Even if the plot is straight-up predictable this one is quite fun with well patched intriguing muder mystery in itâs core. It look cheap but at the same time has sort of low-budget charm to it with Ganni Garko making everything nice. I laugh way more than I should have during that courtroom scene tho. 
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New poll available for this one, top of the page under the original post as usual. 
Database page needs update, too. @Admin
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Yessir, all done.
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Hereâs my article on it!
The Price of Death comes as the Italian Western has given way to the giallo. Therefore, this is nearly a last gasp and an acceptance of the shift. Itâs also very much a Eurospy, as the hero, Silver (Gianni Garko) is a dandy who lives with several gorgeous women and always is surrounded by luxury.
Now, we all know and love Garko as Sartana â in all but Sartanaâs Here⊠Trade Your Pistol for a Coffin in which George Hilton plays the role â but the character of Silver first appeared in Killer Caliber .32 in which he was played by Peter Lee Lawrence and is also in Killer Adios, even if his name is Jessy in that film. The character is the coolest man in the West, always calm and collected, a detective, bounty hunter and unstoppable gunfighter.
That said, Silver dresses in brown instead of black, but he still uses miniature hidden guns. Heâs pretty much Sartana, but itâs not like thatâs a bad thing.
This starts with a very giallo POV of a killer hunting down and stabbing a Carmen Morales (Franca De Stratis) on the same evening where three masked men shot and kill several people at a bar. Sheriff Tom Stanton (Luciano Catenacci) kills two of the men but the third escapes. Everyone thinks that Chester Conway (Klaus Kinski) has to be the criminal, including Judge Atwell (Alfredo Rizzo), who sentences him to hang. In response, Conwayâs lawyer Jeff Plummer (Franco Abbina) hires Silver to prove the innocence of his client after a trial where only Conwayâs ex â Polly Winters (Mimma Biscardi) â stood up for him.
Silver is already working for the Morales family, looking for her killer, and he gets no help from the law and plenty of stares and murmurs from the townsfolk, who include Doc Rosencrantz (Luciano Pigozzi) and Reverend Tiller (Giancarlo Prete), proving the strength of this filmâs cast.
Silver come across as Derek Flint mixed with Sherlock Holmes, training with martial artists, rescuing people and discovering that everyone in town is either sleeping with each other or working with one another to make money off one another. He also learns that while Conway is innocent of one crime, he may also be the man that heâs looking for.
Director and writer Lorenzo Gicca Palli also wrote Killer Caliber .32 and created Silver. He also directed and wrote Blackie the Pirate and two Zorro movies, so he definitely gets how to do an adventure movie. His other names that he worked as are Enzo Gicca and Vincent Thomas. I wish heâd made more movies with Silver, who deserves to be in as many films as Sartana and Sabata.
According to this review on the essential Spaghetti Western Database, there was a softcore scene shot for this movie with Biscardi and Dominique Badou, who doesnât appear in the film, and a hardcore scene with Pietro Torrisi (who I just found out was in Check-up Ă©rotique, a porn directed by Renato Polselli!) and an unknown blonde actress. According to the book Wild West Gals, âillegal or semi-legal soft or hard-core versions of genre movies were often edited by producers and sold under the counter.â I would assume that some scenes like this also appeared in fumetti magazines like Cinesex and often arenât in the actual movie.
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Saw this today, and pretty much agree with most previous takes - a bit sloppy-looking, cast sometimes looking like they were in 70s gear (Gely Genkaâs yellow trouser suit in 1st courtroom scene, anyone?) but interesting genre mix and good script and story.
Conclusions were predictable but a neat solution to one question - how do you give Klaus Kinski top billing upfront in a movie, then imply itâs a âwhodunnitâ?
Agree also. A bit below Killer Calibre 32 and Killer Adios. I donât think it helped that Garko turned up in his Sartana gear and basically played it as Sartana. But the plot wasnât very good and cheats a few times (the shooting outside the saloon I went back and checked and the third guy didnât shoot the other two and certainly couldnât have shot them in the back) and having Garko run out into the dark streets pursuing assassins 3 times was one time too many at least I thought. Also took too long to get going and unmasked villain had no proper motivation. A bit sloppy although I saw it in a poor print.
Difficult to see that this was intended as a sex movie. The pre-credits scene and the scene in which Garko gate crashed a hookerâs bedroom look to have been shot in topless versions, going on stills, but that wasnât that uncommon in this time period, especially for horror movies. Anything else would have been added by different producer in a particular jurisdiction and not part of film proper.