Hallelujah and Sartana Strike Again (1972)

Alberto Dell’Acqua is Sartana and Ron Ely is Hallelujah, two horse thieves who meet when they try to steal the same string of horses from a group of bathing cowboys.

Sartana is caught, and the cowboys have every intention of stringing him up. Then Hallelujah shows up again, wearing a stolen minister’s outfit and saves his fellow rascal.

And he’s still wearing those clothes when the good folks of Moonsville happen by. Led by the pretty widow Mrs. Gibbons (Uschi Glas), they immediately assume Hallelujah is the minister whose arrival they’ve been awaiting.

Lo and behold, this is a widow willing to trust Hallelujah with the $1,600 she and her fellow parishioners have saved to build a church.

That’s a mistake, Hallelujah and Sartana figure to run off with the money, split it up and head their separate ways, leaving Moonsville without a minister or a church.

But their escape keeps getting interrupted, largely because of the antics of The Wolf (Ezio Marano).

Convinced Moonsville sits on rich mine shafts flooded long ago, he wants to chase all the residents out of Moonsville.

And his favorite ploy is to have his gang ride into town in the middle of the night disguised as ghosts while he howls at the moon and the frightened residents cower in their homes.

A few nights of that, and The Wolf figures the settlers will eagerly sell their property at rock-bottom prices.

Sartana and Hallelujah figure to put an end to that nonsense.

Review:

Within the first 20 minutes of this film, we’ve met a villain who howls like a wolf, a villain’s father who blows a trumpet and thinks George Washington is still alive, a minister forced to run around in a barrel because his clothes have been stolen and the lovely Uschi Glas with that adorable smile of hers.

In other words, this has more going for it than lots of Trinity-inspired Spaghetti comedies.

Unfortunately, the good ideas are smothered and sandwiched between a seemingly endless string of acrobatic fistfights, the last of which drags on for a mind-numbing 10 minutes.

Fast forward through those scenes and you’ll likely enjoy this film more. Some of the gags do work, which is more than you can say for several films of this ilk.

Directed by:
Mario Siciliano

Cast:
Alberto Dell’Acqua … Sartana
as Robert Widmark
Ron Ely … Hallelujah
Uschi Glas … Mrs. Gibbons
Ezio Marano … The Wolf
as Alan Abbott
Wanda Vismara … Gertrude
Stelio Candelli … Hawkins
Dante Maggio … The General
as Dan May
Angelica Ott … Therese
Enzo Andronico … Rev. O’Connor
Lars Bloch … Danish
Dan van Husen …. Olson
Carla Mancini … Julia
Furio Meniconi … Mayor
as Men Fury
Giovanni Sabbatini … Jeremiah

Also with: Domenico Maggio, Giulio Massimini, Sergio Testori, Rinaldo Zamperla, Nello , Renzo , Pietro, Aldo Dell’Acqua, Artemio Antonini, Clemente Ukmar, Franco Ukmar, Giovanni Ukmar, Osiride Pevarello, Roberto Dell’Acqua, Salvatore Billa, Alfonso Giganti

Runtime: 102 min.

aka:
Alleluja e Sartana figli di… Dio
Alleluja & Sartana Are Sons… Sons of God
A Hundred Fists and a Prayer
Masquerade of Thieves

Music: Elvio Monti + Franco Zauli

Memorable lines:

Mrs. Gibbons: “As usual, we’re gathered together to celebrate the day of the Lord. And, as usual, we got no church or reverend. Anyway, here’s hoping the good Lord has taken heed and will send us somebody soon.”

Hallelujah: “I know this guy in Chicago. He buys a cow for $15. He chops it up, puts it in cans and sells it for $800. Now that, Sartana, is business.”
Sartana: “Yeah, for you it’s okay, I guess. But it’s not my idea of livin’. I got my horse. I got the clouds by day, the stars by night and that’s enough for yours truly. No ambition, you’ll say. But I’ll tell you, Hallelujah, it sure as hell beats gettin’ put in a can.”

Sartana, sitting in jail: “They didn’t take our belts. We’ve still got bullets.”
Hallelujah: “Without pistols, where do you think we’d put them?”

The Rev. O’Connor, nude and being held captive as a suspected spy by the eccentric General: “Oh, Lord, is it too much to ask you for a pair of trousers?”

Wolf: “Everybody sign their property over to me or I promise you’ll all get shot at dawn. All the others will be shot at dusk.”

Trivia:

* Standing 6-foot-4, Ron Ely starred as Tarzan in the TV series by the same name for 57 episodes between 1966 and 1968. One of his first screen roles was in the 1955 Western, “The Fiend Who Walked the West.” He’d later host the Miss America Pageant in 1980 and 1981, taking over for longtime host Bert Parks. This is one of his only two Euro Westerns.

* Uschi Glas was 22 when she made one of her first film appearances in The Half Breed (1966), one of the films in the Winnetou series so popular in her native Germany. This marked the only other Euro Western for the actress, who was still active into the 21st century with nearly 100 TV and film credits on IMDb.

* Alberto Dell’Acqua played Sartana in another comedy Western, “Trinity and Sartana Are Coming.” That film was released first, seven months before this one. Trinity was played by black actor Harry Baird.

Enzo Andronico as Rev. O’Connor, preaching against the sin of consuming alcohol with the support of Therese (Angelica Ott) and her sister Julia (Carla Mancini) in Halleujah and Sartana Strike Again (1972)l

Angelica Ott as Therese, stunned by the sight of a minister minus his clothes in Hallelujah and Sartana Strike Again (1972)

Alberto Dell’Acqua as Sartana, explaining his family’s criminal history in Hallelujah and Sartana Strike Again (1972)

Ron Ely as Hallelujah, about to bring a horse thief back from the dead in Hallelujah and Sartana Strike Again (1972)