I cavalieri dalle lunghe ombre

In 1971, James Keach and Stacy Keach played brothers in The Wright Brothers (1971). This gave James the idea that they should play Jesse and Frank James in a movie together. Stacy financed James to write a country musical about the brothers, which was eventually produced in Pennsylvania and New York. The Keaches then decided to turn the musical into a feature film screenplay in which both could star. In 1974, James was acting opposite Robert Carradine in La lunga faida (1975) and mentioned the project to him. Carradine suggested he and his brothers play the Younger brothers. The idea that all the brothers in the story be played by real-life brothers expanded.

The song "I'm a Good Ole Rebel", sung in the saloon scene, was not written until 1918.

UK video and DVD versions were cut by 4 secs by the BBFC to edit a horse-fall. Although the BBFC's website states that the 1986 video version was cut by 1 minute 35 secs, this seems to be erroneous.

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