Help me remember this western/comedy movie.

June 22, 2008 1:12 PM

Help me identify this old western movie by its final scene (is it a comedy?)

In the mid 80's I saw the end of a ridiculous movie which I've not seen since. It was a western and there was a narrator in a gunfight against a bald man dressed all in black. The shootout occurred and the man in black got shot in the stomach and the hero/narrator walked away. The evil man begged his lackey "Please don't let me die with my boots on!" and so the lackey tugged and tugged on the bald man's black boots.

The narrator wrapped up the happenings in the movie and then said "As for I don't know if his lackey ever got his boots off" (or whatever). And it showed the lackey STILL tugging on the bad guy's boots.

The bad guy looked like James Carvell, or kinda like Christopher Lloyd in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

Anyone seen this movie (scene this movie ;) ) and if so, can you scratch this itch and tell me what movie it was I saw 20 years ago?

posted by arniec to media & arts (6 comments total)

I can't say I've seen this, but Googling "please don't let me die with my boots on" yields exactly one result, a forum post that attributes the line to an episode of the A-Team entitled Where is the Monster When You Need Him?. It apparently aired in 1985.
posted by adamdschneider at 1:41 PM on June 22

Almost sounds like it could be from Rustler's Rhapsody, but it's been way too long since I've seen it.
posted by madmethods at 1:52 PM on June 22

Since you used the word ridiculous to describe it, the film The Villain immediately came to mind. It's sort of like a Roadrunner cartoon, except that it's not a cartoon. I haven't seen it since the mid 80s though, so can't remember how it ends.
posted by iconomy at 2:20 PM on June 22

Sounds like Support Your Local Gunfighter.
posted by buggzzee23 at 2:56 PM on June 22

From Roger Ebert's description of Support Your Local Gunfighter:
The movie ends with Jack Elam standing on the back platform of the next train out of town and telling us how the story turned out. We learn that James Garner did, indeed, marry Suzanne Pleshette, and that the gunfighter of the title is still trying to get his boots off (because, maybe, he is cursed to die with his boots on and hopes to save his life?). And what happens to Elam? "Me? I go on to be a star in Italian Westerns," he says. To me, he sounded wistful and a little hopeful. There is something inspiring about the sight of a man who wants to improve himself.
posted by buggzzee23 at 3:02 PM on June 22 [1 favorite]

Buggzzee23, good call. However (verified by a trip to my DVD collection), in "Support", the bad/bald guy shoots himself in the foot and James Garner is on a mule which goes nuts and explodes a tavern. So either the original poster is remembering wrong, or it's not quite the right movie. Still a good one though. Always liked Garner. And Suzanne Pleshette.
posted by gjc at 4:59 PM on June 23