In spite of what my fellow commenter states this is a fabulous Euro Western film by visionary director Giorgio Ferroni, who endows what might be an otherwise routine Oater about organized cattle rustling into a unique genre pastiche. Giuliano Gemma is well suited to the role of the lawman wrongly fingered for a crime he didn't commit seeking justice south of the border amongst the heavily made up extra actors who look about as authentic as Mexican peasants as the Little Rascals would.
What makes the film work is Ferroni's visual prowess, combining sound stage footage with location work (some of which looks like Yugoslavia or maybe France) and a profound grasp of how to use color to make visual compositions that just happen to represent a cowboy movie. This one isn't quite a "Spaghetti Western", with a plot-heavy story rather than the usual posturing and exaggerated artiness of a Leone or Corbucci film. There are very few closeups of people's shoes, and the action sequences are more or less straightforward. The movie existed on the page before being visually realized.
And for that reason I find it interesting; there is a surrealist bent going on here creating realities that are more "real" than a John Ford movie. What the movie may be lacking in terms of authenticity or visual flair is more than compensated for by a deliberate sense of composition. The movie looks like a storyboarded cartoon or graphic novel rather than a sprawling, dusty film epic, and the attention to character & set detail is refreshing. Here is a movie that fretted over the way every frame would look in a very painterly manner that will delight hardcore fans of the genre, but with restrained enough violence to recommend this for viewers of all ages. And how often can you say that about a Spaghetti Western?
7/10
