Machine Gun McCain (1969) I feel remiss in taking so long to get to this one.......since BQ positively dotes on such 1960's International Co-Productions.....filled with multi-national casts, and then arriving in America with everybody re-dubbed in English.....oh how I loved 'em.....
This nasty, violent little gangland shoot 'em up benefits from an especially primo cast.....John Cassavetes, no doubt picking up a paycheck to help finance his groundbreaking independent films, takes the lead. Also on board are Cassavetes wife Gena Rowlands, giving the role of his long estranged partner in crime extra power and poignancy......and Peter Falk as a brutal, volcanic tempered mafioso...(the kind of role later taken over by Joe Pesci in Martin Scorcese films.)
(And as we all know, Falk and Rowlands would go on to contribute memorable roles to Cassavetes' iconoclastic indies like "Husbands" and "A Woman Under The Influence)
Falk attempts to bully his way into getting a slice of a new plush Las Vegas casino, not realizing it's owned by his all powerful East Coast Godfather boss (Gabriele Ferzetti, already having one hell of year with iconic roles in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" and "Once Upon A Time In The West")
The ever hot headed Falk arranges a pardon for hardened, imprisoned gangster Hank McCain (Cassavetes) He then recruits McCain's dumb punk son to get dad to rob the casino. Once Falk finds out who's he's screwing over, his attempts to reverse course go awry......cause Cassavetes plans to rob the place for himself anyway, with the help of a Vegas hooker, (Britt Ekland) he romanced and married overnight.
It's all gritty fun stuff, with director Guiliano Montaldo (of the glorious heist epic "Grand Slam") and his Italian crew filming shootouts and chases all over Las Vegas, without ever getting permits from the city....(a standard practice for the mafia blood-fests shot in Rome and Milan.)
And for lovers of 1960's Euro-trash plenty of favorite faces to spot in the supporting cast......the always dangerously stunning Florinda Bolkan and the formidable Tony Kendall of those action packed 'Komissar X' spy capers. American character tough guy Val Avery pops in too, but evidently skipped the re-dub of his own lines.
All you'd need for the cherry on top....a somber but catchy theme by the ultimate maestro Ennio Morricone, You got it......with even overwrought lyrics put to the theme as the end credits roll. ("No man ever was or will be like the man called Hank McCain!")
For all film buffs who can never get enough of this kind of unabashed pulp fictioneering. With its inevitable high body count and terrific cast, 'Machine Gun McCain' remains a guilty pleasure treasure....4 rapid-fire stars (****)
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