Giulianno Gemma (billed as Montgomery Wood) plays Montgomery Brown, aka Ringo, a captain who returns to the U.S. border town of Membros at the end of the Civil War to learn that gold has been discovered nearby.
As a result, the Mexicans have taken over the town. The Americans, with all the young men off at war, live in fear. His own father, a former state senator, has been killed. The Fuentes family — led by brothers Esteban (Fernando Sancho) and Paco (George Martin) have taken over his home.
Paco has claimed Ringo’s wife, Hally (Lorella De Luca) for his own. So Ringo hides his identity for a while, taking a job as an assistant to a florist named Morningstar. At one point, he decides to kill his wife for her infidelities.
Then he learns the truth. She’s being held captive in her own home; and she stays to protect Elizabeth, the blonde-haired daughter he didn’t know he had.
First tempted to free his wife and daughter and flee Membros, Ringo decides on a trickier proposition — pumping some courage back into the local townsfolks and running the Fuentes family out of Membros.
Duccio Tessari reassembles the same cast that served him so well in
“A Pistol for Ringo” and serve up another entertaining film, based on the Grek story of The Odyssey.
One of the more memorable scenes comes when Ringo slips away from serving a party to try to get his wife alone. When caught, he pretends to be a thief and winds up with his gunhand crippled.
The action scenes are surprisingly crude, but the film is a big step above the average Spaghetti Western. Nice score by Ennio Morricone.
Directed by:
Duccio Tessari
Cast:
Giuliano Gemma … Ringo
Fernando Sancho … Esteban Fuentes
Lorella De Luca … Hally Brown
Nieves Navarro … Rosita
George Martin … Paco Fuentes
Antonio Casas … Sheriff
Manuel Muniz … Morningglory
aka:
Il ritorno di Ringo
The Angry Gun
Blood at Sundown
Score: Ennio Morricone
Title song: “The Return of Ringo” performed by Maurizio Attanasio as Maurizio Graf
Runtime: 96 min.
Memorable lines:
Ringo to the Sheriff: “Nobody wants to die, sheriff. But the man who’s afraid dies a little every day. The man who isn’t afraid can die only once.”
Ringo, to the sheriff: “I’m still new around here. I’m entitled to a few mistakes.”
Ringo: “How did the senator die? Did they kill him?”
Morning Glory: “Some say he died of a broken heart. It was broken all right. They fired several bullets right into it.”
Rosita: “I’ll bring the cards.”
Ringo: “Is it possible to know the future?”
Rosita: “The past doesn’t interest you?”
Ringo: “The past is over.”
Trivia:
This was the only official sequel to “A Pistol for Ringo” (1965), though the success of Duccio Tessari’s two films prompted lots of Ringo releases that had no connection to the original film. Heck, some of the Ringo films, like 1966’s “Woman for Ringo,” are entirely Ringo-less.
Having called this a sequel, it’s worth noting that most of the cast members have entirely different roles this time around. The only constants: Gemma is still the hero; Sancho is a villain and Lorella De Luca is the love interest. George Martin, a sheriff in the first film, is a leader of the villainous Fuentes family this time around.
In fact, Ringo returns home with blonde hair and dyes it black to better fit in in a town ruled by a Mexican family.