Vengeance is a Dish Served Cold (1971)

Leonard Mann is Jeremiah Bridger. As a young boy, he sees his family massacred by Indians. As a young man, he’s an Indian-hating scalping machine, known as The Scalp Man.

The one Indian he doesn’t kill is a pretty squaw named Tune (Elizabeth Eversfield). He isn’t sure what to do with her. But the men working for Judge Perkins have some pretty good ideas; they’d like to take Tune off his hands.

Two of them — Boone and Tom — track down Jeremiah and Tune. In the gun battle that ensues, Tom winds up dead, Jeremiah is seriously wounded. Boone rides off with Tune, planning to turn her over to Perkins for his personal pleasure.

An old doctor stumbles upon Jeremiah. He nurses him back to health and reveals the truth about his parents’ death. The Indians weren’t to blame; the land-hungry Perkins was. Killing settlers and making it look like Indians were responsible is one of the rancher’s favorite means of acquiring more and more land.

So it turns out Jeremiah’s vengeance has been ill-directed for years. But that’s something that’s about to change.

Review:

Now that sounds like an interesting variation on the good ol’ revenge for a slaughtered family theme. But director Pasqual Squitieri can’t breathe much life into the film. And it doesn’t help that his primary plot device has a lead character, a man who kills and scalps every Indian he comes across, then rushing to the defense of an Indian girl.

Poor Tune (Elizabeth Eversfield in her only credited role) suffers considerable abuse over the course of the film. First, she’s tugged along behind Jeremiah’s horse. Then she’s tarred and feathered by angry townspeople. Then she’s offered up to Perkins’ guests for their pleasure. Then, when she nearly bites off the ear of newspaperman Virgil Prescott, she’s tied to a post and whipped.

Prescott is played by Klaus Kinski in one of those secondary roles he so often took on in Spaghetti films. He’s a writer who hates Indians almost as much as Jeremiah does early in the film. Unless it’s a pretty squaw who’s helping keep his bed warm.

Directed by:
Pasquale Squitieri

Cast:
Leonard Mann … Jeremiah Bridger / Jim
Ivan Rassimov .. Judge Perkins
Klaus Kinski … Virgil Prescott
Elizabeth Eversfield … Tune
Steffen Zacharias … Doc
Salvatore Billa … Tom
Teodora Corra … Boone
Enzo Fiermonte .. George Bridger
Yotanka … Yotanka
Gianfranco Tamborro … young Jeremiah
Isabella Guidotti … Lucy, saloon girl

Also with: Salvatore Billa, Giorgio Dolfin, Stefano Oppedisano, Pietro Torrisi, Renzo Pevarello, Franco Daddi, Nestore Cavaricci, Alba Maiolini, Lella Cattaneo

aka:
La vendetta e un pitatto che si serve freddo
Vengeance Trail
Three Amens for Satan
Vengeance is a Dish Served Cold
Death’s Dealer

Score: Piero Umiliani

Runtime: 97 min.

Memorable lines:

Boone: “Nice piece of Indian. I’ll give you $3 for her. Take it. You’ll get along without her somehow.”

Boone: “Indian flesh tastes real sweet once you get it clean.”

Doc: “Damn beard always gets in the way.” He pulls it off. “Surprised? If a man’s not quick enough with a gun, he’s got to use a false beard for protection.”

Trivia:

Greek-born Steffen Zacharias, who plays the doctor here, had bit roles in a number of Spaghetti Westerns, including “The Five Man Army,” “A Man Called Sledge” and “My Name is Trinity.” He would later appear in a number of U.S. TV series, including “Dallas,” “Kojak” and “Little House on the Prairie.”

Ivan Rassimov was most often cast as a villain during his film career. One exception was the 1967 Spaghetti Western “Cjamango,” in which he played the lead. After the Spaghetti craze ended, he appeared in a couple of Emmanuel films and starred in a trio of Italian cannibal films, concluding with “Eaten Alive” in 1980.