PLOT: Rancher Mike Sturges (Steve Reeves, the late body builder best remembered for starting the sword & sandal craze by starring in "Hercules" and "Hercules Unchained") and his younger brother Roy are framed for a train robbery they didn't commit and sent the brutal Yuma prison without a trial. There, Roy is tortured and eventually beaten to death by a sadistic guard (are there any other kind in movies like this?). Enraged, Mike escapes during a prison break out, kills the guard who killed his brother and sets out to exact a similar revenge on the criminals who tore his life apart.
An accomplished horse rider, Steve Reeves had always liked westerns - as most people of his generation no doubt did - and when he got into the movie business he naturally wanted to make one (legend has it he was offered the role of The Man With No Name in "A Fistful of Dollars", which helped make a cinematic icon out of then TV star Clint Eastwood - but turned it down because he found the script too violent and was skeptical of Italian knowledge of America's "Old West"), and finally did with this, his last film, which he also co-wrote. Though only in his early 40s, meaning he could have hung around and made more spaghetti westerns as his pal and fellow athlete the late Gordon Scott did, Reeves had injured his shoulder during a chariot accident on a previous film and stunt work in between that accident and "A Long Ride From Hell" only aggravated it and would cause him problems later in life regarding his work out regime (Reeves did his own stunts since there were no Italian stunt men big enough to double for him). Since the injury made being an action star, even a B-movie action star, impractical, Reeves opted to bow out from the game and spent the remainder of his life living quietly in California, where he managed a horse ranch.
As for the film itself, it's a fairly grim, gritty and dark story, in contrast to the mythological fantasy adventure films Reeves was best known for. You wouldn't think Reeves was suffering from a bad shoulder watching him in the film though, as he batters his way through villains and proved himself to be surprisingly nimble for a guy who stood 6'1" and weighed over 200 lbs of solid muscle. Though dubbed again, Reeves dominates every scene he's in by sheer virtue of his physical presence and steely blue eyes.
All in all, a must for fans of Reeves and spaghetti westerns in general.
An accomplished horse rider, Steve Reeves had always liked westerns - as most people of his generation no doubt did - and when he got into the movie business he naturally wanted to make one (legend has it he was offered the role of The Man With No Name in "A Fistful of Dollars", which helped make a cinematic icon out of then TV star Clint Eastwood - but turned it down because he found the script too violent and was skeptical of Italian knowledge of America's "Old West"), and finally did with this, his last film, which he also co-wrote. Though only in his early 40s, meaning he could have hung around and made more spaghetti westerns as his pal and fellow athlete the late Gordon Scott did, Reeves had injured his shoulder during a chariot accident on a previous film and stunt work in between that accident and "A Long Ride From Hell" only aggravated it and would cause him problems later in life regarding his work out regime (Reeves did his own stunts since there were no Italian stunt men big enough to double for him). Since the injury made being an action star, even a B-movie action star, impractical, Reeves opted to bow out from the game and spent the remainder of his life living quietly in California, where he managed a horse ranch.
As for the film itself, it's a fairly grim, gritty and dark story, in contrast to the mythological fantasy adventure films Reeves was best known for. You wouldn't think Reeves was suffering from a bad shoulder watching him in the film though, as he batters his way through villains and proved himself to be surprisingly nimble for a guy who stood 6'1" and weighed over 200 lbs of solid muscle. Though dubbed again, Reeves dominates every scene he's in by sheer virtue of his physical presence and steely blue eyes.
All in all, a must for fans of Reeves and spaghetti westerns in general.