Mannaja (El valle de la muerte)

This film begins with a bounty hunter who goes by the name "Blade" (Maurizio Merli) riding into the small mining town of Suttonville with a criminal named "Burt Craven" (Donald O'Brien) as his prisoner. Unfortunately, when he gets there he is informed that there is no real sheriff there which makes it impossible for him to claim the bounty. To make things even worse, he is also told that the entire town is essentially owned by the wealthy owner of the local silver mine named "Edward McGowan" (Philippe Leroy) and that nothing gets done without his approval or that of his chief enforcer and bodyguard by the name of "Voller" (John Steiner) . To that end, when Blade volunteers to help Edward McGowan with a problem he is experiencing with some local bandits, Voller doesn't take it too well and this results in a serious rift between Blade and everyone else-and Voller is not a man to take things lightly. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was an entertaining "Spaghetti Western" which managed to keep my attention pretty much from start-to-finish. Admittedly, I didn't especially care for a couple of the twists and turns taken and the musical score was a bit odd. But even so I liked this film for the most part and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly above average.