Face to Face (Faccia a Faccia)

Ok, last night I watched Sergio Sollima's 'Face to Face' (1967). Sollima was also the director of last month's review, 'The Big Gundown'. The film stars Spag Western regulars Tomas Milian (Companeros, The Big Gundown, and many others) and Gian Maria Volonte (Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More, A Bullet for the General). Volonte stars as Brad Fletcher, a Boston-based history professor with lung problems who moves to Texas for a lifestyle change as well as a warmer climate. While there, he runs into a wounded bandit named Beuregard Bennett, played by Milian, who kidnaps him. Fletcher helps Bennett recover, and eventually becomes interested in the outlaw life. The two eventually do a 'moral switch' of sorts, with Bennett becoming more moral and conscious and Fletcher transformed into a greedy, ruthless bandit. This is all complicated even more by the appearance of an undercover detective named Siringo, played by William Berger (Sabata, etc)


The version I watched was a Japanese import in the 'Macaroni Western Bible' collection, as it is not available in the US. Unfortunately, there was only an English soundtrack, which at times had some clarity issues and even some speed issues. The picture quality itself looked really good, however.

This one has a reputation of being one of the better non-Leone westerns, and I can see why. The writing and acting were much better than most of what is usually seen in the genre. Volonte, in particular, did a fantastic, nuanced job as Fletcher, a total 360 from his over-the-top acting in other spag westerns. Milian was good too, keeping his acting within the realm of believability, as well. The dialog, in particular, was uncharacteristically eloquent and poetic in many parts of this film. I would have to say that this film had a depth to it that is missing in much of the genre. We see it early on, as Fletcher plays the gawky straight man who's never fired a gun, and he often tries to get Bennett to listen to his head instead of his heart. As the film goes on, we see the roles start to reverse, as Fletcher finally starts to feel the joy de vivre of being an outlaw that was missing in his life previously, and Bennett starts to have a newfound sense of decency in him. It had a really good ending, as well.

The crew of this had a bunch of genre regulars on board, such as Carlo Simi, Alberto Grimaldi, and Sergio Donati, all people who have worked on the better films of the genre. Ennio Morricone's score was good, if typical, and often at times sounded like his themes from 'Death Rides a Horse'. There was some excellent cinematography, as well. I loved how this particular scene at the end was framed:


All in all, this was a pretty good one, with an original plot with some substance to it. I would have liked to have heard the Italian track, for the English actor who overdubbed Volonte didn't do justice to his character (you could see it). Other than that, if you can find this one, I'd recommend picking it up. I'll be reviewing Sollima's third and final western (and sequel to The Big Gundown), Run, Man, Run, next.