Frank Bellamy from a 1973 interview with Dez Skinn and Dave Gibbons
''I'd love to draw the Sergio Leone Dollars films in strip form. Not just the Dollars films because they where big successes but any Spaghetti western''
in 1976 Ally Sloper magazine issue 1 printed a three page strip by Frank of a western strip called Swade inspired by Sergio Leone
it was sadly one of the last things Frank drew so as a tribute to these visionaries here are the 1960's movie posters of the Dollars movies,
like Frank i love these movies for the style the music and the characters all three films are brilliant the movie posters are great too all painted and still look great to look at.
A FIST FULL OF DOLLARS 1964
A FEW DOLLARS MORE 1965
THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY 1966
and Frank Bellamy's Swade
i love this work for it's design layout use of shadow and action there are no word balloons or thought boxes just art ,these pages still show what a great craftsman Bellamy was my thanks to the The Frank Bellamy Checklist's Norman Boyd who was kind enough to send me the Swade pages
the dollars movies copyright MGM Studios
Swade copyright Frank Bellamy
Those three pages hint at a world of mouth-watering possibilities - what a loss to the world.
ReplyDeleteyep sadly there where only three pages finished i would have loved to see him draw the Dollar films as graphic novels they would have been amazing
ReplyDeleteSo glad you made this post Jon, just got a little script recently from a certain online comic which is western themed. :)
ReplyDeleteMan, that would have been INCREDIBLE! WELL, it's totally different, but we have a 10 page comic book in the liner notes of our Spaghetti Western Concept Rap album, called "Showdown at the BK Corral." The album os basically an epic Spaghetti Western over 9 tracks - very influenced by Leone and Morricone, and the comic follows the story. I'd love to hear what you think of it! You can download the album for free at sunsetparkriders.com , but right now, the only way to see the comic is with the disc. Shoot me an email, tho, and I'll give you one way cheap.
ReplyDeleteI am the proud owner of the original artwork to all three pages of Swade. They say a picture paints 1,000 words, but these dynamic Bellamy graphics are more powerful than any script. Bellamy loved the western genre and they cropped up periodically in much of his later work, including Garth for the Daily Mirror.
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