Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)

Franco Nero plays con man Prince Dimitri Orlowsky and he’s fleeing a wedding in which he robbed everyone while posing as a priest.

That’s when he’s captured and forced to give confession to a dying man. The man was beaten because he wouldn’t reveal the location of a fortune in gold, hidden during the Mexican revolution.

Truth be told, the old man doesn’t have the information. Oh, he knows the town where the gold was hidden, but not it’s precise location.

Two men each have half of a map revealing that information, and imprisoned bandit Alfonso Lozoya (Eli Wallach) knows the identity of those two men.

Orlowsky’s next stop, of course, is the prison, where Lozoya is scheduled to hang the very next day.

Then Mary O’Donnell (Lynn Redgrave) shows up at the prison. She’s a journalist secretly hoping to reignite the revolution by freeing a revolutionary leader known as El Salvador.

Turns out El Salvador is dead. But since Mary never met him, Sheriff Randall (Horst Jason) accepts her bribe and decides to free Lozoya instead.

Before long, Mary, Orlowsky and Lozoya are fleeing together. The latter two have formed an uneasy partnership in search for the gold. Mary’s still trying to convince Lozoya to play the role of El Salvador.

They’ll be sought by authorities, of course, including Gen. Huerta (Eduardo Huerta) who doesn’t know the real El Salvador is dead and doesn’t want a revolutionary leader on the loose.

Then there’s Sheriff Randall, who has an old score to settle with Orlowsky, his cousin. It seems one of his cousin’s bullets landed in his spine, forcing him to wear a turtle like metal suit for the rest of his life.

Review:

Director Duccio Tessari and star Franco Nero delivered some of the best Spaghetti Westerns ever made. But comedy was neither’s forte, and this is a comedy Western.

So we’re left with an overlong, uneven film, filled with some excellent action sequences and bogged down by comedy bits that don’t work or seemed too forced.

The best moments come when Nero and Wallach are on screen together, one forever trying to outwit the other in the quest for the hidden gold.

The best moments come to a screeching halt every time Redgrave’s near-sighted redhead shows up on scene.

She’s supposed to be funny and surprisingly deadly for a pretty gal from Irleand. She winds up being mostly annoying.

Directed by:
Duccio Tessari

Cast:
Franco Nero … Prince Dimitri Vassilovich Vladek Orlowsky
Eli Wallach … Alfonso “Max” Lozoya
Lynn Redgrave … Mary O’Donnell
Horst Jason … Sheriff Randall
Eduardo Fajardo … Gen. Huerta
Jose Moreno … Huerta’s captain
Victor Isreal … Manuel Mendoze
Gisela Hahn … Bride
Jose Jaspe … Old prospector
Enrique Espinosa … Migoleto
Marilu Tolo … Lupita

Also with: Gunda Hiller, Furio Meniconi, Dan van Husen, Rudy Gaebel, Carla Mancini, Mirko Ellis, Lorenzo Robledo, Luis Marin, Tito Garcia, Juan Antonio Elices, Carlos Romero Marchent, Antonio Orengo, José Bastida, Fabián Conde, Ernesto Vañes, Marcelo Gonzalez, Juana Jiménez, Adolfo Thous

Runtime: 115 min.

aka:
Viva la muerte… tua!
Long Live Your Death
La Guerilla

Music: Gianni Ferrio
Song: “Don’t Turn the Other Cheek” sung by Lynn Redgrave

Memorable lines:

Lozoya: “God knows you disgust me, but you know the name of that god-damned village.”
Prince Orlowsky: “You disgust me too, but it seems we’ll be forced to be partners, right?”

Mary O’Donnell: “Come on now, horse, will ya?”
Lozoya: “Tell him in Spanish, senorita. We’re in Mexico.”
Mary: “Spanish? Oh, okay. Vamos, el horse.”

Lozoya: “Hey, Orlowksy, what the hell is a journalist?”
Orlowsky: “One who creates an idol and then destroys him.”

Lozoya to Orlowsky, refusing to divulge who has the maps, even as the two men are about to be hanged: “I don’t trust you, even dead.”

Lozoya of Mendoza: “When he was born, his mother took one look at him and died of a heart attack.”

Orlowsky to Lozoya: “If you can’t be an optimist, don’t be a bandit.”

Lozoya, finding two family members slain: “I’m going to kill as many regulares as there are hairs on my sister’s head.”

Lozoya, taking a look at the defenses around Huerta’s headquarters: “I never saw the virgin daughter of a bank president so well protected.”

Mary O’Donnell: “There are many ways to kill a woman, general.”
Gen. Huerta: “I know them all.”
Mary: “Even the pleasant ones?”

Trivia:

* The “Long Live Your Death” U.S. version of the film opens with Nero posing as a preacher, robbing everyone attending a wedding with the help of the bride (Gisela Hahn). In the “Don’t Turn the Other Cheek” version, it’s replaced by an animated opening and Lynn Redgrave singing the title song (see above).

* This marked Redgrave’s only appearance in a Euro Western. She had been nominated for a best actress Oscar five years earlier for her performance in “Georgy Girl.” She died of breast cancer at age 67 in 2010.

* German-born Horst Jason, who plays “the turtle” here, also played a lawman in the 1972 comedy Western, “Life is Tough, Eh Providence?” He went on to enjoy a long career in German TV and was still active into the 2010s.

Victor Israel as Manuel Mendoza, the man with the first clue as to the gold’s location in Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)

Gisela Hahn as the bride who helps Prince Dimitri Orlowsky rob her wedding guests in Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)

Franco Nero as Prince Orlowsky, learning about the hidden gold from a dying man in Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)

Lynn Redgrave as Mary O’Donnell, preparing to seduce Gen. Huerta as a distraction in Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)

Eli Wallach as Alfonso Lozoya, reassuring Orlowsky that he can be trusted in Don’t Turn the Other Cheek (1971)