I Am Sartana Your Angel of Death (1969)
A perfect followup to the <a href=”https://letterboxd.com/jwldk/film/if-you-meet-sartana-pray-for-your-death/>first Sartana film</a>. Gianni Garko is a bit more settled in his role and I think the movie has a more distinct unique flavor to its style now, compared to the first one that still repackaged known spaghetti western elements. The setup is still pretty simple, but no more is needed to make a very entertaining story. Sartana gets a bounty on his head because someone posing like him was involved in a big bank robbery, so he has to fend off several bounty hunters. This alone allows for plenty of cleverly and creatively constructed gun fight scenes, keeping the otherwise repetitive narrative structure interesting to look at. Locations keeps changing and the gun fights are broken up by entertaining parts of gambling.
Unlike the westerns by Sollima or Corbucci, the Sartana series seems less interested in political allegories and criticism - beyond the usual framing rich people as the bad guys, but more in just pure entertainment. Which is far from a bad thing, when it is executing it so well.
Rating: 4