This movie is hysterically funny! It is by far the best of the Terence Hill/Bud Spencer oeuvre. For my money it even tops the Trinity movies! What is not to like about this movie? The pained, laconic expression on Spencer's face is a sure-fire laugh-getter every time! What about the terrific fight choreography? The fight in the gym was already good enough to put this film in the Slapstick Hall of Fame... but then they come up with the great finale with all the balloons! And the hot dog eating contests! And Oliver Onions singing "Dune Buggy"! And the incredible choir scene! With deep baritone Spencer inching his way over to the ladies' section and trying (unsuccessfully) to hit their high notes! This movie is pure genius!

There *are* many lame Spencer/Hill comedies out there... but this is definitely not one of them!

I think I can safely say that WATCH OUT, WE'RE MAD is thus far the funniest of the many Terence Hill/Bud Spencer collaborations that I've been watching recently. This 1974 feature has a naturalistic flow to it, an anything-goes feel, and a running time absolutely packed to the brim with incident and laughs. There was often a sense in the later '80s pairings that the stars were merely doing it for the money and going through the motions, while the writers created lulls between the action scenes. Not so here.

WATCH OUT, WE'RE MAD is consistently entertaining from beginning to end and offers a perfect blend of comedy and action. The boys play buggy racers who fall foul of a British gangster played by John Sharp. They decide to get revenge on him, but this means going up against the bad guy's massive army of goons. Bizarrely, Donald Pleasence also has a supporting role as a Freudian psychologist, and his presence is the oddest thing about the production.

Otherwise, it's business as usual and Hill and Spencer are both a delight to watch, the latter in particular stealing his scenes with his constant deadpanning. Highlights include a great burning car gag, some hilarious jokes at a fairground, and an absolutely wonderful brawl at a gym, of all places. Latterly there's a battle in a room filled with balloons and a motorbike chase, even a bit of jousting. It tails off a bit at the end but that's only because so much has been going on before then.

"...altrimenti ci arrabbiamo! " or "Watch Out, We're Mad" or "Zwei wie Pech und Schwefel" is a co-production between Italy and Spain from 1974, so this one is also moving closer to its 50th anniversary now. Maybe it happened already the day you are reading this review of mine if you take a little longer to get here. No doubt this film will still be on five years from now. Maybe even fifty. If you take a look at the awards recogntion this received, you will see two pretty prestigous awards from Germany. And this is really where Spencer and Hill were at their most successful. Certainly more successful than in English-speaking countries. Probably also more successful than in Italy as otherwise they probably would not have picked international aliases. So yeah, here were Hispanic people working on this movie in front of the camera and behind it and the film was also made in Spain, but at its core, this is a very Italian movie. And I say this as somebody who watched the German dub of course. Over 10k ratings here on imdb is actually also not too bad for a Spencer/Hill movie. It may not be a lot to others, but, as I said, they weren't famous in England or the United States and that of course keeps the number down. The director here was Marcello Fondato and he is also one of the many writers credited with this movie. This should not surprise anybody at all because writing was his main profession and he wrote approximately five times as many films compared to the number of movies he directed. And while he sometimes did some lighter stuff too like this one here (it's a really light movie for sure, even for a Spencer film),he did not work on many occasions with Pedersoli or Girotti. By the way, the three dots at the beginning of the title, the Italian title, are something that was done on other occasions too for Spencer/Hill movies. Sorry, you see I am talking about them a lot, but for good reason. They were very big stars here in Germany, especially Spencer, and people love their movies to this day. Here and there, we even get one shown at a movie theater. I watched one this year, not this one we have here though. Sorry, I am drifting a bit away now, so back to this one here. As for the supporting cast, we have other really established actors here. The one that caught my attention easily was a bearded Donald Pleasence (my favorite Blofeld). He does not have a gigantic amount of screen time, but he is easy to recognize. Just like in his Bond movie, he is an antagonist, but not the boss this time, but really a henchman if you want to call him that. He is almost too posh and vain for such a title. But at least he also gets beaten up apparently by the two protagonists, so maybe that qualifies him. The main antagonist is played by John Sharp. Memorable presence, but not familiar with the actor. But I suppose it mens something if he plays Pleasance's character's boss. A rookie actor never could. Then there are also de Blas and Shepard with the latter dying way too early. I mention those although I am not familiar at all because I see they were married in real life. She plays Hill's character's love interest in here. Nothing unusual. He often has very basic romance stories in his films, certainly more often than Spencer. If anything, then Spencer is the one who has to suffer from the consequences and here he sure does with the buggy being destroyed in the end because Hill's character did not look where his buddy was. By the way, the title song "Dune Buggy" here is from Oliver Onions. Incredibly catchy number. Very positive too. You will keep it in your head forever if you hear it. Pointless pop music, but lots of fun. Today's generation of recording artists can lear something from that. By the way, Oliver Onions contributed several times to Spencer movies, not just here.

So yeah, I already said that Spencer and Hill play characters in this film here who are buddies. Actually, very close friends and that is not too often the case with their films. Still they have a gigantic rivalry when it comes to racing because they are both among the best and also exactly on the same level as we find out here. So they have to share the prize and when they finally even have two buggies (ironically from the bad guys),then still something miserable happens and they are down to one again and have to fight for it. Or go up against each other on several occasions and the chaos starts anew. As for violence, it is kept light honestly The most dramatic moment was maybe during a chase sequence when one fella on a motorcycle crashes and we find out from another character that he broke his neck, so that he is dead most likely and even if the victim was one of his own men, the big (more physically than in terms of how capable he was) antagonist laughs like crazy and says something along the lines that it is better somebody breaks his neck then nobody breaks his neck, even if the affected is one of his men. Oookay? That was weird. Quite a psychopath he seemed also with how he was laughing. But maybe that was good for him because he was so fat and unfit that he did not even have to fight (and as a consequence) get beaten up by our two heroes. All his men do though. Okay, I already mentioned the motorcycle sequence where Hill's character really prevailed and he also showed some acobatic movies earlier I think when he and Spencer went up against a group of acrobats that belonged to the bad guy. So if Hill was ever remotely close to Bond, then it was in this movie. He was also first credit, but that was not an exception at all. People back then loved him as much as Spencer most of the time. Some maybe even preferred him if we are talking countries except Germany. Tough to blame them. Hill sure had the looks for a big career, especially with his bright blue eyes and it's for good reason that he was much more about romance in these films compared to Spencer and the characters he played. But I may be getting a bit too general right now. Let's focus more on this film again. What else can I add? The story was okay, certainly not worse than in other films starring the duo, but the best moments were probably again what they had to say and also some of the more action-heavy moments. I am referring to the punching here, not necessarily to the speed component. But yeah, fans of bikes and cars will really have a fun time here. Normally you do not see this much action and racing in Spencer/Hill movies. Here they are letting it all out. The sand and dust on the streets also reminded me a bit of the past from this duo, especially Hill, when they were in all kinds of western films before moving on to considerably lighter stuff in the 70s. Oh and I almost forgot about the silent assassin near the end with his violin and gun haha. Okay, that one with a more serious approach, could have been taken right out of a Bond movie. No doubt about it. But here it was all for the funs of course. He is supposed to be super competent, super reliable, never failed a job, but how he seems like a complete fool after getting all this money made it easy to believe that neither this film not this character could be taken seriously from any kind of perspective. But that is no negative criticism. Not at all. It delivers in many other areas and I personally had a great time watching here for sure. At least on some occasions. Most of the time, it was a good time I'd say. But maybe the film was closer to 4 stars out of 5 than to 2 stars out of 5. Which is always a good sign. By the way, this went for minimally over 100 minutes, although I am sure there is not only this one version out there. But the most common is minimally closer to 1.5 hours than to 2 hours. Oh and what was uup with that choir sequence that had Spencer's character sing. I know he liked singing and he also was not really bad at it, but still this was unexpected and a completely different brand of comedy. It was not bad though. Kinda dring, but still a success in my opinion. Oh and at the end of my review now, I shall also make a reference to the end of this movie, namely when they are crashing a party (in the truest sense of the word). Again with a car. Again some solid action, but again they kept it lightly. You can say it is for good reason that here we have a film starring Spencer and/or Hill that has the action genre attached to it on imdb. It was not often the case with these two. Comedy yes. Crime too. Western earlier as well. But action not too many times. And I see it positively although I do not really like this genre at all. Probably because it never felt as if it was about nothing but the action. The charm and fun was still there when they two were driving so quickly and we could hardley recognize their faces in these helmets. If you have not seen anything yet from this iconic duo we have here, then this movie is a good choice to start with. Fun characters, fun action, fun music, fun dialogues. Fun everywhere. Definitely recommended. Oh and by the way, the fact that in the end they stand up for a weaker character, a friend, being attacked by these bad guys, is also typical for characters played by Spencer and Hill. They used to stand up for those that mean something to them. Maybe that's why people love them to this day. Enough now. Go see this one. Dune Buggy *sing*