“I’m too sentimental, I’ll never make money.” The Italian-Spanish western did not immediately acquire all its characteristic features, and this is especially noticeable in the paintings that appeared shortly after the appearance of Sergio Leone’s “A Fistful of Dollars”. These include the second dish of spaghetti, created by the Italian director Alberto De Martino, who previously filmed peplumes. The decline of interest in the adventures of ancient mythical and not very heroes and a new niche opened, where filmmakers of various calibers rushed, attracted the seeming simplicity of implementation, which did not require special effects and large financial injections. Proprietary town, imitating typical settlements of the Wild West with all their simple contents, endless shooters with fights gave room for easy earnings.
It remained only to solve the question of the originality and quality of the presentation of pseudo-American showdowns, and it becomes the main filter in assessing the significance of a particular work. Being directly related to the gradual departure from the canons, which at first forced blindly to copy innate elements, this nuance strongly influenced the plot component and the picture itself, which is clearly visible in "100,000 dollars for Ringo". No molten-tight close-ups, ultra-violence, hot love hugs with a candid display of charms. Moreover, you will not find here even the same ... well, let it be a small intrigue, left on the conscience of the creators and distributors.
Instead, on the screen there is a well-tailored action with typical features of the traditions of relief moralizing, the obvious division of the characters into “good” and “bad”, as well as false sentimentality. The latter quality is especially pronounced in the form of a young hero Loris Loddy, whose grimaces can be very stressful. Fortunately, the focus is not on them, but on the action, which is the main character of the picture, starting without swinging, and leaving without much consideration the characters of the main characters, which in this case are not particularly important. Not to say that the continuous flow of events in everything is successful. Take, for example, scenes of confrontations, for better dynamics scrolled at an accelerated pace, which creates the comic effect of silent black and white tapes.
Nevertheless, De Martino manages to keep all the components of his creation under control, which gently but tenaciously keeps in suspense until the very end with the help of a few twists and the successful use of the acting skills of individual performers. It should be noted that since the central figure in the performance of the American who constantly collaborated with the director Richard Harrison is inexpressive, the hero of the experienced mustache Fernando Sancho (where without him!), a couple of dramatic fate Massimo Cerrato- Eleanor Bianchi and even a secondary villain with the appearance of Gina Lollobrigida's cousin Guido
As for the main antagonist, the German acting in this capacity Gerard Tisci, another long-time acquaintance of De Martino, seems to do nothing special ... but, oddly enough, he is good at this, demonstrating not cinematic, ostentatious, pretentious, but quite ordinary everyday evil, the bearer of which is colorless and unremarkable, being full of cruel cold self-confidence and thirst for power. It is easy to imagine him, who has behind him under a hundred ruined fates of innocents, in a large post, with an important appearance talking about moral values and concern for the population. Another plus would note the ending, and more specifically, that part of it that is associated with the distribution of prey, which like a magnet attracted the heroes. It, contrary to stereotypes that have penetrated even the harshest spaghetti, is not designed to show that “money is not happiness.” No, one does not interfere with the other, but also "as you sink, so you croak."
Despite its obvious "Americanization", "100,000 dollari per Ringo" bribes with some kind of naivety, a good adventure plot, appropriately stylized by the music of maestro Bruno Nicolai, and gradually overhanging shadows of the Italian-Spanish approach. It is significant that the film had an impressive box office success, climbing into the TOP-40 profitable genre projects. Yes, born out of the pursuit of this very profit and exploitation of the beloved name of the mystery, which was mentioned above, and will remain unsolved. Let it be so, it still does not affect what is happening, and it can hardly serve as a reason for numerous revisions. But for ordinary viewing it is good and without any special intrigue.
6 out of 10