The Pitiless Three / El sabor de la venganza (Joaquín Luis Romero Marchent, 1963)

[Mickey13]

Copied from the Spagvemberfest 2024 thread:

@Mickey13

Pic’s story essentially portrays a childhood trauma and its impact upon a trio of brothers whose father is killed during a clash with bandits: the surviving son played by Hundar openly expresses his disdain for the instituted laws, while the other played by Harrison deems them as necessary in maintaining order and social cohesion, perceiving them as a noble end in itself, which prompts him to become a man of the law himself the instant he becomes an adult. The third sibling basically resides between the two extremities and plays the role of an intermediary between the two men and by extension, between the two ideological positions.

The friction in question actuates the said men to seek justice in divergent ways, either adhering to or running afoul of the law depending on their personal inclinations. Not only does this strife make for quite a spectacle, but also it provides ample room for character development which reveals itself most conspicuously in Hundar’s part. On the whole, Marchent attempts to stylistically emulate the look and feel of the archetypical American western in the way he narrates and frames the central plotline here. Though it is hard to shake off the impression the work could have become a minor classic had it been crafted with more panache and stylistic elan, eschewing some of the moralistic clichés of the era, film’s writing generally turns out so good it doesn’t constitute much of an impediment, culminating in a fittingly tragic coda.