Le salaire de la haine

"Hate Thy Neighbour" combines the classic Spaghetti revenge scenario, with the regular Spaghetti "map" tale. The story centres around Ken Dakota's search for the murderer of his brother, who was killed by bandit Gary Stevens, at the behest of Mexican land owner Chris Malone, for a goldmine map. Stevens tears the map in two, and gives Malone half, spiralling into a running feud of double crosses between the two, whilst Dakota attempts to bring the men responsible for his brothers death to justice.

This is a really enjoyable Spaghetti Western, albeit with the odd moment of corny dialogue. It includes some really exciting moments, such as peasants and bandits duelling with metal claws for Malone's pleasure, torture by hanging over a pit of snakes, and some very talented bandito musicianship! My experiences to date have highlighted that Director Baldi can come up with some great movies (Blindman, Viva Django) and some absolute turkeys (Get Mean and, so I've heard, Rita of the West). Hate Thy Neighbour doesn't hit the highs of Blindman by any means, but is certainly an enjoyable view, with George Eastman (as Stevens) and Horst Frank (Malone) putting in good roles, and the plot having some quality twists and turns.

Not the easiest of movies to get your hands on, but certainly worth the effort if you are a fan of the Spaghetti genre.

Ken Dakota seeks revenge for the killing of his brother Bill and wife. In his search for the murderers he runs into conflict with the evil Mexican land owner Chris Malone (Horst Frank) who lets peasants fight against each other for pure pleasure. The plot isn't straight and simple and more often than not it is difficult to find any serious reason for what is going on. E.g. why putting Eastman over a snake pit. If he dies everything is lost and he won't talk anyways. Well, there is the reason of maintaining a constant flow of carcasses. Despite the rather violent and dark plot with various scenes of torture the film is beautifully shot in a nice landscape with lakes and waterfalls in front of a blue sky. Often the violence is accompanied by nice music and even the villains prove to be skilled musicians. This generates a strange contrast. George Eastman acts with pleasure and Horst Frank plays a credible villain. Nicoletta Machiavelli has definitely some problems with her role.

The film is pretty long for a Spaghetti Western and able to entertain as long as the viewer doesn't care about the plot. It seems to be filmed in 4:3 format.

This Eurowestern has a solid revenge storyline that holds your interest from start to finish. Horst Frank is fantastic in the role of the cool as a cucumber villain Chris Malone. George Eastman also gives a great performance as Malone's enforcer/partner. The score is typical of the genre, which to me, since I really dig spaghetti western music, means that it is excellent even if it doesn't rank among the very best. There is a little bit of that annoying kind of unfunny comic relief in this one, but thankfully just a very small amount. The overall feeling here is brutal and dark. And it has a bit of that spaghetti western strangeness that I love so much. I would have given this movie a 7 1/2 if I could have. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's great even if it isn't "one of the greats." I highly recommend it if you are really into these movies like I am.

In the long line of spaguetti westerns, this has a double right to belong to the genre: it is a product 'made in Italy', and it has enough ketchup blood on the 'pasta'. Besides a few shootings, the highlights that may make this rather unique is the 'classic' addition of iron-claws used in two duels to the death: one between two Mexican slaves for their masters pleasure; and one between two 'gringo' bandits for possession of a tract of land, and a woman. Either the filming, or the video copying, are so bad as to diminish greatly the original intended gore effect.

Sure, the lead hero guy here is a bit bland and not given much to do, but thankfully the two bad guys here - George Eastman and Horst Frank, save the film! Maybe director Ferdinando Baldi knew this, as he seems to focus more on Eastman than anyone else. That, and there's a them tune seemingly sung by a pre-op transvestite whose hormone supplements have gone wrong.

26 foot tall Eastman plays Gary Stevens, and when we first meet him, he's riding into town following a guy called Dakota, who owns half a map that leads to a gold mine. After no one in town will help Dakota, and grinning Stevens guns him and his wife down (he doesn't spot their son, however). A local undertaker saves the son and takes him to Dakota's brother, who is also called Dakota.

This, more alive Dakota, starts things off by giving local sheriff Franco Fantasia a good kicking for not helping his brother, but it's really Stevens he's after. Things get a bit complicated as Stevens actually works for evil Horst Frank, and Frank wants that map, but also doesn't want to give Stevens his share - cue double crossings! The good thing about Frank is that he likes to force people to fight each other using huge metal claws. Why I don't know, but it looks cool and it's not something you see often in these films. That's another thing this film has going for it - claw fighting. And explosions.

While it's mostly a kind of run of the mill Spaghetti Western director Baldi throws in enough weirdness to grab your attention (claw fighting!) so it kind of stands out that way. Plus, Baldi also made Warbus so he ain't no fool. Eastman is good as the goofy, laughing Stevens and Horst Frank has a stare that could pierce metal. Needed a better leading man, though.