NOT WHAT YOU’D EXPECT FROM A SPAGHETTI WESTERN
Antonio Margheriti was one of the masters of Italian Gothic Cinema. This was his first Western, and it would echo his early horror work. The only named star is Klaus Kinski, another familiar face in the horror genre. The entire film has an aura of doom wrapped around it. Kinski is Gary Hamilton, a former Confederate officer accused of robbing a gold shipment. His alibi was his girlfriend, Mary. But she was paid off and married Acombar, the mastermind behind the robbery.
So Gary is doing hard labor in prison. He is almost bitten by a rattlesnake. “That’s not the way I want to get out of here,” he tells a fellow prisoner. But Gary gets a pardon after doing ten years. He gets a ride on a stagecoach. A fellow passenger is Dick Acombar, the son of the guy who set Gary up. Gary gets off the stagecoach at an outpost and tells Dick to tell his father that he’ll see him at sundown. He leaves a canteen with the initials G.H. on the stagecoach.
Gary finds an old gun dealer and tells him he needs a horse and a rifle. The old man warns of a storm coming in. A tornado is on the way. Night is falling, and Gary is coming. Dick gives his father the canteen and asks about Gary Hamilton. Everyone is shocked, but Dick is not given any answer. Acombar orders his 30 men to ambush Gary when he gets to town. Here’s the horror element. A ghost or someone returning from the dead. They thought they had Gary buried in prison.
The gunmen watch as Gary approaches. The storm is stirring up a lot of dust. They see Gary’s horse, but Gary has vanished. A friend, Doctor Jonathan, left a well cover open that leads to an Indian burial ground that runs beneath the town. The first guy to find Gary is an Indian. Gary cuts him down. Then he randomly shoots a bunch of Acombar’s men, and then vanishes. He takes out Acombar’s best men. One is shot through the head.
The local church bell is ringing , so they leave the body with the priest and silence the bell.
Maria, who owns the saloon , and Dr. Jonathan are Gary’s allies. Acombar has held the town in a grip of terror. Gary hangs another one of Acombar’s top guns with the church bell. Acombar guns down the priest when he refuses to give up Gary. When they try to silence the bell, Gary cuts the rope and it cuts another gunman in half. Dick goes into town , seeking the truth. Acombar comes looking for him and takes him back to the ranch. He shows Dick a secret room full of the stolen gold. Dick tells him that he now knows the truth.
Dick is not happy, but says that he will defend his father. Dr. Jonathan wants to help. Acombar sends the rest of his men into town to roust Gary out of hiding. Dr. Jonathan shoots at them, but takes a fatal hit. Before he dies, he opens the stable doors and the gunmen are trampled by the stampeding horses. Gary has gotten into Acombar’s house and is confronting Mary. Mary tells Gary she had no choice, but he’s not buying it.
Gary kills a few more of Acombar’s men. Dick runs in to help his father, but Dad thinks it’s Gary and shoots him. Then he blames Mary and shoots her twice. When Mary falls, she knocks over a lamp which sets the house on fire. Gary and Acombar stalk each other through the flames and a room full of mirrors. This scene is straight out of a horror film. Acombar shoots Gary’s image in the mirrors.
Gary finally kills Acombar , then throws his gun away. He tells the people that there is enough gold under the ruins of the house for them to rebuild the town. Gary rides off as a biblical verse crawls across the screen before the credits roll. This is not your typical spaghetti western. No Morricone score, not regulars like Aldo Sambrell, Robert Hundar, or Mario Brega.
Kinski is not his usual manic self , which is unsettling. He is a ghostly avenger who never stops killing. All the gothic touches are here: Night approaches bringing something evil. The tornado coming gives a sense of impending doom. The underground caves, bodies piling up, and the end with its fire and mirrors all displaying Margheriti’s gothic roots. It’s an interesting film with a slow build , but then it kicks into gear when Gary gets to town.
The film has been treated like shit over the years. It came out on a bunch of low-end VHS tapes that used grainy prints as a source for transfers. It was public domain material and wound up in many spaghetti western budget compilations. Arrow just put it completely restored in a four-film box set, Vengeance Trails. Margheriti dabbled in just about every film genre. He would do two more westerns, Blood Money, aka The Stranger and the Gunfighter with Lee Van Cleef and Lieh Lo, and Take a Hard Ride with Lee Van Cleef, Jim Brown, and Fred Williamson .
Pete Chiarella aka 42nd Street Pete 1/27/22