Considered one of the finest Italian westerns ever made, this is also Lee Van Cleef’s first starring role after years of secondary villain parts in Hollywood. He had made an impression in Sergio Leone’s The Good The Bad And The Ugly and was offered a lot of work in Italy as a leading man.

Van Cleef plays a bounty hunter who is asked by a wealthy pal to track down a man called Cuchillo, who is accused of raping a young girl. Using a knife as his weapon of choice, Cuchillo proves to be crafty prey and insists on his innocence. As Van Cleef is constantly outwitted by his target and becomes more and more obsessed with his capture, he must also start wondering about his employers’ motives and Cuchillo’s possible innocence.

Beautifully shot in Spain, director Sergio Solima captures some real grit in the performances and the surroundings. The original Italian version runs 110 minutes. When it was picked up for release in the US it was cut down to 95 minutes and then further cut to 89 minutes when it ran in theatres. The Grindhouse edition has the 110 minute Italian version with English subtitles and also includes the 95 minute version in English. In this massive Grindhouse edition there are Blu-ray discs of both the Italian version and US version, a DVD of the US version and a CD soundtrack of Ennio Morricione’s sprawling film score.