Day of Anger

Lee Van Cleef followed The Good, the Bad and the Ugly with this similarly tough Spaghetti Western. Van Cleef (as Frank) marches his spare strut and coyote stare into the town of Clifton, where he tutors Guilano Gemma’s bullied yet hulkingly handsome Scott in the ways of gunslinging. Unfolding as a series of numbered lessons (“Lesson number four – don’t get between a gun and its target!”), it transitions to Scott getting strident with power and Frank drunk on it, creating conflicted loyalties and a showdown.

The developmental beats and sweaty close-ups are routine, but there’s a muscularity and focus to Day of Anger that make its power dynamics and violent turns clear, direct and engaging. Meanwhile, director Tonino Valerii's stylistic flourishes – a gunshot framed between a man’s legs; a shotgun duel arranged like a horseback game of chicken; a rousing, twanging Riz Ortolani score – are inventive enough to be noteworthy. [Ian Mantgani]