Print the Legend: Notes on Antonio del Amo’s Son of Jesse James

Cinema has long taken certain artistic license with regard to history, often for good reason. Recounting facts accurately and exclusively would likely result in a fairly tedious piece of escapism: you want cold, hard fact then go watch a documentary. And so it is that legendary outlaw Jesse James has been granted a certain clemency with regard to his life and crimes, the legend sanitized via a dubious romanticism whenever interpreted on screen. (Walter Hill’s The Long Riders [1980] and Andrew Dominik’s The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford [2007] being two rare exemptions, both pictures rather anomalous in their conviction of a darker, more unpalatable truth.) Historically, James’ murky reputation rests on that of acknowledged killer, career-criminal, guerrilla, confederate champion and gang leader. His considerable and enduring film legacy, however, is somewhat distorted and shamefully sentimentalized – more akin to that of a Robin Hood-esque folk hero championed by a downtrodden Middle America than opportunistic, cold-blooded murderer.

And yet that falsified legacy endures to this day, at least cinematically, thanks in part to a clutch of classic American western films, and the respective movie star tasked with having brought the legend to life (star wattage eclipsing real-world atrocities, of course). In that regard, Jesse James has been well represented by a roster of charismatic actors essaying him on screen, among them Tyrone Power in the excellent – albeit historically unreliable – 1939 film Jesse James; a youthful Robert Wagner in The True Story of Jesse James (1957), that title something of a predictable misnomer; Robert Duvall in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid (1972); James Keach in Hill’s dazzling Long Riders; Kris Kristofferson in the solid 1986 TV movie The Last Days of Frank and Jesse James; and – last but certainly not least – a career-best Brad Pitt in the aforementioned Assassination of Jesse James, a superb film by any metric. Even James’ own real-life son, Jesse James, Jr. played his father not once but twice on film (both films are now thought lost, although a bastardized composite of both pictures still exists under the title Jesse James Under the Black Flag). And to bring us full circle, it is a fictionalized James’ son who takes centre stage in director Antonio del Amo’s little-seen 1965 Spanish-Italian western El Hijo de Jesse James / Solo contro tutti / Son of Jesse James. (Note: The more direct/well known English title is Jesse James’ Kid, but this article will refer to Del Amo’s film as the more manageable Son of Jesse James.)

Produced during the critical bridging period linking Hollywood-inspired Euro-oaters to spaghetti westerns proper, Del Amo’s Paella western falls very much into the former category: measured in its pacing, inoffensive in both attitude and content, neutered in its violence (although there is some blood), unremarkable in execution. And yet – like so many of those early, prototypical Spanish westerns – the film proves to be a worthwhile endeavor despite its routine nature: although far from an essential entry in the evolution of the genre, Son of Jesse James is just about worth the time of any serious Euro-western aficionado. The director, Madrid-born Del Amo, was a cineaste, prolific screenwriter and director who peaked, artistically and commercially, with his so-called trilogía del ruiseño / Nightingale trilogy – a troika of musicals featuring popular Spanish child singer Joselito. The first of these films, El pequeño ruiseñor/ The Little Nightingale (1956), was so financially successful at the Spanish box office that it afforded Del Amo the opportunity to form his own production company, Apolo Films (which would ultimately co-produce Del Amo’s western). Although Son of Jesse James was his only foray into the spaghetti western (with no documented or identifiable affinity for the genre outside of said credit), Del Amo as director worked with many of the genre’s most representative Spanish actors throughout his career (Antonio Casas, Roberto Camardiel and Luis Induni et al). Outside of his sole western venture, Del Amo also contributed to two Eurospy entries as screenwriter: A 001: operazione Giamaica (1965), again produced by Apolo and featuring spaghetti-regulars Camardiel, Brad Harris, John Bartha and Raf Baldassarre, and the excellent Requiem per un agente segreto/ Requiem for a Secret Agent (1965), starring Stewart Granger. The latter film was helmed by Sergio Sollima, director of notable Euro-westerns The Big Gundown, Run, Man, Run and Face to Face.

Del Amo’s western begins amidst bleak winter snow and heavy atmosphere. Shooting in wide Totalscope, cinematographer Alfredo Fraile swamps the frame with thick mist, lending the sequence an unexpected gothic air. The fog seems real, too – none of that impenetrable, manufactured haze that Fulci brought to his I Quattro dell'apocalisse/ Four of the Apocalypse (1975) via smoke diffusion overkill. (Note that there are two different DoPs credited to Son, Fraile being the Spanish cinematographer and Fausto Zuccoli the named Italian professional. Whether they both contributed to the lensing of the film, or one credit was merely a requirement for fulfilling an international funding quota is debatable.) Jesse Woodson James cuts through the dolour on horseback as a narrator provides some background information as to his outlaw status. Unfortunately, any conjured visual mood ends here, as the film cuts to a prologue introducing Jesse proper. The ageing outlaw is played by Robert Hundar. At this point in his career, Hundar had yet to be sidelined into supporting villain roles à la Bruno Corazzari and was still enjoying an extended period of leading man status. Bewigged and sporting a hideous fake mustache, less obviously handsome than his Hollywood antecedents, Hundar cuts a towering presence as the famed outlaw. The scene strives hard to convince the viewer that Jesse has been domesticated by family life, although there exists no hint of remorse or regret from the man himself. From there the film slips straight into the oft-told, now clichéd scenario of James straightening a canted picture on his living room wall and being gunned down from behind, the act witnessed by Jesse’s young son, Bill. Del Amo, however, seeks to subvert proceedings by keeping Bob Ford off-camera, insinuating Son of Jesse James might become an identity mystery of some sort. Indeed, when Ford shoots Jesse, the hidden killer is bathed in a harsh red light à la Bava or Margheriti, the moment redolent of future gialli. Said lighting is the only hint of originality in what is an otherwise uninspiring and bland establishing sequence.

Mercifully, the film kicks into gear proper as it jumps to the present, the narrator informing the viewer that we are now some 20yrs down the line, and that Jesse’s son, Bill, has grown into the antithesis of his father: kind, honorable, empathetic, peaceful. Hundar again plays James, sans Velcro mustache, who arrives in town, immediately ingratiating himself with the locals by joining a poker game in the local saloon. Bill James bets his horse and gun against a measly $10 and loses. It’s an odd story beat – it paints our hero as compulsive, naïve, ineffectual. Moments later and he’s having the obligatory dust-up with the locals (who deem his nag unworthy of the $10 stake). Luckily, Bill is saved from a bullet to the back – talk about history repeating itself – by Sheriff Davis. The lawman is played by the excellent German actor Adrian Hoven.

From thereon, Bill and Davis form a reluctant alliance which runs the length of the film. The production design of Son is generally rock solid, but here the saloon fails to convince: the set looks too new, freshly built, unaged. Bill then steals Davis’ gun and shoots up the joint, somewhat contradicting what our (unreliable?) narrator imparted regarding Bill’s genial nature. For some reason, Davis points Bill in the direction of the Three Star Ranch with the promise of possible work. The Three Star Ranch is run by the beautiful, headstrong Dorothy and her dubious foreman, Bruce (Raf Baldassare). Having proven himself capable by taming an unbroken stud and shooting a hole dead-centre through a silver dollar, Bill is taken on the ranch payroll, despite the bruised-ego protestations of Bruce. Bill is immediately recognized by Alonzo, the ranch cook (Roberto Camardiel), although this detail remains buried for much of the picture. Bill is duly informed by the ranch hands that a local land baron named Marshall is absorbing all land and property, with the Three Star Ranch being among the very last properties to capitulate to his strong-arm tactics.

Bill and Alonzo are sent to intervene when rustlers take off with some of Dorothy’s horses. Bill shoots dead one of the thieves, seemingly without remorse or crisis of conscience – seems there might be some of his father in him after all. The film then introduces the viewer to Marshall, played by a pipe-smoking Luis Induni. Davis and Marshall pay mention to an upcoming frontier race, where participants – immigrants, frontiersmen, settlers et al – will be awarded parcels of land via a government initiative. This, obviously, does not sit well with the covetous Marshall.

Back at the Three Star Ranch, Bill and Bruce duke it out until the fight is halted by Dorothy, who then promptly fires Bruce. The film drags momentarily here, the pace slowed by seemingly endless scenes of riding and uninspiring scoring courtesy of the normally reliable Angleo F. Lavagnino. Sheriff Davis and Marshall arrive at the ranch. Is Dorothy in love with Davis? The film certainly plays it that way, such is her exuberance and obvious affection around him, but ultimately does nothing with said plot strand. Bill recognizes Marshall, although can’t quite place the face. The viewer, however, has no such trouble, and the ‘mystery’ effectively ends at the 37minute mark. Del Amo and his co-screenwriter, Pino Passalacqua, can’t honestly have seen this thread as a credible mystery/frontier whodunnit, could they? Who were they fooling? The veiled identity thread is so weak that one wonders why the filmmakers bothered to include it at all. Son is basically a typical revenge-western lent a modicum of novelty value via its celebrity trapping and brand recognition. Del Amo might have crafted a genuinely suspenseful tale in the giallo mould had he fully committed to the mystery angle, gifting the genre something along the lines of Mario Bianchi’s Hai sbagliato... dovevi uccidermi subito!/Kill the Poker Player (1972), but – disappointingly – the film seems content to give up the chase before the halfway point. Such a route would have been given further irony via Hoven’s previous association with the German Krimi films, a popular series of mystery thrillers from Rialto and based on the works of prolific crime writers like Edgar Wallace. Hoven was a popular leading man of German genre cinema throughout the 50s, 60s and 70s who made the occasional foray into European westerns – prior to appearing in Son, Hoven had starred in the Spanish-Italo Sette ore di fuoco / Seven Hours of Gunfire (1965), directed by the estimable Joaquín Luis Romero Marchent. Like Son, Marchent’s film posited an alternative history for a real-life figure, with Hoven taking on the role of Wild Bill Hickok. Hoven would go on to form his own production company, Aquila Film Enterprises, and eventually settle into the director’s chair, focusing mainly on horror.

Around the halfway mark, the film seems to lose focus, the narrative going into free fall. The headstrong Dorothy still refuses to sell out to Marshall. Hoven appears to have a crush on Bill (‘He’s intrigued me from the start’), which might explain the head-scratching lack of interest he shows in the stunning Dorothy, and Bill gallops off to…well, I’m not sure where. Cue more riding inserts. Dorothy really is a knockout in this film. (Indeed, the biggest mystery of the film isn’t the identity of Bob Ford, but why the Sheriff hasn’t put a ring on this woman’s finger.) As played by Mercedes Alonso, Dorothy is gorgeous, tough, fair and believable – a woman who might just hold her own during a time of male-dominated western expansion. The Santander-born Alonso had appeared in a number of Spanish and Italian comedies throughout the 1950s before starring in her first western in 1962, Gunfighters of Casa Grande. Two years later and Alonso appeared in La tumba del pistolero, another mystery-western from feted genre director Amando de Ossorio. Ossorio’s film featured an all-star line-up of Euro-western favorites, including Induni, José Canalejas, Frank Braña, Tito García and Aldo Sambrell. In Son, Alonzo is so good that she recalls a diamond-hard Barbara Stanwyck from Anthony Mann’s The Furies (1950), and I found myself wishing she’d appeared in more European westerns.

That night, rustlers arrive to steal more of Dorothy’s horses. They empty the coral, though a few are killed by Bill and Alonzo, the ranch cook. It’s a brief scene, over too quickly, as if Del Amo was intimidated by a large-scale action set piece, or perhaps didn’t have the means to execute it properly, but it’s effectively shot at night, in genuine darkness. The film seems to be gearing up toward the oft-mentioned land race, with the altruistic Dorothy volunteering to lend her horses to any participant without a steed. Said decision pisses Marshall off no end, whilst Bill confesses to Dorthy that he suspects Marshall of being Bob Ford, his father’s killer. They share an inevitable kiss, but are ambushed by Parker, Slim and Bruce. Bill endures the by-now regulatory Spaghetti Western Beating © that all Euro cowboys were expected to take.

The big land race finally arrives. A federal agent (played by John Bartha) explains the rules to both characters and the viewer before the race begins. The following action sequence does not disappoint: it’s a complicated scene, with much traffic in the frame at all times (horses, wagons, long shots, close-ups, dust, wheels clashing etc – the western equivalent of a chariot race from a classic Peplum). The cinematography here is superb – each frame crammed with plenty of background hustle and constant movement. There isn’t an inch of wasted space within any shot, the film brimming with energy. The Rivers, a husband and wife team, are killed during the race. The Ford brothers are named as culprits. (One might reasonably wonder if said brothers are related to Bob Ford – fellow James-Younger gang member Charley, maybe? – but that question goes unanswered.) They draw down on Davis, but Bill intervenes, ostensibly repaying his debt from the beginning of the film.

Hundar pouts and broods through this mid-section in archetypal hero fashion, our protagonist disinterested in incidental plot strands, his mind on vengeance and vengeance only. There exists no ironic humour in Del Amo’s film – Son of Jesse James is played dead-straight and drier than a Death Valley cactus. Camardiel mugs away and aims for laughs in his usual patented manner, of course, the genre forever quick to paint at least one subsidiary character per film as well-meaning clown – usually in its depiction of benign alcoholics, as is the case here – but for the most part the film works as passable drama. As the picture heads toward its climax, Bill guns down a town father, forcing Davis and the law to go after him. Del Amo captures the chase in a series of impressive long shots, his stuntmen and riders dwarfed by the spectacular Hoyo de Manzanares landscape. Alonzo confesses that he’s known Bill’s identity all along, telling Jr. that he fought alongside his father in the civil war. Together, the bitter son and the drunken cook take on Marshall’s cronies. Beyond the standard gunplay, there’s a totally unexpected – and hugely impressive – action sequence in which Bill escapes from the enemy by boarding an elevated mining cart and sliding to safety. The camera is mounted on the cart, some hundred feet in the air, with Hundar himself (no stunt double) riding high and firing away with his pistol. It’s a simple yet highly effective piece of old-school film-making, and easily emerges as the standout moment of the film – perhaps its only legitimately memorable scene.

Back at the Three Star Ranch, Sheriff Davis and his lawmen arrive. As always, in a genre teeming with corrupt officials and tarnished tin stars, it’s always a welcome surprise to have a stoic, upstanding guy as honourable lawman, and Hoven makes for a likable Sheriff, imbuing Davis with a charming, affable decency (you can see why Dorothy might be so enamored). Bill is arrested for his killing of the town official, even though Dorothy protests his innocence, appealing to Davis for leniency. Such scenes should be tepid, hollow stuff – the kind of blandly coquettish fluff that killed many a lesser oater – but Hoven is such an infectious presence and Alonso so utterly beguiling that even the slower moments of pseudo-romance can’t bring the film to a halt. When the smoke clears, Alonzo identifies Marshall as Bob Ford, the murderer of Jesse James (how the hell he knows this isn’t addressed – was he masked beyond all that red light in the opening scene?). Bafflingly, Hundar plays it dumb-as-nails here, as if he had no real clue, the film further painting Bill James as a bit of a dolt. Turning the tables, Bill throws Davis and his deputy in a jail cell, the film foolishly sidelining its star player (Son is infinitely more interesting when Hoven is on-screen). Bill then guns down Bruce, igniting the final battle. Somewhat mystifying is the Sheriff’s sudden reappearance at this juncture: What was the point of the previous scene? Who let him out? Why is he not pissed off at Bill for locking him up in his own jail cell? All questions go ignored as the action escalates, culminating in a shootout at the Three Star Ranch. Here, the hulking Alonzo runs around splitting enemy skulls with a piece of timber which looks suspiciously like a baseball bat, as if Camardiel was foreshadowing famed Tennessee lawman/vigilante Buford Pusser and his patented wooden club. The prevailing dramatic dynamic here is intriguing: Bill wants Marshall dead; Davis wants Bill arrested and Marshall wants his great deception to continue. It all boils down to a gentlemen’s dual between Bill and Marshall. Bill is, of course, faster on the draw, and his vengeance is finally executed, the settling of accounts complete. Commendably, Davis still arrests Bill, acknowledging likely justification yet sworn to uphold the law. Cue choral chanting and an impressive crane shot signifying the end of the film.

If nothing else, Son of Jesse James proves to be both frustrating curiosity and a fairly painless ninety-minute diversion. The Jesse James myth has little to do with the film outside providing a scrap of name recognition and a reason for its embittered, bastard protagonist to exist. Some might be surprised to learn that Del Amo’s film was co-produced by Alberto Grimaldi’s P.E.A. (though I saw no clear indicator of a more generous budget on screen). Beyond staid pacing and no real narrative drive, the biggest problem with the film – at least to my mind – is how it negates the real-life Bob Ford’s motives for killing Jesses James in the first place. Killing James in the hope of claiming a reward from then-Governor Crittenden (and, no doubt, hoping to syphon off a little of James’ notoriety in the process), Ford famously went on to enjoy a period of problematic celebratory, even participating in theatrical enactments of the murder across the country. In Son, however, Ford is clearly running from the past; instead of basking in his earned infamy, he opts to live incognito whilst continuing his criminal enterprises. It’s a confusing detour, to say the least. There’s also the issue of age: Ford was only thirty years-old when he was shot and killed himself by Edward Capehart O'Kelley. Yet in Son, the actor portraying Ford (Induni) is clearly pushing fifty. Not that any of this fact-tweaking ultimately matters, mind. As the classic Fordian credo goes… ‘Print the legend.’ Or as pertains to Del Amo’s lower-tier western, print the middling variant.

Written by DG Bell