IslandGuru Who payed the critics

Comwayon A Disappointing Continuation

Frances Chung Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Quiet Muffin This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Wuchak RELEASED IN 1969 and directed by Giorgio Capitani (aka Holloway), "The Ruthless Four" is an Italian-German Western about an old prospector (Van Heflin) who discovers gold in the Nevada desert and only trusts his quasi-stepson (George Hilton) to apprehend it. Unfortunately for them, the latter is indebted to a shady man (Klaus Kinski) while the former is forced to enlist a bitter ex-comrade (Gilbert Roland). My title blurb pretty much says it all. The acting is good and Sarah Ross is a highlight in a too-small role as a saloon babe, plus there are a couple of good elongated gunfights (in the middle and at the end). But the story is too one-note to be compelling, not to mention it's predictable. The average Jimmy Stewart Western of the 50s, like "Bend of the River" and "The Far Country," has more happening in 25 minutes than this film does in its entire runtime. Still, the music's good and there's some worthy Western cinematography. The movie runs 106 minutes and was shot in Almeria, Andalusia, Spain. WRITERS: Fernando Di Leo & Augusto Caminito. GRADE: C

classicsoncall If you're a Western movie genre fan, you've probably caught the classics "Shane" and "3:10 to Yuma", with Van Heflin in prominent supporting roles. The surprise in "The Ruthless Four" is that Heflin leaves both of those prior characterizations firmly in the dust with a strong lead role as Sam Cooper, a grizzled gold prospector who's saddled with a trio of partners when his plans called for only one man he could trust. Coming near the end of his career, Heflin pulls out all the stops to give a noteworthy performance, and I'd be hard pressed to come up with another that was any better than this.Rounding out the 'ruthless' quartet finds George Hilton portraying Cooper's adopted son Manolo, Klaus Kinski as Manolo's enigmatic former companion, and Gilbert Roland's Mason, hired on by Cooper to keep the others honest while he's trying to cover his own back. The homosexual subtext between Manolo and Brent the Blonde (Kinski) is the subject of a couple of quick teases in the story, and is never fully developed. However there's not much more explanation for Brent's intrusion into the expedition, which gives Cooper some pause as to Manolo's reliability. It's also not immediately apparent that Mason (Roland) will prove honorable by the time the film winds down, so that gives the picture another hook to keep the viewer interested. On top of all that, you've got a pair of brother bad guys hovering around on the fringe of the action hoping to cash in by the time the picture's over.However it all could have gone down hill with a puzzling opening scene when Sam Cooper's original partner in the gold dig turns on him with the idea of taking it all for himself. Those kinds of scenes always bothered me when I was growing up - here was a gun man who had the drop on his partner with the intention of killing him, and then he doesn't kill him. I mean, why leave anything to chance when you can win the whole ball of wax right there. But instead, in an attempt to what, be fair?, the guy challenges his foe to draw down. When anything can happen, and it usually does, the villain loses, and it serves him right for being such an idiot.And how about when Cooper was waylaid by the bandits who stole his horses but left the gold sacks? What movie were they watching? Come to think of it, how did one of the bandits get behind Cooper to knock him out with a rock? Cooper had his back to the river and it wasn't like he couldn't keep an eye on all of his attackers. Just a very clumsy scene that didn't make very much sense to me.But get beyond those couple of examples, and the rest of the story is pretty intriguing, with some interesting twists and turns that move the picture to a climactic showdown. This had to be the only time I ever saw a cowboy on horseback use an umbrella in the rain (Manolo), and Kinski ordering up a glass of milk in the saloon was definitely an oddity. The only sure thing, if you can call it that, would be that Van Heflin would come out pretty much as he went in, as last man standing. How each of his partners fared, well, that's for you to find out, as this wasn't called "The Ruthless Four" for nothing.

Michael_Elliott Ruthless Four, The (1968) *** (out of 4) Spaghetti Western take on The Treasure of the Sierra Madre has Van Heffin playing an elderly gold digger who finally hits it big but is betrayed by his partner who he has to kill. After being robbed by some bandits, Heffin must leave his gold behind and head back to the city where he asks his stepson (George Hilton) to go back and get the gold with him. The stepson agrees to go but is forced into taking an ex partner (Klaus Kinski) and even Heffen is forced to bring along a man (Gilbert Roland) and soon all four are looking over their shoulders. This is far from a great film but it has a terrific cast and a very good story, which makes this a worthy addition to the good titles that this genre has given us. The music score really hurts the film as it sounds out of place but outside of this everything else works just fine. What works the best are the terrific performances with Heffen leading the way. Just take a look at the early scene when his character is dragging himself out of the desert and nearing death from lack of water. I'm not sure what Heffen did to "look" the part but it's rather amazing to watch him. Kinski, playing that mysterious silent man, is terrific as well and makes for a great villain. Roland also delivers a fine performance as the calmer bandit and Hilton is good, although can't really touch the other three men. There are a couple classic shoot outs in the film with an excellent one coming half way through the film. The direction is also nice throughout and there's some wonderful scenery as well.

lost-in-limbo Sam Cooper (Van Heflin) is a gold prospector who discovers a mine filled with gold, but his partner tries to kill him, but before he does Sam gets him. Riding back to town his robbed of his horses, but not his gold. Too heavy to carry all of it, he dumps some in the river and hides the rest. When he arrives in town he sends a message for his adopted (possibly homosexual) son Manolo Sanchez (George Hilton) to see if he wants to be his partner and go back up to the mind. After Manolo arrives in town so does the mysterious Brent (Klaus Kinski) who gets in with the deal because of Manolo. Not trusting what has happen Sam asks Mason (Gilbert Rolanda) long time army buddy, who now has a grudge against him to tag along so his not back-stabbed and he agrees only if he gets 50% of his share. So now the conniving begins when the four head out for this mine."The Ruthless Four" is one of many spaghetti westerns that flooded the mid to late 60's, but something about this Italian/German production that stood out from the rest for me. It's not I think it's brilliant, but actually the simple story which at times felt like it came across more out of something of Hollywood is a curious piece. Its hard to put my finger on it, sure it didn't entirely blow me away, but this a sturdy spaghetti western is done with buckets of chic and grit. Though, I warn you if your looking for a abundance of wild and over-the-top violence, you'll surely be disappointed as they only come in small doses. But when they do occur that's when the flair kicked in, with well mounted shootouts and showdowns, even if they do lack some sort of sting (well, except for a certain bloody showdown between Brent and Sam). But like I typed earlier these are far and in between plenty of sequences involving a lot chat, confrontations, accusations and scheming. That's basically what happens in the first half of the film, but when the four head out to the mine that's when things "kinda" get going with a change of pace in the plot. It's more about the effects of paranoia and greed with these shifty man trying to knock each other off, or teaming up to get this gold no matter what. There's always something going on to keep you glued.What makes up for the slow going nature is the encroaching camera shots that seem to have a mind of its own! It rather was dynamic, especially amongst the upbeat moments. And also Klaus Kinski performance, his venomous persona soared above the rest and added a lot to proceedings. His sly character didn't say too much, but the his appearance and blistering stare were just unsettling. In my eyes he also makes a grand first appearance on screen. Just like in most spaghetti westerns the camera work is prominent, but so is the score and landscape. Here is no exception, but the score that flooded the film was rather bloated and bombarded some scenes without grace. But not enough to really tick me off. Now the location, well the harsh rocky terrain where most of the film took place truly helped portray the rough and cruelty of the ever changing face of the west.The well rounded characters and story builds on a remarkably persuasive script, it wasn't particularly hammy like I thought it might be. Sure there were some things left up in the air, but it didn't damage the story at all. It was more up to you to decide on certain things that were hinted. While the other three performances from Gilbert Roland, Van Heflin and George Hilton were nothing but terrific.Solid spaghetti western caper. It's something a bit different, but I would definitely recommended it, if only for Kinski's performance. Give it a chance, you might be surprised?