. She was replaced by

Mariana Hill Marianna Hill (born Marianna Schwarzkopf; February 9, 1942) is an American actress who is known for her starring roles in the Western films '' El Condor'' (1970) and ''High Plains Drifter'' and the cult horror film '' Messiah of Evil'' (both 1 ...

who said she would go nude: "If it's done well". Cohen says that director John Guillermin and producer Andre de Toth did not get along, in part because the latter wanted to direct. According to Cohen, de Toth took over from the director on his previous movie (''

Play Dirty Play Dirty may refer to: * ''Play Dirty'' (1969 film), a British war film * ''Play Dirty'' (upcoming film), an upcoming American crime thriller film * ''Play Dirty'' (album), a 1983 album by Girlschool * ''Play Dirty'' (novel), a 2007 novel by ...

'') and wanted to do the same thing again. The conflict resulted in Guillermin and de Toth having a fistfight.

Home media

The film was released on a fullscreen VHS in 1994, and a

widescreen Widescreen images are displayed within a set of aspect ratio (image), aspect ratios (relationship of image width to height) used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ...

DVD by Warner Archive in 2009.

Critical reaction

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert ( ; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American Film criticism, film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter and author. He wrote for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. Eber ...

of the ''

Chicago Sun-Times The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspaper ...

'' gave ''El Condor'' a negative review, giving it one-and-a-half stars out of four. Ebert declared that "what ''El Condor'' lacks in intelligence, it makes up for in stupidity" and opined that the film contained nothing but cynical violence. Larry Cohen later said he thought it "was not a good film. I don't think John Guillermin was a very good director. He and producer Andre De Toth had some awful fights over the picture. Personally, I don't think Lee Van Cleef captured the part in the way I'd written it. But the film was successful. This was when I realized I could talk to actors.... I was completely disillusioned about what other people did to my scripts, as with ''Daddy's Gone A-Hunting''. So, that's when I made the decision to go ahead and make my own films."

References

Bibliography

* The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States – Feature Films, 1961–1970. University of California Press, 1997, page 298. * Greenspun, Roger, "Screen: `El Condor' Bows, Mexican Treasure Tale Comes to the Forum", ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', June 20, 1970, page 22.

External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Condor, El 1970 films 1970 Western (genre) films American Western (genre) films Films directed by John Guillermin Films scored by Maurice Jarre Films set in Mexico Films shot in Almería Films with screenplays by Larry Cohen Second French intervention in Mexico films 1970s English-language films 1970s American films Films with screenplays by Steven W. Carabatsos English-language Western (genre) films Apache in popular culture National General Pictures films