“Only Apache blood can take revenge.”

Justin’s rating: “Yellow Hair” feels like her mom wasn’t putting in much effort when the naming day came around

Justin’s review: When you’ve been swimming in the untended pool of cult films for a while, you’ll become more than familiar with all of the knock-offs that are out there — the Alien knock-offs, the Jaws ones, the Star Wars clones, and especially (in the ’80s) the Indiana Jones generic brand. And here’s the thing. You know that all of these are going to be some brand of terrible, because none of these directors are Spielberg or Lucas or Scott. The only question is, what brand of terrible will each of these be?

From the very title of Yellow Hair and the Fortress of Gold, I sent my expectation-o-meter somewhere between “innocently racist” and “Olivia Newton John music video.” But the idea of a female variant on the Indiana Jones pulp adventure genre intrigued me, so into it I went.

Oh yeah, movie, slather me with your awfulness.

This Spanish flick is more of a western-infused tale with a hint of the Indiana Jones spirit but not the overall format. It follows the platinum blonde Yellow Hair (Laurene Landon, Maniac Cop), a half-Apache adventurer who’s seeking a Mayan treasure with her trusty sidekick, the Pecos Kid (Ken Roberson). This treasure turns out to be a pool of gold, and in a very strange coincidence, this is the second movie in a row that I’ve watched with such a pool (the previous one being Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze). Maybe this was a thing back in the day? Lotsa gold pools everywhere?

Hot on their trail is the notorious (and heavily implied gay) Colonel with his army of thugs. But the bad guy’s not going to have it easy. The natives of whatever country this is supposed to be don’t like him much and aren’t above dunking a foe or two head-first into molten gold, so he’s kind of outclassed even with all his advanced weapons.

Yellow Hair and the Fortress of Gold emulates the old adventure serials pretty well, if a little more tongue-in-cheek and violent. It’s not exactly a predictable movie — I didn’t expect it to start with a pretty graphic slaughter of a gang of bad dudes — but it also struggles to get its tone right. Is it a light-hearted adventure? A cheeky comedy romp? A dip into exploitation? It can’t make up its mind.

However, the best part is easily the cheery comradery between “Yella” and Pecos. They’re both high-spirited physical types who love kicking butt, pulling one over on the bad guys, and trading quips. Despite a brewing romance, the two actually show bickering brother-and-sister vibes in the way they interact.

Yellow Hair isn’t a perfect action hero, and that’s a good thing. She’s quite capable in the action department, but she’s stubborn, runs a temper, and needs a helping hand now and then.

At the end of the day, this is a fun if old-fashioned nod to spaghetti westerns and serial adventures. It’s pretty dorky in parts and lacks all subtlety, but if you can get into the spirit, Yellow Hair takes you on a thrill ride that only a blonde could provide.

Intermission!

• Always fun to start a film by putting the audience into a virtual theater full of screaming kids and shushing, thank you for that
• She’s brave… heroic… and easy-going. Two out of three of those are admirable.
• Dude takes a HARD fall at the start there. Did we need to see him bounce?
• Wholesale slaughter — would you like to be shot, crushed, hung, scalped, drowned in gold, or impaled? This movie is a veritable buffet of options!
• The old-fashioned machine gun is pretty cool if completely inaccurate
• Context-free and music-free wrestling scenes stir confusing feelings in me
• “Nothing’s going to make me move before I’m ready.” [Yellow Hair tosses in lit dynamite] “I’m ready!”
• I now stab you with this ridiculously shaped weapon!
• Yellow Hair giving subtle card-playing advice
• Yellow Hair shooting off the guy’s earring was a great moment
• Well this is now the first movie where I’ve seen people tossing rattlesnakes tucked into tumbleweeds at people