One Hundred Thousand Dollars for Ringo

There's certainly a lot of action in this production -- a seemingly endless series of shootouts and fistfights involving good white guys, bad white guys, Indians, and various members of the Mexican army. One bad guy gets a fork stabbed through his hand and Richard Harrison gets tied up and whipped. (Curiously, though Harrison was one of those muscular physique-models who went to Europe in the wake of Steve Reeves' success as "Hercules," he plays this whipping scene with his shirt on, and that shirt must be made of a super fabric before it never shows so much as a rip!)

The action soon becomes wearying, however, because the muddled plot never generates much interest and the characters' motives and allegiances are confusingly presented. Even fans of "spaghetti westerns" may want to skip this one.

(Note: though the song heard at the beginning and end of the movie refers to "Ringo," that name is never used in dialog in connection with the Richard Harrison character who instead goes by the names "Lee Barton" and "Ward Cluster." Also, the "$100,000" referred to in the movie's American title seems inaccurate since the trove of lost money proves to be $200,000.)

As for Harrison's flogging scene, it would probably have been included in the book, "Lash! The Hundred Great Scenes of Men Being Whipped in the Movies," had Harrison played it with his shirt off. This attempt to flog information from Harrison does provide the movie with its best dialog. "If I were you," says the villain, giving his victim a momentary reprieve from the whip, "I'd choose a much quicker death. I promise you that I'll leave you here to rot unless that tongue of yours loosens up a bit."