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Ask most cinephiles about the spaghetti western and Sergio Leone’s name will most likely be invoked. As for those who’ve delved a little deeper into the genre, chances are that they’ll name-drop one or both of the other Sergios: Sergio Corbucci (Django) and Sergio Sollima (The Big Gundown).

Back in 2021, Arrow Video’s Vengeance Trails box set aimed to broaden viewers’ horizons of the spaghetti western by spotlighting works by directors like Lucio Fulci, Massimo Dallamano, and Antonio Margheriti, whose names are more often associated with other genres. Now along comes Blood Money, which unveils several lesser-known yet excellent examples of the genre. The thematic through line this time out concerns the value placed on human life. As the grizzled protagonist of Find a Place to Die puts it: “Madness and greed were in men’s hearts a long time before you came along.”

Romolo Guerrieri’s...

Lee Broughton returns with a review of Michele Lupo’s fine-looking Spaghetti Western, Arizona Colt. Giuliano Gemma stars as the eponymous anti-hero-cum-bounty killer who goes head-to-head with Fernando Sancho’s villainous Mexican bandit. The show’s collateral damage comes in the shapely form of fan favourite Rosalba Neri while its highly reluctant love interest is played by none other than Corinne Marchand, of Cleo from 5 to 7 fame.

Arizona Colt

Region Free Blu-ray

Wild East

1966 / Color / 2.35:1 widescreen / 116 min. / Il Pistolero di Arizona, The Man From Nowhere / Street Date 9 February 2021 / Available from Wild East / 16.95

Starring: Giuliano Gemma, Fernando Sancho, Corinne Marchand, Roberto Camardiel, Rosalba Neri, Nello Pazzafini, Jose Manuel Martin, Andrea Bosic.

Cinematography: Guglielmo Mancori

Film Editor: Antonietta Zita

Art director: Walter Patriarca

Original Music: Francesco De Masi

Written by Ernesto Gastaldi, Luciano Martino

Produced by Elio Scardamaglia

Directed by Michele Lupo

A sadistic bandit, Gordo (Fernando Sancho), expands his gang...

We’ve got more Spaghetti western action from Guest Reviewer Lee Broughton — the more obscure they become, the more fanciful the concept. This creative 1968 entry foregrounds a gothic vibe and employs imagery and narrative devices that Lee says would fit well in a horror movie. Italo western fans know the regular actors Fernando Sancho, Femi Benussi and Aldo Sambrell, who star alongside Lang Jeffries and future Pedro Almodóvar star Marisa Paredes.

Requiem for Gringo

Region-free Blu-ray

Wild East

1968 / Color / 1.66 widescreen / 98 min. / Requiem para el gringo, Requiem for a Gringo, Duel in the Eclipse / Street Date, 23 October 2018 / $16.28

Starring: Lang Jeffries, Femi Benussi, Fernando Sancho, Ruben Rojo, Carlo Simoni, Carlo Gaddi, Aldo Sambrell, Marisa Paredes, Giuly Garr, Angel Alvarez.

Cinematography: Mario Pacheco

Film Editor: Jose Antonio Rojo

Production Designer: Eduardo Torre de la Fuente

Original Music: Angelo Francesco Lavagnino

Written by Enrico Colombo, Giuliana Garavagli, Maria del Carmen Martinez Roman

Produced by...

Aldo Sanbrell photographed at is home by Cinema Retro's John Exshaw. (Photo copyright John Exshaw. All rights reserved.)

Cinema Retro,

I just wanted to say thank you for the fantastic job you guys did on the Aldo Sambrell article. It's sad for many of older fans to see these actors now ride into the sunset without them getting the send off they deserve. Many out of the public eye for nearly 30 - 40 years now are unknown to anyone under 40 and yet they are missing a heritage and a group of actors who dominated films in the 60s and 70s. The character actors in the Spaghetti western genre appear over an over in the genre and to the fans they are as recognizable and loved as the stars of the films themselves. It was always great to see a film and see the names Fernando Sancho, Aldos Sambrell, Victor Israel, Lorenzo Robledo,...

An insurance fiddle on a strongbox of gold is initiated by a scheming cabal of town dignitaries in Gianfranco Parolini's 1968 angel of death film ... If You Meet Sartana, Pray For Your Death. Into the breach steps the Sartana (Gianni Garko), the most stylish character ever to set foot in the usually grubby and sweat-drenched world of the Spaghetti Western. He takes it upon himself to serve justice upon the outlaws, Mexican bandits and corrupt officialdom, in the process walking away with a coffin-load of loot, as he influences events, turns up unexpectedly, or simply takes matters into his own hands with the silver Sharp's Derringer and Winchester rifle that play integral roles in his personal arsenal.

Ample death, ample destruction and muchos double-crossing quickly follow.

Sartana, to give it the more popular and less unwieldy title, brings together such heavyweights of the Spaghetti Western genre as Gianni Garko (Blood At Sundown,...

There's something special about saucy European sleaze horror in the 70's.

That unique blend of morally bankrupt, American potboiler pulp noir attitude combined with a distinct haute couture informed Euro-sexuality and sensationally stylized level of graphic, phantasmagorical violence just speaks to me. I worship Dario Argento, swoon over Sergio Martino, bite my lip at the name Leon Klimovsky, click my heels over Antonio Bido, pump my fists at the mere mention of Lucio Fulci…yes, I love these men and the maniacal works of misbehaving, lush, junk-shock cinema they once slung (and in some cases, continue to sling).

I've seen and own so many fantastic Italian, Spanish and French genre films from this period that I consider myself something of a connoisseur, a man who knows and loves his Eurotrash and can differentiate between a really good lurid treat, a middling one and one that couldn't cut the mustard in...

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We Continue Our Series Of Reports From Our Correspondent John Exshaw's Diary From The Recently Concluded Venice International Film Festival.

Joaquín Luis Romero Marchent was the earliest European director, prior to Sergio Leone, to consistently explore the Western form. After two films in the mid-1950s featuring the Zorro-esque El Coyote and two in the early Sixties featuring the Fox of Old California himself (Zorro the Avenger and The Shadow of Zorro), Romero Marchent made his proper Western début in 1963 with The Magnificent Three, followed by Gunfight at High Noon, starring Richard Harrison, Robert Hundar, Gloria Milland, and Fernando Sancho. The latter three actors also starred in Seven Guns from Texas (1964), shown here today, and introduced by the hulking Hundar himself. Whether or not Romero Marchent, still going strong at 86, was invited, I’ve been unable to discover . . .

Bob Carey (Paul Piaget), having...