Johnny (Juan Orol), a big city gangster on the run, comes to a small
town ... where he finds his former girlfriend, singer Rosa (Rosa Carmina)
performing in a night club. This brings back memories of course: Many
years ago, Johnny has worked as an honest car mechanic, and his life has
been going exactly nowhere - until a gangsterboss witnessed him in a
fistfight in which he beat the living daylights out of 3 opponents
single-handedly. The boss was quick to offer him a career in crime, and
Johnny became a success almost immediately. Eventually though, Johnny ran
across Rosa, fell in love with her, and started dating her. The problem:
Rosa was the moll of a big gangsterboss, so Johnny had to gun him down -
which didn't sit well with his gang, who not only tried to get him on
their own, but also used the police to get rid of him. Eventually, Johnny
got into a shootout and faked his own death, just to get away. Since then,
he, an officially dead man, is on the run ... Back in the now: Upon
meeting Johnny again, Rosa immediately falls in love with him again, but
there's a problem, she is now the girlfriend of Pancho (José Pulido),
head of the local charros, and he is not one to give her up easily. Thing
is, the local merchants don't like Pancho and gang one bit, so they hire
Johnny and friends to get rid of them. Soon a gangwar is on, but Johnny is
quick to win the upper hand because losing Rosa to him leaves Pancho a
broken man. Eventually, he pays a visit to kill her - but seeing the woman
he still loves he just can't, and when she explains that she hasn't left
him out of cruelty but out of love for Johnny which predates their
relationship by years, he is almost willing to give up everything - but he
still has a gang to lead, to he challenges Johnny to a final shootout - in
which not only Pancho and Johnny but also Rosa find their deaths ... A
weird genre mix of Western and gangster movie with definite touches of
Jacques Tourneur's film noir masterpiece Out of the Past ... and
musical interludes. This all adds up to a not particularly good film,
especially when coupled with a very sloppily written script full of
plotholes and lacking proper story buildup, a rather clumsy directorial
effort that's a bit on the stagey and uninspired side, and a cast of less
than great actors. And for all these reasons, Gangsters contra Charros
is at least a fun movie, something that might not have invented filmmaking
or is at least good at it, but it does give you a chuckle or two,
unintended chuckles maybe, but chuckles still.
|