''The Silent Stranger'' (

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

: ''Lo straniero di silenzio''), also known as ''The Horseman and the Samurai'' and ''The Stranger in Japan'', is a 1968

Spaghetti Western The spaghetti Western is a broad subgenre of Western films produced in Europe. It emerged in the mid-1960s in the wake of Sergio Leone's filmmaking style and international box-office success. The term was used by foreign critics because most o ...

jidaigeki is a genre of film, television, and theatre in Japan. Literally meaning "historical drama, period dramas", it refers to stories that take place before the Meiji Restoration of 1868. ''Jidaigeki'' show the lives of the samurai, farmers, crafts ...

film directed by

Luigi Vanzi Luigi (; ) is a character created by Japanese video game designer Shigeru Miyamoto. Part of Nintendo's ''Mario'' franchise, he is a kind-hearted, cowardly Italian plumber, and the younger fraternal twin brother and sidekick of Mario. Like ...

. It is the second sequel to '' A Stranger in Town'', with twenty minutes excised for its 1975 release. The film is the third in a series of four western films starring

Tony Anthony Darrell W. Anthony (born April 12, 1960) is a retired American professional wrestler, also known by his ring name Dirty White Boy. He wrestled in NWA territories in the Southeastern United States. He was most active throughout the 1980s and 1990 ...

as "The Stranger". Despite being produced in 1968 for MGM, the film was never given an official release until 1975, nearly a decade after the previous film in the series. Tony Anthony stated that he believed the film became the victim of a power struggle at MGM, and the film was re-edited when it was later released by a different studio.

Plot

The protagonist, a likeable American cowboy (Antony) in

Edo-period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

19th-Century Japan, becomes trapped in the middle of the strife between two feuding aristocratic Japanese families. The cowboy possesses a priceless scroll, acquired by chance while he was in Alaska, which both warring families want. Violent fighting ensues, involving Samuri swords, a

Gatling gun The Gatling gun is a rapid-firing multiple-barrel firearm invented in 1861 by Richard Jordan Gatling of North Carolina. It is an early machine gun and a forerunner of the modern electric motor-driven rotary cannon. The Gatling gun's operatio ...

, and a makeshift single-shot

blunderbuss The blunderbuss is a 17th- to mid-19th-century firearm with a short, large caliber Gun barrel, barrel. It is commonly flared at the muzzle (firearms), muzzle to help aid in the loading of Lead shot, shot and other projectiles of relevant quantity ...

. In the end the cowboy returns the scroll (worth "one million dollars") to The Princess, a member of the family who are the rightful owners.

Cast

as The Stranger * Lloyd Battista as The American * Kin Ōmae as Lord Motori * Kanji Ohara as Koeta * Kita Maura as Princess Otaka * Kyōichi Satō as Koeta's Henchman * Yoshio Nukano as Motori Samurai *

Raf Baldassarre Raffaele "Raf" Baldassarre (17 January 1932 - 11 January 1995) was an Italian film actor. Life and career Born Raffaele Baldassarre in Giurdignano, Lecce, Apulia, he started his career in the late 1950s, being cast in many peplum and advent ...

as White-Eye * Gaetano Scala as Thief in Klondike * William Conroy as Thief in Klondike

Reception

Paul Mavis, of

DVDTalk DVD Talk is a home video news and review website launched in 1999 by Geoffrey Kleinman. History Kleinman founded the site in January 1999 in Beaverton, Oregon. Besides news and reviews, it features information on hidden DVD features known as ...

, reviewing the 2015 Warner Archive Collection DVD release of ''The Stranger Collection'', wrote, "While they're not in the league of Leone (what is?), Anthony's grimy, sneaky little punk killer is an intriguing addition to the genre. Tony Anthony did some very interesting things with the spaghetti Western genre, including, perhaps, presaging the ''

Trinity The Trinity (, from 'threefold') is the Christian doctrine concerning the nature of God, which defines one God existing in three, , consubstantial divine persons: God the Father, God the Son (Jesus Christ) and God the Holy Spirit, thr ...

'' movies, while certainly "inventing" the West-meets-East subgenre".

References

External links

*
The Silent Stranger
at

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1968 films 1960s Italian-language films English-language Italian films Spaghetti Western films 1968 Western (genre) films Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films Films with screenplays by Vincenzo Cerami United Artists films Films set in Japan Films scored by Stelvio Cipriani Japanese-language American films Japan in non-Japanese culture 1960s Italian films {{1960s-Western-film-stub