Death Rides a Horse

• Italian: Da uomo a uomo, lit. From man to man
• Directed by Giulio Petroni
• August 1967 (Italy)

A boy that watched his murdered by a group of marauding outlaws sets out years later to get revenge.

As a Spaghetti Western Death Rides a Horse is a tutorship revenge narrative where a younger character seeks out the guidance/help of an older character who has similar goals but differences in motivation lead to some type of conflict. As a young boy Bill Meceita (John Phillip Law) watched his family get slaughtered by an outlaw gang with each member possessing something unique about themselves. Sometimes it’s a scar while others it is a piece of jewelry making some elements of identification used decades later tenuous.

Ryan (Lee Van Cleef) is a former member of the gang left to rot in jail while they went free. He is after revenge his path crossing that of the single-minded Bill. Van Cleef gets to sport his own voice while law might be dubbed but regardless sounds like somebody doing a bad John Wayne impression.

Lee Van Cleef is certainly the bigger name in this, but he’s almost secondary to John Phillip Law. I’m not complaining. Director Giulio Petroni is trying to balance both stories, but clearly by necessity he needs to tell Bill’s a little more than Ryan’s. Van Cleef to his credit does nothing to overshadow John Phillip Law.

This is one of many Westerns whose focus is revenge and it’s probably one of the more unique takes. Not a startling revelation of a take, but certainly a different take whose presentation is helped by the style and panache of the Italian Western present throughout. Not a cheesy style that permeated the tail end of the genre’s heyday, but a style that adds a magic and perhaps even an unreal nature to your viewing. It elevates the characters into larger-than-life figures facing off against a grand challenge.

This is a masculine film. Not one of men flexing muscles but men proceeding with a clear code and of understandings and actions. This is not necessarily about pure vengeance but seeking justice or setting things right in some way. By the end they even have a level of respect for one another.

The stark and shocking opening tells us we are at the minimum getting an attempt at something a bit different. Eyes carry a great deal of expression in Death Rides a Horse making dialogue often unnecessary but adding more meaning. Van Cleef-as-Ryan manages a few amazing lines like “They came in the windows. It wasn’t to wish me pleasant dreams.”

If there was anything wrong with this I would say that the turn by the townspeople was sudden. I understand that they have every reason to hate the bandits but give us a line or two that says they hate the bandits enough to turn against them and risk their own lives. It’s like they were going for a The Magnificent Seven finale.

This is lively film as Ryan and Bill proceed along on a relatively shared goals engaging in revenge or action while screwing the other over so they can do it themselves. Like many movies, the baddies can be a bit dense when confronted. Rather acting while in danger they wait allowing Ryan or Bill to succeed.

Death Rides a Horse is an excellent though imperfect Spaghetti Western. It has style and a great story carried by Lee Van Cleef and John Phillip Law.