Sonny and Jed

This latter-day Spaghetti Western boasts a good cast (Tomas Milian, Susan George, Telly Savalas, Laura Betti, Eduardo Fajardo, Rosanna Yanni and Herbert Fux) and is enjoyable while it's on...but the misogynist traits of Milian's character in particular and the general unpleasantness of it all leaves a bad taste in the viewer's mouth. In essence, this is a vulgarization of the Bonnie and Clyde myth in Western garb with Jed (Milian) an illiterate brute with Robin Hood pretensions and Sonny (George, just off Peckinpah's STRAW DOGS [1971]) is almost always on the point of being raped by all and sundry. Among the gallery of grotesques that cross their path are blinded lawman Savalas, whorehouse madam Betti and sex-starved aristocrat Yanni. Ennio Morricone provides the typically eclectic music score but I wouldn't say it's one of his more memorable works.

It's surprising to see how fast Sergio Corbucci's career declined. Only two years earlier he was making COMPANEROS, one of the high-points of the mid spaghetti western period. For SONNY AND JED he united his 'muse' Tomas Milian with Susan George fresh from Peckinpah's STRAW DOGS the previous year and Tellys Savalas who was at the time enjoying a prolonged vacation in the Mediterranean by making Italian b-movies. Despite of the cast however, the movie is a dim shadow of COMPANEROS. Certainly a let-down by Corbucci's usual standards, which he would go on to follow with another two poor westerns, essentially ending his career in the western as ingloriously it began (MASSACRE AT RED CANYON).

SONNY AND JED in its way reflects the ongoing the decline of the genre that Corbucci both helped shape and found his niche in by making the transition from the peplum he used to make under alias Stanley Corbett in his earlier days and with cheesy titles like Goliath and the Island of Vampires. It's a gritty, crass, vulgar tale of two unpleasant people, scruffy bandit Jed and feisty tomboy Sonny, hitching up together in a nameless patch of Roman countryside substituting for a nameless part of the West and going on a robbing spree while a monomaniac sheriff dressed in a fur (!) and his posse gun after them. The couple-of-criminals-on-the-loose idea seems to be a loan from BONNY AND CLYDE and Milian and Susan George have enough chemistry to see it through even when their constant bickering crosses the line from amusing to annoying. Milian's Jed is cut from that mould of distinctly latino temperament, the kind of uncomplicated picaresque irreverence Italians loved to introduce in their characters because it borough the western back home in a way, which owes a big debt to Tuco from Leone's GBU (as do all the characters of that lineage).

In the end the movie doesn't amount to much and the questionable choice of undermining Tellys Savalas' suave menace by turning him from a cruel, methodic badass into a staggering blind does a good job of cutting the legs from the movie's climax, but it's still peppered with memorable moments that save the day. Great examples of spaghetti western visual irony involving coffins and barns, snappy one-liners, hilarious bits like the scene when Jed enters a photographer's shop and demands to know why his photo is missing from the "Wanted" posters he's printing, a general sense of comic-book irreverence that is at once violent and funny, Sonny and Jed, although far from a rousing success, still has enough of these little moments to recommend it to genre fans.

I'd wanted to see SONNY AND JED for a while thanks to its provenence: the great Sergio Corbucci directing, and starring a fine triumverate in Tomas Milian, Telly Savalas and Susan George. Sadly, this turns out to be nothing more than a misfire, with the actors encouraged to overplay it at all times in the name of some extremely broad comedy, and a general lack of cohesion. Savalas appears at the beginning but then vanishes for most of the screen time, while Milian's anti-hero is one of his most irritating. And poor George is unsuited to her tomboy role and comes across as a little too shrill and histrionic. It's watchable enough for genre enthusiasts, but a far cry from the best of this kind of film.

Guns and violence are pretty synonymous with the Spaghetti Western genre; and while this film has all that stuff, the real reason Bandits is so good is not because of it; but because of the central characters and their relationship, and works so well mostly thanks to excellent performances from the beautiful Susan George and the immensely talented Tomas Milian. The film takes obvious influence from the famous story of Bonnie and Clyde, and indeed the most shocking thing about this film is the misogynistic nature of the lead male character. The story focuses on Jed; a good for nothing bandit who has little respect for anybody; friend or foe. His life is changed one day when he runs into a wannabe bandit by the name of Sonny, who he later finds out (much to his annoyance) is a female. They get split up after a robbery goes wrong, but fate soon brings the pair back together and they soon win themselves a reputation and have a price put on their head, leading the determined Sheriff Franciscus to chase the pair; stopping at nothing to bring them to justice.

Bandits has two central plots; we have the idea of the pair being wanted and chased by mercenaries, and also the relationship between them. It's the latter plot that is by far the most interesting and the one that director Sergio Corbucci is most keen to focus on. He ensures that both of his central characters are extremely well fleshed out and this benefits the film immensely as the audience is really made to care for them. This genre is not well known for well put together characters, so that makes this film all the more surprising. Tomas Milian is undoubtedly the film's biggest standout and I would have no qualms putting him right near the top of an all time greatest actors list. He leads the film amazingly well and we're never left in any doubt as to who the star of the show is. He gets good support from Susan George in one of her best roles and Telly Savalas who is effective as the lawman. It all boils down to a conclusion that brings closure to both of the main plots and while Sergio Corbucci will always be better remembered for Django and The Grand Silence; this is still an excellent Spaghetti Western and not one to miss!

"Sonny and Jed" starts out okay but after a while it runs out of steam. After it runs out of steam, it actually starts to get annoying. The cast is fine. Telly Savalas does a nice job (unfortunately, his character takes a turn toward the ridiculous). Forever dreamy Susan George does her best with pretty weak material. A dreamy Rosanna Yanni has a great last fifteen minutes or so but the star of the movie, Tomas Trigado, is mostly annoying. He brings nothing to the table. The biggest problem with "Sonny and Jed" is the script. It provides a few good moments here and there but it's mostly pretty bad. I won't be watching this movie again any time soon.