Spikeopath La resa dei conti (The Big Gundown) is directed by Sergio Sollima and written by Sollima and Sergio Donati. It stars Lee Van Cleef, Tomas Milian, Walter Barnes and Gerard Herter. Music is by Ennio Morricone and cinematography by Carlo Calini.Superior Spaghetti Western with shades of Zapata for good measure, The Big Gundown finds Van Cleef as bounty hunter - cum - unofficial lawman Jonathan Corbett, whose reputation for bringing in the criminals, dead or alive, has caught the attention of business baron Brockston (Barnes). With an interest in getting into politics, Corbett is sold on Brockston's offer of political help if he will do a job for him. The job is to hunt down a Mexican rogue by the name of Cuchillo (Milian) who is alleged to have raped and murdered a 12 year old girl. Tracking Cuchillo across the land, the Mexican proves to be a slippery customer, and more importantly, Corbett begins to doubt the veracity of the charges against him.Adios Amigo.What do you need for a great Italo Western? A leading man with screen presence supreme? Check! Rogue antagonist able to overact opposite the leading man whilst still exuding charm personified? Check! Scorching vistas? Check! A musical score so in tune with the story it's a character all by itself? Check! And violence? Check! Sollima's movie has it all.Much of the film is about the manhunt and how the two men involved develop a relationship. Cuchillo claims he's being set up and seems to have friends in every town featured in the play. Corbett is a dandy with a gun, but he's not perfect, he can be outsmarted and get caught cold. There's good thought gone into the screenplay in this respect, not putting the anti-hero up as an infallible superman.Then there's the side-bar narrative strands that show Sollima's political bent, even though this is hardly a heavily politico piece. From class struggles and racism, to asides on the justice system and the fat cats who operate around the system, Sollima does enjoy dangling such carrots. With zippy set pieces fuelled by brooding machismo that is in turn enhanced by the top work from Carlini and Morricone (it's one of Moricone's best scores, real dynamite), this is grade "A" Spaghetti and well worth feasting on. 9/10

Scarecrow-88 The hunt is on as American lawman chases after a "dog of Juarez" (a Mexican Revolutionary who thought Mexicans deserved to be free from the tyranny of the country's government) accused of raping and murdering a 12-year old girl, following him into his native Mexico. Brokston, an American railroad tycoon, quite wealthy and ruthless, is protecting the true rapist, Shep (when he gets drunk, and spots a teenage girl, he usually accosts them, as we see later when a Mexican servant, carrying a tray of drinks, is nearly raped by him), because the scumbag has precious land (this land will serve as a path for the railroad), who will participate in the hunt with Van Cleef's black-clad officer of the law. Cuchillo, crafty and evasive, uses cunning techniques to escape Van Cleef (such as a supposed snake bite) and prison (a cool scene where an also imprisoned Van Cleef must watch as his quarry, in a separate cell, had already previously devised a plan of escape just in case he was jailed there again), and continues on the run, soon in deep trouble when his position is discovered in cane fields. There's the inclusion of a primpy, flamboyant showboat (Gérard Herter; who puts on a cape and wears a monocle for crying out loud) who talks about reading the eyes of those he draws against, waxing poetic to Van Cleef (Van Cleef, amusingly, just stands still in silence, but we know he thinks this blowhard is full of blarney and will get his just desserts eventually) about his skills.Before Brokston's overall involvement in the movie, "The Big Gundown", is ultimately about Van Cleef hunting Cuchillo through hot mountains and desert (and we see the dirt and sweat, the lawless frontier of Mexico is certainly established in the second half of the movie when Van Cleef loses Cuchillo and must pursue him in his terrain), each outsmarting the other at times. No new ground, plot-wise, is broken, but there's plenty of action, gun-fights, and stylized violence.There's really nothing earth-shattering about the movie, though, but as a Van Cleef fan, I just want to see him as the focal point of the action and, true to form, he doesn't disappoint. You never get the impression that he won't come out on top, however, so the western is predictable in that regard, but his opposition is loathsome enough that anyone he knocks off is deserved of his fate. Van Cleef's character approach pretty much remained the same in his "hero" movies, a pillar of resolve and unflinching when facing down gunfighters, he always seems (or, most of the time) to be the smartest character in the scene, but occasionally he was able to spread his wings within the spaghetti western genre. In this one, he's essentially the same character you would see in Death Rides a Horse. For someone like me, that is just fine, while others would probably complain that he is one dimensional. An actor who is as cool and charismatic as Van Cleef can get away with it, I feel, while others bore you to tears…some actors were born with this, some simply were (and are) not.Tomas Milian (Almost Human/Don't Torture a Duckling) is a treat as Cuchillo and really invests a lot in the role (one scene has a widow's hired hands/gunmen burying him in pig slop!) while Nieves Navarro (Death Walks on High Heels/All the Colors of the Dark) has a small, but memorable, part as a ranch widow who offers Van Cleef a position next to her side (Cuchillo smartly stirs up her knuckle-head brutes into engaging in a gunfight that does not go well for them). Amazingly Ángel del Pozo is uncredited as the slimy son-in-law of Brokston (Walter Barnes), despite his memorable showdown with Cuchillo which involves a knife.

Coventry I listened to the theme song on YouTube numerous times and I already watched and enjoyed the sequel "Run, Man, Run"; so it was about time for me to watch the one and only "The Big Gundown". Everybody is always talking about the spaghetti westerns directed by Sergio Leone, and particularly the Dollar-trilogy, and even though I'm the very first person to admit his films truly are genius, there were so many over- talented Italian directors making great westerns around that same time and nobody ever mentions their work. Sergio Sollima's "The Big Gundown", for example, which came out during the same year as "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" and even shares the same protagonist with Lee Van Cleef, is also a truly stellar and prime example of the spaghetti western genre. The film has a great cast, a stupendous Morricone soundtrack, an arousing plot outline, an intelligent script and numerous moments of great action & adrenalin, but apparently that's still not enough to qualify as an internationally acclaimed classic. Oh well, who cares, at least there's a handful of Italian cinema freaks out there (including Quentin Tarantino) that acknowledge and appreciate the smaller diamonds in the rough. I was fortunate enough to watch the fully uncut 107 minutes version, which features bits and pieces with original Italian sound edited into the American dubbed version. It's occasionally a bit peculiar to hear the sound switch and watch the colors fading, but the film makes much more sense with the cut bits into it. "The Big Gundown" has a very simple and rudimentary plot, but the elaboration is terrific and the chemistry between the two lead players – serious autonomous Lee Van Cleef and playful daredevil Tomas Milian – is sublime. Jonathan Corbett (Van Cleef) is a practically unbeatable Colorado lawman turned bounty hunter, and because of his prestige and honorable position, his friends are even suggesting him to run for congressman. Corbett then volunteers to bring Cuchillo Sanchez to justice; a Mexican immigrant and petty criminal who's now accused of raping and murdering a 12-year-old girl. Cuchillo is heading for Mexico and Corbett has to arrest him before he crosses the border. Cuchillo is a sly fox, however, and always manages to escape just in time. Meanwhile, Corbett increasingly grows uncertain whether he's even chasing the real culprit. "The Big Gundown" is literally full of memorable and notably brilliant sequences that are exemplary bits of great scriptwriting. Cuchillo's escape in the middle of the desert, for example, with just the help of a cactus and an innocent snake, is truly ingenious and clever. There are many more highlights in the film as well, like the escape from a ramshackle Mexican prison, the shootout between Van Cleef and a bunch of obnoxious simple-minded Texan cattle farmers and the virulent climax with not one but two duel showdowns! The soundtrack is legendary, with musical bits of Morricone genius like "The Verdict" and "The Surrender". The direction by Sergio Sollima – also responsible for the great "Violent City" and "Revolver" – is taut and professional, while Van Cleef and especially Milian deliver dazzling performances. This is Italian film-making at its finest.

Wulfstan10 This is absolutely one of the best so-called spaghetti westerns ever, after Sergio Leone's films of course, and it rates very highly among all westerns. Unlike many other non-Sergio Leone westerns, the cinematography, camera-work, etc., are all very good and some scenes are very artistic and even worthy of Leone himself.Lee van Cleef is excellent as the pseudo-lawman/bounty hunter with integrity who believes in "justice" and "progress" for society.Ennio Morricone, as usual, provides a great score for the film. The song is rousing, while the music for the chase scenes is excellent. Morricone also does a folk-music/square dance version of the theme for the wedding party, which is a neat touch.The story is interesting and well-developed, as well. In its full-length version, it is in fact somewhat deep, with van Cleef's Corbett being a fairly complex character who undergoes a significant character development in the course of the film. In the abridged American version, unfortunately, he is shown as simply bounty hunter who mercilessly kills all before him in cold blood, who never bats an eye at his job, making his character two-dimensional and making the end more flat, more perfunctory, and less convincing or meaningful. In the full-length version, though, he cares about justice, gives outlaws a choice (and a chance), and there is significant development on how he becomes so obsessed with finding Cuchillo that he crosses the boundary between justice and personal obsession. He then re-examines himself and the events in which he finds himself to come to a significant realisation near the end.