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IMDbPro

Black Killer

  • 1971
  • 1h 25m
IMDb RATING
5.3/10
506
YOUR RATING
Klaus Kinski in Black Killer (1971)
Spaghetti WesternCrimeDramaWestern

In Tombstone, a new sheriff vows to clean up the town of outlaws like the O'Hara brothers and is assisted by a strange lawyer who always carries two large law books with him.In Tombstone, a new sheriff vows to clean up the town of outlaws like the O'Hara brothers and is assisted by a strange lawyer who always carries two large law books with him.In Tombstone, a new sheriff vows to clean up the town of outlaws like the O'Hara brothers and is assisted by a strange lawyer who always carries two large law books with him.

  • Director
    • Carlo Croccolo
  • Writers
    • Luigi Angelo
    • Carlo Croccolo
  • Stars
    • Klaus Kinski
    • Fred Robsahm
    • Antonio Cantafora
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    5.3/10
    506
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Carlo Croccolo
    • Writers
      • Luigi Angelo
      • Carlo Croccolo
    • Stars
      • Klaus Kinski
      • Fred Robsahm
      • Antonio Cantafora
    • 14User reviews
    • 3Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • Photos25

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    Top cast16

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    Klaus Kinski
    Klaus Kinski
    • James Webb…
    Fred Robsahm
    • Burt Collins
    Antonio Cantafora
    Antonio Cantafora
    • Ramon O'Hara
    Marina Rabissi
    • Sarah Collins
    • (as Marina Mulligan)
    Enzo Pulcrano
    • Pedro O'Hara
    • (as Paul Craine)
    Tiziana Dini
    • Consuelo
    Calogero Caruana
    • Miguel O'Hara
    • (as Ted Jones)
    Gerardo Rossi
    • Peter Collins
    • (as Jerry Ross)
    Claudio Trionfi
    Antonio Danesi
    • Ryan O'Hara
    • (as Robert Danish)
    Domenico Maggio
    • Slide O'Hara
    • (as Dick Foster)
    Carlo Croccolo
    Carlo Croccolo
    • Fred, Deputy Sheriff
    Dante Maggio
    • Judge Wilson
    • (as Dan May)
    Rolando De Santis
    • O'Hara Gunman
    • (uncredited)
    Antonella Dogan
    • Maureen
    • (uncredited)
    Xiro Papas
    Xiro Papas
    • Poker Player
    • (uncredited)
    • Director
      • Carlo Croccolo
    • Writers
      • Luigi Angelo
      • Carlo Croccolo
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews14

    5.3506
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    Featured reviews

    6spider89119

    a fairly good spaghetti western

    This spaghetti western has a very good music score and a great performance by Klaus Kinski as a strange lawyer who kills with books that have guns inside of them. He's really a natural for the role. His look and mannerisms fit the character perfectly.

    Not only does this western have Kinski, it also has a family of Mexican thugs named O'Hara! There's definitely nothing like a good old Italian western.

    This is one of those movies that will have you scratching your head a lot if you try to make perfect sense of everything that happens. It's best not to think about it too hard. Just sit back and enjoy it for what it is. It's got style, action, violence, weirdness, and an interesting though somewhat vague storyline.

    All in all, it's pretty good stuff for the spaghetti western fan.
    7Red-Barracuda

    Entertaining Kinski spaghetti western

    Many spaghetti westerns had absurd gimmicks that made them memorable while at the same time subverting the iconography of their traditional American counterparts. Perhaps most famously there was Django and his coffin, in Black Killer we have Klaus Kinski's lawyer with his guns disguised as books! Like a lot of the spaghetti western gimmicks it's simultaneously completely silly and very cool. On the whole though, its business as usual spaghetti western style in this movie. We have a lawless town called, perhaps unsurprisingly, Tombstone which is terrorised by a gang of Mexican bandits called somewhat improbably the O'Hara gang. A mysterious drifter called Burt who is adept with a fire-arm comes into town and is made new sheriff by the fearful locals. The bandits subsequently kill his brother and rape his sister-in-law, an Indian called Sarah. Burt and Sarah band together, with the help of Kinski's lawyer to get revenge.

    To be honest, the story-telling is a little confused and messy in this one. And it can appear a lot more convoluted than it really should do. But it ultimately is a pretty straightforward violent western. The sexual violence is fairly unpleasant, while one of the unfortunate early sheriffs is shot several times and then killed with a knife. It was good to see the character of Sarah get in on the retribution though – a female Indian with deadly skills with a bow and arrow made for a pleasant contrast to the typical taciturn gunfighter anti-hero she teams up with. Kinski is good as always as the lawyer who we can only assume the film is named after. He is in a rare good(ish) guy role in this one. He is dubbed with a silly English accent though it has to be said which is quite distracting. All-in-all though, this is a pretty entertaining spaghetti western.
    5lost-in-limbo

    "Be very careful with those books. They're very important to me"!

    I was sold when I saw Klaus Kinski on the poster artwork. Playing the title character too. Sadly in spite of that, he actually plays secondary to Fred Robsahm's rugged heroic cowboy, corrupt townsfolk judge and flamboyant dressed, evil cackling Mexican bandit brothers in this surprisingly ruthless, yet formulaic spaghetti western set in the town Tombstone?!

    What starts with a loose string of story threads and characters eventually had Kinski's sly, scheming lawyer as the glue holding the (confounded and raggedly edited) plot together. It's rather a collected performance, although the intensity in his eyes is all on show emoting every lingering thought. However he doesn't get much to do on the action front. Unless you enjoy watching him read, glare down, creeping about, peering out of windows or behind red curtains with books always in hand. Books you say, yep books. Oh there's a catch. Think Django with his coffin... now how about Black Killer/James Webb with his books. Even one with a built in draw string. Kinski gets creative with his pistol handling, real creative on the quick draw and faultless with his aim. The problem... I just wish we had more of it. It's a small novelty, but this along with the wicked spaghetti flavoured music score made a lasting impression.
    7alandolton

    Good performances from Marina Malfatti and Tiziana Dini

    This film features good performances by the Italian actresses Marina Malfatti and Tiziani Dini. Bizarrely, although Malfatti is correctly credited in several of the earlier reviews on IMDb, and is also correctly credited on Wkikpedia, the cast list for this title on IMDb has been changed (vandalised) within the last year or so to credit Malfatti's part to a little-known actress named Marina Rabissi. I attempted to correct this some months ago, but the change has not been made. Malfatti looks convincing as a Native American, but the weakest feature of this film is the 'brownface' make-up of some of the Italian actors playing the O'Hara brothers who are the villains of this movie.
    Wizard-8

    A spaghetti western that's a mixed bag

    Much of the positive that is to be found in "Black Killer" can be found with Klaus Kinski and the character he plays. The cold-eyed Kinski instantly brings in some grit with his charisma, though I have to admit that the unintentionally funny English dubbing for him sounds NOTHING like how Kinski (who could speak English) sounded in real life. There is also some novelty that Kinski is playing a lawyer (!), though one who is handy with a gun. Other positive things in the movie include a good musical score, as well as some good shoot-outs. And there is a significant amount of nudity, which you usually don't see in a spaghetti western. On the other hand, there isn't much of a story here, and the little there is unfolds very slowly. There were a couple of slow stretched where I almost drifted off into sleep. This isn't a bad movie, but I would only recommend it to Kinski fans and/or spaghetti western fans.

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    Related interests

    Clint Eastwood in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)
    Spaghetti Western
    James Gandolfini, Edie Falco, Sharon Angela, Max Casella, Dan Grimaldi, Joe Perrino, Donna Pescow, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, Tony Sirico, and Michael Drayer in The Sopranos (1999)
    Crime
    Mahershala Ali and Alex R. Hibbert in Moonlight (2016)
    Drama
    John Wayne and Harry Carey Jr. in The Searchers (1956)
    Western

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      The leading actress is Marina Rabissi, (then director Carlo Croccolo's wife), who is credited with the name of Marina Mulligan. In the past Marina Mulligan has been wrongly credited as an alias for Marina Malfatti in several publications. It was Carlo Croccolo himself, interviewed by Italian movie critic Marco Giusti, to reveal the mistake. "[...] In her place I took my wife, who was playing the lead as Marina Mulligan, put her in a blonde wig and immediately shot her to the head.[...]," he said about an extra.
    • Goofs
      Near the end, Sarah triggers an explosion by hitting the previously placed explosives with an arrow. The explosion is shown in 2 successive shots. In the 2nd shot, one of the O'Hara brothers behaves like he was standing near the explosion and got gravely injured. However, it is blatantly obvious that there was nobody near the explosion in the 1st shot, which means that O'Hara abruptly appeared there between the shots.
    • Connections
      Edited into Bounty Hunter in Trinity (1972)

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    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • November 27, 1971 (Italy)
    • Country of origin
      • Italy
    • Language
      • Italian
    • Also known as
      • Crni ubica
    • Filming locations
      • De Paolis/INCIR Studios, Rome, Lazio, Italy(Studio)
    • Production companies
      • Virginia Cinematografica
      • Tegica
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 1h 25m(85 min)
    • Sound mix
      • Mono
    • Aspect ratio
      • 2.35 : 1

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