Winnetou III: The Last Shot

Winnetou III: The Last Shot (1965)

Runtime: 93 minutes

Directed by: Harald Reinl

Starring: Lex Barker, Pierre Brice, Rik Battaglia, Ralf Wolter, Carl Lange

From: A few different European companies in various European countries

I am happy to return to the world of the West German Western, OLD SHATTERHAND the white hero, and the noble Native American Winnetou. In the past few years, I’ve viewed several previous installments in the series: 

Treasure of Silver Lake
Apache Gold
Last of the Renegades

To copy and paste what I’ve wrote in the past about the series: 

“Another topic is how because I've reviewed a staggering variety of different movies, all sorts of people follow me that see all sorts of motion pictures no matter how niche their favorite genres be. Consequently, I always feel obliged to keep up the rather eclectic mix of pictures.

One mutual in particular has an interest in old West German genre flicks, including the Westerns they made. Yes, West Germans made more than a few cowboys & Indian films and they were shot in locations like what is now known as Croatia. As they did w/ their krimi movies that were based on old stories from the likes of Edgar Wallace, the Westerns were typically based on the works of 19th century German author Karl May... someone who had never been in America at all-let alone the Wild West-but managed to fake it well enough to fool people. He wrote a number of novels featuring a white cowboy nicknamed Old Shatterhand-which to me sounds like the name of a Jaeger in Pacific Rim!-who teamed up with an Apache chief named Winnetou.”

I’ve had a swell time viewing those previous pictures; whatever you want to call this installment (it has several different names), it was the best, IMO. The plot wasn’t too revolutionary: once again, white people are attempting to stir up Native Americans and cause problems for the sake of profit. However, this time the stakes just felt more fatalistic than before. Specific reasons won’t be given, except that the heroes are chased often & a rival tribe’s been manipulated by bad white people via the usage of both whiskey and guns.

Like in the other movies, Croatia managed to be a reasonable facsimile of the Wild West, except with more lakes, waterfalls, and greenery. That scenery always looks resplendent. They are all fine adventures along with enjoyable Westerns. Personally, I was happy that the supporting character Sam Hawkens returned. He was in two of the other movies as a wacky guy who wore a bad wig as he was scalped. I was also happy that he had more to do here. Furthermore, the scores from Martin Bottcher are always epic; this may have been his best.

Thankfully these can all be streamed on Amazon, more often than not on Prime. If you're so inclined, those movies are all a swell time.