Shalako

Shalako (1968)

Sean Connery is Shalako! Shalako means action! Action means Bardot!

While guiding a hunting party of clueless European aristocrats, cowboy Bosky Fulton leads them into hostile Apache territory. Becoming separated from the group, Countess Irina Lazaar experiences the first run-in with an Apache, which results in the tracker Shalako coming to her rescue. Despite Shalako's warning to leave the area immediately, the pampered foreigners fail to take him seriously, leaving them in grave danger.

Date of release
1968-09-26
TMDB
5.6 / 10 (101)
Runtime
1h 53m
Genres
Western
Director
Edward Dmytryk

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Box office: $2.6M
  • Budget: $5M
  • Earned 0.5× its budget
  • Based on: Shalako
  • Filmed in: Almería Province

Shalako is a 1968 Western film directed by Edward Dmytryk and starring Sean Connery and Brigitte Bardot. It was shot at Shepperton Studios near London with sets designed by the art director Herbert Smith. Location shooting took place in Almería in southern Spain, particularly in the Tabernas Desert which was frequently used in European westerns during the decade.

Production

Producer Euan Lloyd was introduced to Louis L'Amour, author of numerous Western adventure novels, by his actor friend Alan Ladd. Over the years, as Lloyd dreamed of becoming an independent producer, he kept in touch with L'Amour. He wanted to film his 1962 novel Shalako. In 1965 Lloyd announced he had the rights.

Lloyd offered the project to director Edward Dmytryk when the latter was preparing Anzio. Dmytryk felt "the story was interesting, script awful" and agreed to direct if Lloyd had the script rewritten by an actor friend of the director, Jim Griffith. The producer acquiesced and Dmytryk said the new script "wasn't Shane or even Warlock but it wasn't bad." However he doubted Lloyd would be able to get the necessary stars to finance the movie.

During a meeting with L'Amour, Lloyd recounted long lines at the cinemas in New York City for the latest James Bond adventure film. L'Amour remarked that Sean Connery, who starred in the role, would certainly "look tall in the saddle". When Lloyd met Sean Connery and discussed the work with him, he learned that Connery was a Western fan since childhood.

Connery was available, as he had turned down playing Bond in On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Lloyd obtained that film's planned original co-star Brigitte Bardot, Bond cinematographer Ted Moore, and Bond stuntman and action scene arranger Bob Simmons. Bardot turned down the female lead in On Her Majesty's Secret Service for Shalako. She was paid $400,000 plus 12.5% of the profits. It was her second Western, the first being Viva Maria (1965).

Once Lloyd had Connery on board, many European and other film distributors were keen to finance the film. Distributors in 35 different countries agreed to provide promissory notes worth $5 million payable on delivery of the film. This enabled Lloyd to raise the $3 million necessary to start production and to sign Connery and Bardot.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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