A Western adventure taking place in 19th California starred by El Coyote written by Jose Mallorqui and heavily indebted to the likes of Zorro by Johnson McCulley and his contemporaries. 1848 California, the USA invading army has defeated the Mexican forces and California takes part of the United States. But there happens the mistreating carried out by the encroaching military against the ranchers, humble villagers, countrymen and peasants , including the greedy prospectors when encounter the valuable gold nuggets. Meanwhile, a nasty and powerful owner, Alberto de Mendoza, takes lands of the poor farmers. As an ordinary man called Cesar Echague who is actually the Masked Coyote : Jose Coronado, son of a good Land Baron : Cesar Echague Sr: Nigel Davenport, becomes annoyer by the corruption and injustice he sees. And in the end his annoyance leads him to don a mask to take vendetta against the villains.
This is an adventure western postboiler with noisy action, go riding chases , shootouts .Being last cinematic appearance of this fictitious, sucessful character written by Jose Mallorqui that was a big hit in Spain and Latinoamerica . But this mediocre tale particularly fails to ignite enough entertainment and excitement in the part of the spectator. As it is utterly predictable in every aspect as well as the action, and the story nothing special. The film is formed by 2 parts titled : Cesar Echague and El Tribunal de Coyote . Javier Coronado as El coyote gives a passable acting, being well accompanied by a frankly fine support cast, such as Nigel Davenport, Alberto Mendoza, Manuel Alexandre, Ramon Langa, Ray Lovelock, Chiara Caselli, Isabel Serrano, Manuel Zarzo, Txema Blasco and many others. It packs a colorful and evocative cinematography by Jaume Peracaula. And an atmospheric as well as thrilling musical score by Sebastian Marine. The motion picture was professional but regularly director by the veteran and prestigious filmmaker Mario Camus, failing at the Spanish boxoffice.
Based on a novel by popular writerJose Mallorqui, whose novels have been adapted several times, such as : El Coyote 1954 by Joaquin Romero Marchent with Abel Salazar, Gloria Marin, Manuel Monroy, followed by a sequel La Justicia del Coyote 1954 by Marchent himself and same actors. And The sign of the Coyote 1963 also titled El Vengador de California by Mario Caiano with Fernando Casanova, Mario Feliciani, Maria Luz Galicia and Fernando Sancho. Jose Mallorqui also wrote scripts for Spaghetti, Chorizo Westerns such as : Brandy by Jose Luis Borau, 3 hombres buenos by Joaquin Marchent, 4 balazos by Agustin Navarro, El sheriff terrible by Antonio Momplet, Winchester uno entre mil by Primo Zeglio and Heroes del oeste by Steno.
