A Fistful of Sausages

Next month the British Film Institute will screen a recently restored print of A Fistful of Sausages.

This now forgotten sequel to the classic Spaghetti Western A Fistful of Dollars was made in 1967 and was partly sponsored by the British Pork, Beef and Mechanically Recovered Offal Marketing Board.

Despite the shoestring budget, Clint Eastwood returned one more time to play 'the man with no name', although here the character is retitled 'the man who enjoys 100% prime pork and beef substitute meat products'.

Thinly veiled marketing exercise

At the time of its release the film suffered badly, with many critics claiming that it was little more than a thinly veiled marketing exercise. They took a particular dislike to the gunfight at the conclusion of the movie, in which Eastwood taunts a group of Mexican bandits about the inflated prices they have paid for inferior quality meat products before gunning them down.

Development of the British sausage

Recent years have seen the movie reappraised in a more favourable light, both in the context of its place in the history of cinema and in respect of its pivotal role in the development of the British sausage.

And although they are not directly connected, A Fistful of Sausages went on to inspire a short run of British sex comedies, staring the irrepressible Robin Asquith - as a cheeky window cleaner in A Fistful of Buckets, a cheeky plumber in A Fistful of Ballcocks, and finally as a cheeky boxing promoter in A Fistful of Fists.