Review of Ballad of Death Valley

This Spaghetti Western could had been good, but it was such a disappointment. First off, this movie is hard to find due to it being produce with different titles. It lead to much confused of what the film is called. It is often mistaken for other movies. One such title for this film is 'Ballad of Death Valley" which happens to also be the title to an earlier film. Now retitled, as 'A Pistol for Ringo' (1965). This movie has nothing to do with A Pistol for Ringo's film. So if you're thinking this is a remake or the original of that movie, you just waste your money. The second one is more complex as this film goes by Sartana in Death Valley, Sartana in the Valley of the Eagles or Sartana in the Valley of the Vultures. While the man in the film dress up like Sartana, it's not Sartana at all. Sartana was a semi- famous Spaghetti Western character that was introduced in 1968's If You Meet Sartana Pray for Your Death. Sartana was often played by Gianni Garko in most of the sequels to these films, but not here, as William Berger supposedly plays Sartana, despite the fact in the film, his character is name Lee Callaway. Lee Callaway doesn't have the Sartana like charm. There is no smoke bombs, no derringer with double chambers, and not even a robot name Alfie. Surprising, it doesn't have the same high death count as the other Sartana films as well. There is only a few similar to the other films like how Lee Callaway is trying to get money. Lee Galloway is an infamous outlaw, who is hired to break the three Douglas brothers out of jail and look for their stolen treasure of gold. After the Douglas (Craigs in some versions) brothers double cross him in the Valley of Death, Galloway must learn how to survive the harsh environment and seek revenge on the gang. While, the film looks like he would have an awesome showdown against the brothers in the end. Sadly, it was disappointing. I blame it on the scorpion on the wires. Watch it, to get what I meant with that. I just couldn't root for Galloway anyways. He's a criminal, just like the brothers. Austrian William Berger is not that good to look at, plus, he looks like the villain. He did help the brothers, gun down the doll maker in the beginning of the film that got me anger and done a lot of vile things. The best part is the Valley of the Death walking scenes with the Douglas gang mocking Lee for not having a horse. It add suspense that was needed for the film. The film was shot somewhere in Italy. To make the vast desert landscape the script calls for, the crew simply made a sandpit as Spain would be too expensive to shoot in. I find the sandpits interesting since you can measure a film's budget by sand. I think they did what they can, but it doesn't look like a desert. The exteriors had repeated shots of people riding across green and moist hills, covered in grass. The story is pretty confusing at times due to bad editing and lack of explanation in some key scenes like where did those explosions come from? Even the odd twist and turns are pretty out there. The movie is in widescreen format with English audio, but the dubbing is really bad as some German is add in on accident in the beginning. The dialogue is pretty awful, as some of what they say, doesn't make any sense. For 79 minutes, it's a short film, but with a slow pace. In some version of this film, it's approximately 15 minutes cut off. I don't think the 15 minutes lost, even added anything. The whole scene, missing in that version is the movie's beginning which is pretty pointless. It's just supposing showcasing of the hero's unhuman shooting abilities. It really boring and not that much action in it. The action, we get wasn't that good anyways. The music sounds like an odd folk rock song, 'King for a Day' sung by Augusto Martelli. It is pretty catchy, but forgettable. I did like the girl that sang at the saloon scene. She was very beautiful. I also did Pamela Tudor as Esther. She was one hot woman in her time. Her scenes was just there for sex appeal, as it was bit cheesy. Overall: In my opinion, I don't think this is a Sartana movie, the producers most likely use that name on the title, just to capitalize on that character's fame, so more people can go see it, thinking it's a Sartana's movie, when it's not. It's so misleading. Who knows? I might be wrong. The character Sartana does have a certain affinity like the Man with No Name hero of Sergio Leone character as in the fact that he might give or sell false information about himself. In many cases, the Sartana in these movies bore little resemblance to Garko's interpretations in the original film cycle. It's clear to see that in this Roberto Mauri's low budget film as it doesn't have the action nor charm of that character.