Nonureva
Really Surprised!
StyleSk8r
At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
fredgfinklemeyer
07/12/2018 I've watched alot of cowboy movies in my 69 years of life. The 1950's Gene Autry's, Lone Ranger movies in black & white, right up to the John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, Steve McQueen and into Roddie Yates aka Clint Eastwood movies. Clint being my all time favorite old western actor as he played the hired killer in "The UnForgiven" my #1 favorite movie of all time in my book with at least a dozen Plus views by me and possibly more? This movie "Death Rides A Horse" is easily one of Lee Van Cleef's best movies that he ever made. He's on par with ol' Clint in his old western acting skills. Nothing more needs to be said after that. Watch for yourself and then you can decide??? Of course, I think this novie's great. Bon Appetit
arfdawg-1
As a child, Bill witnesses the murder of his family by four robbers.Fifteen years later, he embarks on his revenge. During his quest, he crosses paths with Ryan, an ex-con who wants the money the robbers owe him.Saw the good reviews. Let me say up front the version I saw had the worst dubbing ever. People's mouths would move and no voice would come out until 4 seconds later. It was like some bad Japanese dubbed movie!That said, it's well made and apparently influenced Tarantino in Kill Bill. John Philip Law cannot act but Lee Van Cleef saves the day.I'm not a huge fan of spaghetti westerns, but I liked this movie. If you ARE a fan, you'll probably love it.
oOgiandujaOo_and_Eddy_Merckx
This is one of the good spaghetti westerns, but it could have been great. It tries too hard to re-weave the magic of For A Few Dollars More, indeed it comes from a similar creative team (Vincenzoni, Morricone, along with several cast members), but the pity of life is, you can't recapture old magic, you can only forge ahead.Similarly to For A Few Dollars More, there's two gunmen to sympathise with, one played by Lee van Cleef, and one younger more handsome one. Van Cleef plays Ryan and John Phillip Law plays Bill, both trying to beat the other to the punch. The difficulty is, Law comes off as a Alan Ladd's understudy for Shane and this is at times a damned dark movie, into which he doesn't seem to fit. The ladies / androphiles are in for a treat though because he's darned handsome, not hard to see why he was cast as a bare-chested angel in Barbarella.Both men have got an old grudge to settle and are after the gang of men responsible. We're back to A Few Dollars More territory in the setup (back-story of Mortimer), and with the gang (Mario Brega and Luigi Pistilli reappear). The only evocative name (a critical Leone-ian ingredient) in the whole film is Cavanaugh, and that's a recycle from For A Few Dollars More as well, and the efficiency of the bank robbery scene seems to be a visual quotation of Indio's rescue.I absolutely love parts of the film. The opening rain-soaked scene (minus a tad of expository dialogue) is pretty spectacular, as is the trick shot sequence. There's also craft in allowing connection with the senses of the character, you can feel Ryan take his gloves off, you can feel his face burn after his curious shaving technique.The effective scenes in the movie are all about horror, and I feel that many of the dark interior scenes had the same pungency of Pierre Lhomme and Henri Decaë's work for Jean-Pierre Melville. However the son-I-never-had buddy movie aspect of it diminished things somewhat. It's also a movie where there are occasional longueurs of the type that you would never see in a Leone movie, and there are lines that fall flat as the movie sprawls on to just under two hours. I felt that an editor could make judicious subtractions to this movie without damaging it at all.Petroni and co seemed to have trouble ending the movie, finishing with what seems like a condensation of the plot of The Magnificent Seven, and they never discovered how to inject humour without mawkishness, the Eastwood ingredient. It's a great watch, but so sad that it doesn't quite come across as its own movie.
wes-connors
A gang of western cutthroats kills a ranch family during a robbery, but misses the hidden boy witness. Fifteen years pass by quickly. All grown up, tall blond John Phillip Law (as Bill) uses visual clues to track his family's murderers. He receives an unlikely ally when likewise vengeful gunslinger Lee Van Cleef (as Ryan) gets out of jail; the older man was part of the gang, but played a different role than the others. They have a secret bond. Although dubbed, the stars make it predominantly English-speaking Italian film. This is a stylistically stiff, sneering and steely-eyed attempt to capitalize on the newly popular "spaghetti western" genre. Unconventional direction, camera-work and editing adds a little interest.*** Death Rides a Horse (8/31/67) Giulio Petroni ~ John Phillip Law, Lee Van Cleef, Mario Brega, Anthony Dawson
