La resa dei conti

Retired sheriff is persuaded by a politician to come back and hunt down a Mexican who has raped and murdered a twelve year old girl but he slowly realises the Mexican has been framed to cover up the real murderer. Good, stylish spaghetti western,this is the longer uncut version of the film and not the hacked up Amercian version that lost nearly twenty minutes of footage.This has a rather slow start and develops into a chase movie in a kind of western version of "the fugitive".Lee Van Cleef is his usual dependable self and the Ennio Morricone soundtrack is good although i'm not sure about the screeching title song!Film is good and satisfies overall.

What I liked about this film was an intriguing storyline, superb music by Ennio Morricone and Lee Van Cleef. The action scenes are almost on a par with Leone's films and Van Cleef is top-notch (more convincing as a 'good guy').

After watching my tape of this film, I found out that it was a (badly-cut-by-Columbia) 84 min version. This would explain some confusing sections of the dialogue/narrative.

I'm told that the fuller versions (there is one of 114 min) are superior. Let's hope this film gets a decent treatment on DVD (hello Sony-Columbia) - it certainly deserves it more than most.

In this Italian spaghetti western from director Sergio Sollima, Lee Van Cleef stars as "Colorado" Corbett, a feared bounty hunter looking to hang up his guns. He's convinced by rich fat-cat Brockston (Walter Barnes) to go on one more manhunt, and in exchange he'll be rewarded with backing for a potential political career. Corbett's quarry is a Mexican known as "Cuchillo" (Tomas Milian), who's accused of sexual assault and murder. What Corbett believes will be an easy takedown turns ever more complicated and dangerous. Also featuring Nieves Navarro, Gerard Herter, Maria Granada, Roberto Camardiel, and Angel del Pozo.

This has the usual over-blown sound effects and striking musical score (courtesy of Ennio Morricone) that I love in spaghetti westerns. The story doesn't hold a lot of surprises, but fans of the spaghetti sub-genre should dig it.

I try to avoid promoting individual products, but in this case of the Grindhouse Releasing Blu-ray, it is a fantastic release featuring the remastered American cut on both Blu-ray and DVD, the original Italian version on Blu-ray, and a CD of the soundtrack. The film discs also include commentary tracks and interviews with cast and crew.

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.

As a big fan of Spaghetti Westerns, two of my all-time favorite directors are Sergio Leone and Sergio Corbucci. Out of all Spaghetti Westerns directed by neither Leone, nor Corbucci, Segio Sollima's "La Resa Dei Conti" aka. "The Big Gundown" is my personal favorite, and doubtlessly one of the greatest films the genre has ever brought forth. An exciting and extremely stylish film with brilliantly drawn characters, "The Big Gundown" is a masterly Spaghetti Western with a political message.

Jonathan Corbett (Lee Van Cleef), a famous gunman and bounty hunter, is sent to hunt down a Mexican small-time crook named Cuchillo Sanchez (Tomas Milian), who is accused of the rape and murder of a 12-year-old girl. Corbett is an experienced and successful lawman, but Cuchillo is very clever too. On the his long hunt Corbett gets to know Cuchillo, whose guilt he finds more and more doubtful. Although this is a very serious Spaghetti Western in most of its parts, there are some very funny characters, like the almost cartoonish aristocratic Austrian gunman Baron Von Schulenberg (Gérard Herter), a cold-blooded but extremely arrogant and almost Nazi-ish killer wearing a monocle and always looking neat as a pin.

Sergio Sollima's directing is truly outstanding. The acting is also great, especially the brilliant performances of Tomas Milian and Lee Van Cleef, two of my personal favorite actors. The score by Ennio Morricone is one of a kind, outstanding, even compared to most of the other Morricone soundtracks. In one ingenious part of the movie, for example, Morricone mixes Ludwig Van Beethoven's "Für Elise" with a Mexican guitar and his typical dynamic Spaghetti Western drums. The cinematography and settings are overwhelming in a manner that is en par with Leone. In short: "The Big Gundown" is a formidable gem that even Leone would be proud of, and an Italian Western highlight that no lover of the genre could possibly afford to miss! 10/10