Review: Find a Place to Die

1968 spaghetti western directed by Guiliano Carnimeo (though supervised by Hugo Fregonese, apparently) starts with a geologist and his wife (Pascale Petit) chased by bandits (who are led by a guy named Chato, of course) who are after their gold. When a rockslide sees the old man incapacitated, his wife travels to the nearest town in search of help. There she meets disillusioned (i.e. drunk as a skunk), Confederate soldier-turned gunrunner Jeffrey Hunter, who reluctantly agrees to help, gathering up a posse of rather unseemly types (who can barely contain themselves at the sight of a bathing Petit, in a ‘memorable’ scene), only to find the husband was tortured and killed and their mission now more centred around bloody revenge! Or something like that. Daniela Giordano (a former Miss Italy) plays a hooker who sings the film’s godawful mopey title song, with Hunter mumbling appallingly in the background in a scene that stands out like a sore thumb. Alfredo Lastretti, as one of the posse, steals the film in a fascinating (if underwritten) role as a possibly phony priest with a shady background in torture techniques (off-screen, unfortunately, though I’m no torture enthusiast or anything), a proficiency in gunplay, and rather questionable morals (At one point he remarks ‘My cloth shouldn’t prevent me from the pleasures of a man!’, which could sound a bit weird if read the wrong way, come to think of it).

This obscure spaghetti western boasts a terrific title, and a surprisingly excellent, varied, non-Morricone music score by Gianni Ferrio (“Don’t Turn the Other Cheek”), with a title tune I’m sure I’ve heard many times before. It also has a sense of doom and gloom to it all that I actually rather appreciated.

Unfortunately, it also has a stock-standard ‘woman hires gunmen to ward off evil baddies from her stash of gold’ plot you’ve seen far too many times to care about. And when you add to that a leading man in Hunter, who is so dull, he makes Richard Egan and John Phillip Law seem like master thesps, and the direction is similarly uninspired.

It’s ultimately not very distinguishable from the rest in the genre, with the characters especially getting short shrift. It perks up a bit in the final third with some reasonably tense action scenes and fine location shooting by Riccardo Pallottini (“Marco Polo”). With a better lead, stronger direction, and more character development, this might’ve earned more points. But it hasn’t, and doesn’t.

The screenplay is by Leonardo Benvenuti (“Once Upon a Time in America”, “Alfredo, Alfredo”), Hugo Fregonese (director of “Marco Polo”), the director, and Lamberto Benvenuti, from a story by Lamberto Benvenuti and Fregonese.

Rating: C