The Master Gunfighter

[Drayton Calhoun]

How many of you have ever watched this one? Tom Mclaughlin (I think that's how it's spelled, I have problems with any name over five letters, lol) it's interesting.

[Professor Marvel]

Ah yes, regrettabley I must admit that I *did* see but, gratefully I did not actually pay actual money (beyond the cost of running the telly) to do so , but it was so .... pathetic .... that it kind of seared it's way into my memory .

I would best describe thusly:

iBilly Jack heads to Japan, in an unrealistically short period of time becomes  samurai-like , and proceeds to carry a katana and a legendary mythical fictional  "six chambered" twelve shooter (actually a none-shot  LeMat) to Old California to do what that which Billy Jack usually does.

The first several Billy Jack movies did reasonably well ... ok somewhat well. After the critical and financial failures of his films "The Trial of Billy Jack" and "Billy Jack goes to Washington", Monsieur Laughlin came up with this turkey.

It would appear that Billy Jack, er... Tom Laughlin attempted to follow the success of the Spaghetti Western Kings by ripping off the plot ... er I mean  basing it on the Japanese Samurai Flic "Goyokin". We can see that monsieur Laughlin's name appears waaaaaay too often in the credits, and he appears to have used nom-de-plums (as was his wont) for further credits.

The movie, released in 1975  was an attempt to leverage the martial-arts craze into some sort of Spanish California Western.

A far far better film was the earlier (1971) "Red Sun" starring Charles Bronson and Toshirô Mifune which realistically introduced a Japanese Samurai (Mifune) into the West as a bodyguard to the Ambassador of Japan on a rail trip from San Francisco to his posting in Washington.

In "Red Sun" the writers even worked in the Japanese Legend of the great sword named "Grass Cutter". the evil badguys attempted to burn the good guys out by setting a prairie fire. The good guys survived because Mifune remembered and duplicated the legend, using his sword to make a large clearcut in which they took refuge.

Rather than regale my delicate audience with depressing detail of the Master Gunfighter's general awfulness, I will leave you, the gentle reader, with this quote from a "horrible film review" website, (to wit jabootu.com )

"As ponderous and deeply silly as The Master Gunfighter  is, it's a gently graded foothill in the foreboding Bad Movie mountain range churned up by the tectonic ego of by '70s schlock amateur Tom Laughlin."

yhs
prof marvel

[Drayton Calhoun]

Oh, come now, Professor! I thought it was a masterful blend of martial arts, gun fighting and historical awareness...please pardon my hysterical laughter! It should rate up there with Teryaki Mofumbo or whatever Tarantino's western effort is called.