The Scalphunters

Released Apr 2, 1968

1 hr. 42 min.

Western

Comedy

List

70%

10 Reviews

Tomatometer

58%

500+ Ratings

Audience Score

Illiterate fur trapper Joe Bass (Burt Lancaster) is coerced by some Kiowa Indians into trading his haul for a well-educated, escaped slave named Joseph Lee (Ossie Davis). Bass seeks to track the Indians and recover his treasure, while Joseph wants to travel to Mexico, where slavery is illegal. Their plans are complicated by the arrival of a band of scalphunters, led by Jim Howie (Telly Savalas), who want to kill the Indians, claim the furs and resell the black man.

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philip w

Well if you don't like this there's something wrong somewhere = it's very entertaining

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

01/01/24

Full Review

Audience Member

Burt Lancaster wants his furs back. Ossie Davis wants his freedom back. I want my 90 minutes back.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

01/31/23

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steve d

Nothing special even if it has its fun moments.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

03/30/23

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delysid d

i really liked this 60s american western, how i wish i was a cowboy

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

04/09/19

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Audience Member

Por maior que seja o gozo de ver Burt Lancaster e Telly Savalas em confronto a caminho do México, "The Scalphunters" não é muito mais que um simples western cómico de aventuras, com a agravante de um subtexto racial datado aos olhos de hoje.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

02/24/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Sydney Pollack directed The Scalphunters in 1968 with a strong leading cast, including Burt Lancaster, Ossie Davis, Shelley Winters, Telly Savalas, and a small role with Dabney Coleman in it. And while the material probably reads very strongly on the page, the resulting film is kind of a mess, mostly in tone. It's a movie that can't really make up its mind what it wants to be about, or what kind of tone that it wants to follow through on. There are some obvious character comparisons going on between Burt Lancaster's character and Telly Savalas' character, as both men are strong-minded, bull-headed, and have fierce convictions, but both men are on different sides of the playing field and the movie plays with the idea of their moral convictions. In the middle of all of this is Ossie Davis' character, a runaway slave who wants nothing more than to get away from everyone and be free, and he must play his part with both men in order to do it. The most obvious problem with the tone of the movie is the score, which is sometimes serious, but mostly just silly and cornballish in nature. It's definitely the main aspect of the movie that gives it its identity crisis. It also doesn't help that Burt Lancaster seems to be in the wrong movie. He's meant to be playing a very simple man (more or less admitting that he can't read or write), but yet he spouts that sharp Burt Lancaster dialogue that he's well known for. On the other hand, one could argue that he's the main reason for seeing the film in the first place. And Shelley Winters, as a character at least, is even more pointless. She seems as if she's going to have some kind of an arc, but by the end of the film, she continues to be the woman she's been for the previous hour and a half. There are some good scenes to be had here and there in the movie with some nice dramatic weight to them, but they're all jumbled into a messy story that doesn't know what it wants to accomplish. By and large, a different score would definitely have helped, but a complete re-write from the very beginning (and dare I say, better direction) would have helped even more. It's not a complete waste of time, but it could have been sharper in execution.

Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars

01/26/23

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Sydney Pollack

Director

Burt Lancaster

Joe Bass

Shelley Winters

Kate

Ossie Davis

Joseph Lee

Telly Savalas

Jim Howie

Dabney Coleman

Jed

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Variety Staff

Variety

Lancaster and Davis work particularly well together, ditto Savalas and Winters. There are talky periods of slow pace, but they are terminated before undue damage has been done.

Mar 20, 2008

Full Review

Time Out

An amiable enough liberal comedy Western, with colour-coded cultural conflict worked through an ironic circular plot.

Feb 9, 2006

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Renata Adler

New York Times

While the individual incidents are familiar, they are played with gusto by Lancaster and Davis.

May 21, 2005

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Brian Orndorf

Blu-ray.com

Navigating the movie's period attitude is relatively easy, but finding its sense of humor takes some work.

Rated: B-

Sep 27, 2014

Full Review

David Nusair

Reel Film Reviews

...a seriously misguided and hopelessly dated endeavor that's best left forgotten.

Rated: 1/4

Sep 30, 2013

Full Review

TV Guide

A comical western with more than a hint of social satire.

Rated: 3/4

Mar 20, 2008

Full Review

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Synopsis

Illiterate fur trapper Joe Bass (Burt Lancaster) is coerced by some Kiowa Indians into trading his haul for a well-educated, escaped slave named Joseph Lee (Ossie Davis). Bass seeks to track the Indians and recover his treasure, while Joseph wants to travel to Mexico, where slavery is illegal. Their plans are complicated by the arrival of a band of scalphunters, led by Jim Howie (Telly Savalas), who want to kill the Indians, claim the furs and resell the black man.

Director: Sydney Pollack
Screenwriter: William W. Norton
Distributor: United Artists
Production Co: Norlan Productions, Bristol Films
Genre: Western, Comedy
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Apr 2, 1968, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Sep 16, 2008

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