A Reason to Live, a Reason to Die (1972)

[grandpa_chum]

Just saw it... and wanted to know if anyone else can confirm my suspicion that i swear the fort was the same set as the jailbreak scenes at the begining of FAFDM... also the use of the sweetwater ranch... and the one i'm least sure about... Is some of the score straight out of Above The Law... the Van Cleef spaghetti.

anyone else notice any of these when seeing it.

[cigar joe]

Was it any good?

[grandpa_chum]

it was pretty good... I love Coburn and he was great... and it was a great story... i would definitly recomend it to anyone who likes leone... it is a little slow, and not in a good leone way... but it's not that bad

[DJIMBO]

i see there's quite a few familiar names in there:

Coburn, Savalas, Stefanelli, Hill, Spencer

any decent performances or is it your typically spaghetti hammy overacting?

[grandpa_chum]

well i've never seen a bud spencer movie... but he and coburn were great. No hammy stuff from those two... the rest of the gang was a little like that though... savalas was definitly great as well

[grandpa_chum]

excuse me... music from BEYOND THE LAW not above the law.

[DJIMBO]

mmmm....could it be that this film is actually quite good?

im not a huge spencer fan ive seen ace high probably the worst film ive ever seen apart from maybe El Condor.

[grandpa_chum]

it's definitly of higher visual quality than i expected... and this was pan and scan so i'm sure the widescreen looks even better... seems like it had a decent budget at least... not your average shitty looking/sounding spaghetti.

[JoeH]

Yesterday, I saw this Spaghetti Western with Bud Spencer and James Coburn and I was a bit disappointed. OK, the characters are not bad and the topic (The guys can decide between the death of hanging and a very dangerous job) is interesting, but finally these things are too superficially treated, so that they didn't really convince me. The humor is average, the score is trash and a lot of scenes are too slow and boring. Some scenes are even nearly useless. The atmosphere was also missing rather in the whole movie.
Nevertheless it was not bad entertainment, but nothing compared to many other westerns.

[Belkin]

Yup, not the worse I've ever seen but light years from the best. Caught this on it's first release many moons ago as part of a double-bill that included KUNG FU - THE HEADCRUSHER!

[The Smoker]

Kung-Fu -The Headcrusher, blast from the past. Highly amusing cockney over dubs for the bad guy renamed Slasher Pete.   

[titoli]

I don't remember seeing it at the movies, except for the last scene when

Spoiler  Spoiler Spoiler

Coburn kills Savalas (his facial expression is memorable).


Coburn is his usual good, as Savalas (that goes without saying) but the surprise is Spencer, who is really the lead of the movie. That is about all there is to know about a movie that I've found  childish in his plot, without a single spark of originality and of very slow pace. I can't say whether the fort was the same of other movies, but it was very good to see: the designer knew his trade. One of the best edifices I have seen in any movie, not only SW. A pity the screenplayers could find a better way to make use of it.
Also, can't tell whether the music was the same of Beyond the Law. Might possibly be, as I wasn't impressed by either: one expects more from the author of More.


 

[Banjo]

I think my pan and scan version maybe be cut but this is still an enjoyably above average sw.However i found Savalas's performance a bit limp and restrained by his standards  and i don't think it suits Coburn to be almost bullied around by his associates and if i remember correctly is rescued from a beating by Bud Spencer(yes Bud is great in this movie as he is also in the excellent Five Man Army).
From memory i'm sure the music is taken  Day of Anger(Valerii's earlier western).Its a shame from what is obviously a reasonable budgetted sw that there couldn't have been some newly composed music and i think it takes away the enjoyment slightly because it makes you think of the earlier movie.

[titoli]

and i don't think it suits Coburn to be almost bullied around by his associates

 I think it suits his character and also, as he explains to Spencer, he doesn't want the rumour of the shots to attract southern troops to them.

[Banjo]

*However* in some English-speaking markets, its score was replaced by pieces of the DOA and BTL score, and Howard Hughes mistakenly claims in "Once Upon a Time in the Italian West" that this was the way it was originally.

Yeau thats the version i've got.I'm don't think Hughes is claiming that this was the way it was originally because i've just looked up that paragraph and all Hughes says is"even the extensive reuse of Ortolani's scores from DOA and BTL couldn't spoil the film"  so maybe thats the only version he's seen and in any case he was making a brief reference to Valerii's earlier movies in a chapter devoted to My Name Is Nobody.