Lucky Johnny

Movie
German title	Lucky Johnny
Original title	Arde baby, arde
Country of production	Mexico
original language	Spanish
Publishing year	1975
length	94 minutes
Rod
Director	José Antonio Bolaños
script	José Antonio Bolaños Pedro Miret
production	Juan Abusaid Ríos
music	Luchi De Jesus
camera	Alex Philips
cut	Nino Baragli
occupation
Glen Lee : Johnny James Westerfield : John Applebee Venetia Vianello : Kelly Evaristo Marquez : Lucius Sonny Vandeusen : Sonny (as Granville Van Deusen ) Virgil Frye : Jack Poggin Carlos East : Deek Barbara Angely : Sara Jorge Russek : District Officer (as George Russek ) Tony Monaco : Driver

Lucky Johnny (Original title: Arde baby, arde ) is a Mexican Western , the José Bolaños 1971 staged, but which came only four years later in the cinemas. In the German-speaking world, it was marketed as the Spaghetti Western and premiered on video under the title Lucky Johnny - The Curse of the Rattlesnake .

action

The gravedigger Applebee finds a baby in the desert that he saves from the bite of a rattlesnake, takes with him, names it Johnny, and raises it like his own son. As he grows up, Johnny develops into a violent young man who often starts arguments in order to be able to shoot the enemy down; so he wants to support his father in his profession. When one day both of them come across the remains of a massacre, they come up with the idea of ​​an opulent burial park, which they successfully implement. When Johnny falls in love with Kelly, however, he has to choose between his adoptive father and his love when she, a prostitute, is betrayed and arrested by her partner with whom she has robbed the stagecoach. Together with a black deserter, Johnny goes on a search.

criticism

The lexicon of international films saw a “(un) half-baked mixture between the melancholy late Western and the bloody straggler of the spaghetti western wave; the anti-war film attitudes of the production filmed in Mexico seem artificial. ” Hal Erickson draws the conclusion:“ What begins as an educational drama is in the end almost a splatter film ”.

Remarks

The international title of the all-Mexican production, which was filmed in 1971 but only performed four years later, is Dead Aim . It was the last film by US actor James Westerfield, who had been dead for over three years when the film premiered. Mel Carter sings the song Where's Love .

Web links

• Lucky Johnny in the Internet Movie Database (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Lucky Johnny. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .  
2. ↑ http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/127192/Lucky-Johnny-Born-in-America/overview