Trivia / The Legend of Frenchie King

• Awesome, Dear Boy: Claudia Cardinale signed up for this film under the condition that Brigitte Bardot, of whom she was a fan, be secured as her co-star.
• California Doubling: Texas, where the story takes place, is played by a Spanish desert, as usual for European-made Westerns.
• Completely Different Title: It's impossible to translate Les Petroleuses without losing one of its two meanings, thus the laundry list of very different titles.
  • The Legend of Frenchie King is a beautiful title, but has the drawback of suggesting that Louise is the sole main character, when in fact she shares that with Maria.
  • The Japanese title is Kareinaru Taiketsu. It means "Magnificent Showdown".
  • There's two Finnish titles - one means "Taming the Texas". Okay. But the other? "Oil, Chicks and Bad Guys". Cringe.
  • The Danish and Norwegian titles translate into "Wildcats of the West".
  • The Swedish title is "West's Wildest Brides".
  • The Polish title is "Queens of the Wild West".
  • One of the Greek titles is "Two Bandits Sweep the West".
  • Some countries took note of the historical meaning of "petroleuses" and named the movie The Arsonists, even though no one in the movie sets fire to anything.
• Dueling-Stars Movie: 'Dueling' being taken quite literally here.
• Dueling Works: With Hannie Caulder. Frenchie King and Hannie Caulder are both European-produced, 1971-released, female-centric (but not very feminist, or at best espousing an outdated idea of it) westerns. Both are considered trashy cinema for being heavy on the fanservice. But while Frenchie King is a farcical comedy, Hannie Caulder is a revenge drama.
• Fake Nationality: Lots of Spanish actors play French characters (e.g. 3 of Louise's sisters), Italo-Tunisian Claudia Cardinale plays a Corsican, and the best example ever, a Russian actor as a Native American (Valéry Inkijinoff as Spitting Bull).
• Friendship on the Set: Brigitte Bardot and Claudia Cardinale became good friends during filming, no doubt frustrating the paparazzi that had hoped their onscreen rivalry was fed by Reality Subtext.
• No Stunt Double: That nasty Cat Fight was all Bardot and Cardinale's doing. However, Bardot did use doubles when she had to ride horses and could get away with it.
• What Could Have Been: Nathalie Delon and Mireille Darc were the first choice for the leads.
• Working Title: According to an article published in the Evening Standard while the movie was in production, its initial English title was Love on Horseback.

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