On paper, this spaghetti western must have looked like it would work magnificently. It had a budget, three big stars heading the cast (James Coburn, Telly Savalas, and Italian star Bud Spencer), music by the legendary Riz Ortolani, and the still fresh DIRTY DOZEN plot premise. However, the end results are somewhat lacking. I think the reason why the movie doesn't work is a combination of its script and the direction by Tonino Valerii. Despite its premise suggestion there will be a lot of action, there actually is almost no action until the movie's climax. And the action that does happen in the climax seems somewhat humdrum and routine. It doesn't help that the part of the movie leading up to the climax is more often than not very low key. I would only recommend this spaghetti western to die hard fans of the genre.
Review of A Reason to Live, a Reason to Die
