• Joseph Cotten is an ex-Confederate soldier who would like to see the South rise again. To finance such a venture, he and his three sons rob a Union convoy carrying $1 million. The money is placed in a coffin and disguised as the dead husband of Cotten's "daughter" - really just a woman he has hired to play the part of a widow in case they get stopped. The group will have to evade not only the Union Army, but also Mexican bandits, revenge minded Indians, a posse, and each other if they are to get home with the money.

• After having seen Hellbenders, I'm convinced now more than ever that if it weren't for Sergio Leone, Sergio Corbucci would be the recognized master of the Spaghetti Western. Hellbenders fits nicely beside Corbucci's other genre masterpieces. It may not be as over-the-top as Django or as beautiful as The Great Silence, but in it's own unique way, it's almost as good. Hellbenders takes it's own sweet time telling its story, and that's a good thing. You really get to know the characters and develop feelings for them. The acting, whether it's the crazed brother Jeff (Gino Pernice),the sympathetic Claire (Norma Bengell),or the always entertaining Cotten, is as good as you'll see in this kind of movie. The ending is marvelous. It's got to be one of the most satisfying twist endings I've seen in a SW.

• For those familiar with SWs, all I really need to say about the score is that it was composed by Ennio Morricone. That should be enough. The main theme is a trumpet-dominated mournful piece that grows in meaning throughout the film.

"Hellbenders" shocked me. While there are tons of bad Italian westerns, there are very few classics and near-classics. Too often, they were indifferently directed, poorly dubbed and were just meaningless violence. It's a shame, as I really do like the genre. When they are well done (such as the films of Sergio Leone),they are wonderful. As for Sergio Carbucci, I've found his films to be better than average. Yet, oddly, I have never heard of this film--and it seems to be his very best.

The film is about an insane family who refuse to admit that the Civil War has been lost. Despite General Lee's recent surrender, Colonel Jonas (Joseph Cotten has a bloody and nutty plan--to steal a huge cache of Union money and finance a renewed Civil War! To do this, he and his three sons cold-bloodedly murder Union troops--and even of their own men! The problem is that now they have to get the money from out west all the way east where the fighting has been occurring. When their plan starts to unravel when the woman assisting them is killed, they need another female gang member because they are hiding the money in a coffin--a coffin supposedly holding a grieving widow's husband. How can this go wrong? See the film.

There's a lot to like about this one. The dubbing is far better than normal and the film looks very professional. Plus, while some similar plots were used in the 1940s and 50s (several with Randolph Scott),they never were handled like this one. While I am not usually a fan of violence, it really helps make the family thoroughly despicable--and this evil, clannish quality gives the film a very gritty (almost noir) edge. Overall, a very successful film with only one tiny flaw (the way the family reacts to a 'bum' in the desert late in the film makes absolutely no sense--especially in light of how the family behaved early in the film). Still, there's a lot to like and admire about this one.

Knowing that a hellbender is actually a large type of salamander, I was weirdly surprised to see that the flag draped coffin bore a likeness of a salamander on it. The Hellbenders were a Confederate outfit in the film, with leader Jonas (Joseph Cotten) and his three sons attempting to revive the Southern cause with a million dollars in stolen money. The story starts out rather unbelievably as Jonas, with only two sons, wipe out a thirty man Union convoy from behind rocks and trees. Now that there's a ten thousand dollar bounty on their heads, their march back home to Nashville is fraught with peril on all sides.

Jonas himself is rather a vile sort, establishing his authority early in the story, and when he yells jump, his sons know enough to ask how high. The development of the story allows enough time for son Ben (Julian Mateos) to come to question his father's autocratic supremacy, in no small part aided by a newly hired stand-in daughter after maniac Jeff (Gino Pernice) dispatches the gold digging Kitty. However high stakes gambler Claire (Norma Bengell) is more than a match for Jonas when she pulls a fast one and has the group headed for Fort Brant where she insists her manufactured husband be buried. The whole time you wonder what evil plan Jonas will cook up for his 'daughter'.

There were a couple of clever symbolic moments in the story which left me wondering whether they were intentional. When the Indians appeared to seek justice for the death of the chief's daughter, it provoked a family Civil War, brother against brother with the outcome satisfactory to the chief.

Anticipating a "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" type of ending, I expected to see the coffin release it's contents to the desert winds. The twist of course was just as satisfying, and led directly to an understated definition to the film's title. With time running out and the mission at a collapse, it was fitting to see the wounded Jonas slither across the parched banks of the Rio Hondo looking just like, well, a hellbender.