Review of More Dead than Alive (1969) by Van R — 19 Oct 2010

In this above-average but gritty western, a reformed gunman named.

'Killer' Cain (Clint Walker of "Cheyenne") emerges from prison.

After serving an 18-year sentence and sets out to earn himself an.

Honest living. Veteran television director Robert Sparr's.

Turn-of-the-century oater "More Dead Than Alive" functions as a morality play about redemption and poetic justice set in 1891 that suffers from an Old Testament downbeat ending. Essentially, the theme of this low budget but well-produced horse opera is that you reap what you sew. In other words, what goes around comes around. Sparr is sparing with his use of slow-motion violence, but the death scenes are rather gritty. Nevertheless, watching Vincent Price die from multiple gunshots to the chest is something that you don't always witness, and "More Dead Than Alive" is one of those westerns made when slow-motion violence in movies was in vogue. Certainly, Sparr.

Pulls no punches in this dust-raiser, and Walker is sturdy as ever as the.

Ex-convict who wants to do nothing more than settle down with lovely.

Anne Francis.

Life is particularly cruel to Cain, who grew up on an army post and rarely saw much of his father, and he finds it even more difficult to earn a good living. Initially, when he left prison, he told himself never to touch a gun again. Of course, our protagonist isn't fortunate enough for this to happen. He gets a job as a bouncer at a saloon, but he is fired when the owner learns that Cain gave him a false name. Cain is basically a transient who cannot hold onto a job for any length of time, until he meets the savvy and sagacious Dan Ruffalo (Vincent Price of "The Last Man on Earth") who puts him to work in his traveling gun shooting sideshow. Mind you, Ruffalo's current attraction, a swift-drawing, sharp-shooting kid named Billy Valence (Paul Hampton of "Women of the Prehistoric Planet"), isn't pleased when Ruffalo replaces him with Cain. Billy starts out as Cain's friend, but he becomes his enemy when he realizes that Cain is the big shot of the show. Meantime, Cain meets a beautiful young lady, Monica Alton (Anne Francis of "Bad Day at Black Rock") when she is painting a ghost town. Later, after he grows sour on the shooting show, Cain goes back to see her and decides that he wants to raise livestock on her land. Eventually, they become a couple, but.

Justice never lets up pursuing Cain and nothing of his redemptive acts prevents him from enjoying his life. Sparr keeps things moving along at a nice pace. Look for screen heavy Emile Meyer as a saloon barkeeper.