Seven Dollars to Kill (1966) Poster

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6/10
Passable Spaghetti/Paella Western co-produced by Italy/Spain and with important intervention by the great Fernando Sancho
ma-cortes11 February 2017
It is a thrilling western that packs a story full of violence , fights , killings and subsequent suspense , so-so dramatic pace , twists and slick direction . A little boy is kidnapped by nasty outlaw band whose leader turns out to be the vicious cutthroat nicknamed ¨El Cachal¨ (Fernando Sancho) , a known Mexican thief . Then , Cachal and his henchmen (Jose Luis Martin , Espartaco Conversi) butcher the child's family with the exception of his dad . Later on , the father called Johnny Ashley (Anthony Steffen) returns home and looks for his son . Many years later , one time grown-up the kid's become into a killer gunslinger , the feared Jerry (Roberto Miali) , and his adopting father results to be the ominous bandit ¨El Cachal .

Decent Maccaroni/Chorizo Western dealing with a deadly confrontation , including interesting elements of Greek tragedy , though it has some flaws and gaps , too . This violent Spaghetti results to be an oater plenty of action , thrills , gun-play , in a word : emotion . Besides , it contains effective action sequences as when there takes place the final attack on the town or the exciting ending gun-down between father and son . It's a medium budget film with passable actors , technicians, production values and ordinary results . Here there are ritual shootouts among gunslingers confronting each other in some quick-draw duels in the accepted Western movie fashion . It follows the Sergio Leone wake , including close-up , zooms , choreographic duels and no being proceeded in American style . Acceptable action sequences with rousing crossfire and spectacularly bloody shootouts . Charismatic performance for the whole casting . The notorious Spaghetti actor , Anthony Steffen is good in his usual tough role . Enjoyable and sympathetic performance by the always great Fernando Sancho . In the film appears ordinary Tortilla/Spaghetti Western actors , such as : José Luis Martin , Elisa Montes , Spartaco Conversi , Franco Fantasia and Loredana Nusciack of ¨Django¨ .

The picture displays a resounding and appropriate musical score by Francesco De Massi who composes one of the his best Western soundtracks . And colorful and glimmer cinematography by Jose F. Aguayo who photographed various Buñuel films . Being filmed on location in Hoyo Manzanares del Real , Colmenar Viejo and La Pedriza , Madrid , Spain and El Lacio , Rome , Italy . This Chorizo-Spaghetti Western mostly produced by Italy and important Spanish participation , being decently shot by the Italian professional Albert Cardone . Albert was a prestigious assistant director to popular films as ¨Ben Hur¨, ¨Purple noon¨, ¨Cagliostro¨ , ¨Carmen¨ , ¨Don Camilo¨ , ¨Return of Don Camilo¨. And shot some films , most of them entertaining Westerns such as : ¨¨ Blood at Sundown¨ , ¨Kidnapping¨ , ¨Il Lungo Giorno Del Massacro¨ , ¨20.000 Dollari Sul¨ , ¨L'ira Di Dio¨ and starred by usual genre stars as Brett Halsey , Gianni Garco , Peter Martell , Wayde Preston , Fernando Sancho and Anthony Steffen . Rating : Acceptable and passable 5.5/10 . Only for Spaghetti Western aficionados .
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5/10
Adequate and nothing more
planktonrules14 February 2013
At the very beginning of the film, there is a little prologue that is all written in Italian--and so I had no idea whether or not this was important. I saw the film on a disc that included: 7 Dollars on Red / Apocalypse Joe / Bounty Killer / Minnesota Clay. Perhaps if there are other versions out there that they will have captioning for the portion. As for the rest of the film, like most Italian westerns we get here in the States, it's dubbed.

"Seven Dollars on the Red" begins with a group of bandits slaughtering a household. A young boy is left unharmed and the bandit leader decides to adopt the kid. Little does the bandit know that the boy's father was not home and vows to do everything he can to find the boy. But, everything is not good enough and years pass--and the nice kid slowly evolves into a vicious jerk just like his foster dad.

If you are looking for an Italian film of the quality of a Sergio Leone or even a Sergio Carbucci film, then keep looking. This one is actually a bit funny, since the guns didn't even use blanks--and the actors had to pretend that the guns were firing something. However, the gun sounds were added later and it comes off as kind of funny seeing the men jerking the guns even though nothing is coming out (even a blank will appear out of the barrel the same as a normal bullet). Plus, they also seemed to have tried to save money by eliminating blood--making the bullet-riddled bodies oddly clean and without bullet holes. The film also has only fair music--nothing particularly haunting or memorable about the tunes. The bottom line is that the Italians made hundreds of westerns--some good, some bad and some ugly. I'd rank this among the ugly--kind of cheap but reasonably entertaining if you are looking for just a time-passer.
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6/10
Anthony Stiff'un
Bezenby10 February 2017
Fernanda Sancho and his legions of guffawing sidekicks rob and kill Anthony Steffan's wife, and steal his son to be brought up as a red-headed bandido. Steffan makes it his life mission to track them down, which takes an awfully long time...

Decades, it seems. By this time Anthony's son has grown up to be a full on chuckling, card dealing, people killing jerk of the highest order (just like his adopted dad Sancho). Can Steffan rehabilitate his son and reunite them in time for coffee and fainting or are they going to be squaring off against each other, as they do in these films? This one kind of meanders all over the place in the middle, as we follow Steffan around doing stuff in an indestructible way, but then we see him taking a kicking off some bad guys, and then we sidestep into a romantic interlude with his son and this girl (or is it?). It's not quite the most exciting Spaghetti Western I've watched, although it is made well enough.

It's hard to imagine Fernando Sancho wasn't like that in real life. Somebody find out and get back to me.
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Ancient Greek tragedy in Cinecitta!
vassn25 February 2000
Warning: Spoilers
This Italian western is interesting only for its tragic finale and for the great score by Francesco De Masi.Cardone's direction is flat and only the final shot shows some kind of inspiration. 7 DOLLARI SUL ROSSO is a fine example of the Italian western although i have seen much better movies of the genre. It's really noteworthy to say that this film has nothing to do with the majority of the Italian westerns.It reminded me a little of IL GRANDE SILENZIO.The hero is a man with no future and it is crystal clear that the ending will be sad. His main aim is to find his lost son who was stolen by the bad Fernando Sancho when he was a baby.The hero, who is played by Antony Steffen, is spending all his life to find him and when he succeeds on doing it, he finds out that his son has become a cruel and pitiless criminal.Here we come to the tragic end, a very well made sequence with the father and son in the final confrontation.
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6/10
7 dollars on the red
coltras358 May 2023
A cowboy( Anthony Steffen)seeks for years the evil bandit (Fernando Sancho) who murdered his wife and kidnapped her newborn son. When he finally manages to find him, he attains the vengeance he has longed for and ends with him, but his son will be against him as the bandit raises the child as his own son, ensuring that the final showdown has the added angst ridden element of father facing son.

Seven Dollars on the Red boasts a competent cast and a memorable soundtrack, and though a little unremarkable and slightly muddled its strong plot helps overcome this. Steffen is very good in the lead, and so is a dead-eyed Roberto Miali and a radiant Elisa Montes - they play the stolen son and his doomed love interest. It presents a hand-to-hand fight in the barn which is an eye opener, and it ends with a rain soaked showdown with father vs son. The last twenty minutes are quite tense and emotional. Not a bad spaghetti western.
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5/10
Fairly nihilistic yet mediocre western
Red-Barracuda6 June 2017
Warning: Spoilers
Seven Dollars on the Red is another fairly typical Italian western, from the days when the spaghetti western sub-genre was knocking them out ten-a-penny. Like a very large amount of others, this one essentially has a revenge-themed story underpinning it. The film opens with a gang of Mexican bandits storming a house and slaughtering all the inhabitants except for a young boy who the leader takes an immediate shine to and instead decides to take under his wing rather than kill. The boy's father returns to find his wife murdered and son abducted and we then fast-forward to at least a decade in the future where we have the father both seek vengeance against the bandits and retrieve his son who is now a young man.

Western regular Anthony Steffen plays the tortured hero here, in what is a pretty forgettable western on the whole. The main distinctive element is the fact that the son character has grown up to be a total bell-end of a man, at least as bad as his adopted father; possibly even slightly worse. The fact he is such an irredeemable violent chump kind of goes against what you expect, as it means that a typical father-son reconciliation becomes decidedly unlikely. Events eventually boil down to a final duel in the town square where the son character even finds time to shoot his adopted mother dead for a trivial reason. Needless to say, it all ends in a somewhat downbeat manner, which was a little interesting I have to say but aside from the ending and nihilistic son, I found this one to be very middling otherwise.
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2/10
Dreadful attempt at a western movie.
tcwaterford20 April 2022
There is little good about this movie, in fact I would have to be tied down to my chair and forced to waitch it again.

The acting including the lead, is woeful to say the least!.

Sets move at times and the script writer/s must have gotten their knowledge of the wild West from a penny western book. (old Western comic like books of the 50's).

It's hard to describe the sound of gun fire in this movie, but it's unlike any gun ever fired, including the flintlock.

As for fist fightng, we'll the acting is so poor, that you can see punches thrown, but clearly missed by 12 to 18 inches.

When someone is hit or shot, they seem to stay upright for a week before screaming and hitting the ground.

All I can say is Clint Eastwood saved the spaghetti westerns for sure, if this is typical of those produced at the time.

Simply Dreadful.
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8/10
Worthwhile spaghetti Western
Woodyanders28 June 2010
Warning: Spoilers
A little boy is abducted by ruthless band gang leader El Cachal (veteran bad guy thespian Fernando Sancho in peak nasty form) after Cahal and his men butcher the boy's family with the exception of his ace gunslinger father Johnny Ashley (a fine and engaging performance by Anthony Steffen). The determined Ashley goes searching for his son. Alas, the boy has grown up to be a mean and merciless criminal named Jerry (a perfectly vicious portrayal by Roberto Maili). Director Alberto Cardone, working from an absorbing script by Juan Carlos and Melchia de Coletti, relates the involving story at a steady pace, maintains a suitably tough and gritty no-nonsense tone throughout, stages the rough'n'ready fisticuffs and stirring shoot-outs with considerable brio (the climax with a bunch of oppressed townspeople banding together and standing up to Cachal and his gang is very exciting while the big confrontation between Jerry and Ashley is quite tense and gripping), and delivers one doozy of a devastating downbeat ending. Moreover, the tragic plot packs a strong emotional wallop and the outbursts of brutal violence are genuinely startling. Kudos are also in order for the uniformly excellent acting from an able cast: Steffen makes for an appealing hero, Sancho is deliciously despicable as the vile Cachal, and the lovely Elisa Montes contributes a nice turn as the sweet Sybil. Jose F. Aguayo's crisp widescreen cinematography offers several breathtaking panoramic shots of the rocky countryside. Francesco De Masi's twangy and spirited score hits the harmonic spot. Recommended.
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8/10
Worthwhile Revenge-Fueled Tale
FightingWesterner17 March 2011
Warning: Spoilers
Anthony Steffen returns home to find his wife murdered and his son missing. Taken by bloodthirsty bandit Fernando Sancho, the boy is raised to be cruel and violent, leading to a less than peaceful encounter with his still vengeance-seeking father years later.

Grim and atmospheric, this low-budget, near-minimalist spaghetti western is propelled by the presences of Steffen and Sancho, lots of action and attitude, it's neat wannabe Ennio Morricone score, and an almost epic feel that you don't usually get from the second feature on a double-bill.

The pace is sped up a lot by having a good portion of the picture take place outdoors (on some excellent locales), making for quite a few good action scenes with plenty of movement.

The rain-soaked finale is great. However, part of me would liked to have seen the filmmakers take a chance on the ending and have Steffen unceremoniously slay his own son, while his near love-interest, perhaps having found out the truth earlier, reluctantly staying silent, choosing to let him ride off and keep searching rather than find out the ugly truth of what his son had become. That would have been pretty cool too.
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Bland pasta dish
Wizard-828 December 2015
Warning: Spoilers
Though you might think that with the title "Seven Dollars On The Red" that this spaghetti western centers around gambling, it doesn't - it's just a reference to something that quickly happens in the opening sequence. This bait and switch does not ruin the movie, but plenty of other things make this particular spaghetti western below average. Many of these problems can be blamed on the script. The movie is poorly plotted at times, jumping ahead twenty or so years at one point with no warning or proper transition, and containing plenty of padding that ranges from gratuitous and inconsequential action to characters feebly engaging in dialogue that does not advance the story at all. To be fair, the script does have a little interest with the story of the hero's long lost son becoming an outlaw and eventually crossing guns with his father, but this part of the plot is surprisingly underused. The direction lacks flair for the most part, with a slow pace and action sequences that simply lack excitement, which may explain why Anthony Steffen sleepwalks as the heroic lead. Fernando Sancho, as usual in this genre, adds a little fun as the scummy bandit leader. And there is some interesting background scenery here and there. But apart from those two things, there's little else to make this spaghetti western satisfying to genre fans.
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