Born to Kill film review

Born to kill (Nato per uccidere, Italy / 1967 / Director: Antonio Mollica)

A handsome reward awaits!

Rod Gordon (Gordon Mitchell), a feared gunslinger, is lying in bed with a whore who keeps telling him that Bill is coming to kill him. A glance out of the window shows that three horsemen are actually arriving. Rod catches a fly in the air and lets it fly out of the window "Live in peace if you can". He straps on his gunbelt, pays her, says goodbye with "Don't worry" and goes down to the street. Then he lights a cigarillo and the three men approach him with the words "I've been looking for you and I want all my money back". Rod replies "do you want it alive or dead" and shoots the three and as it was self-defense, the sheriff lets him go. On the way to the next town, he secretly witnesses a raid on a small ranch, during which a building is set on fire. Dodge (Aldo Berti), whom he sees again at the entrance to the saloon, is responsible. The atmosphere there is cheerful and upbeat, with lots of music and dancing. He agrees to play a round of poker with him, but puts away the mirror on the table on which Dodge could always see which cards the other players were dealt. It comes as it must: Rod wins a lot of money! But Dodge is a bad loser and gets the money back with the help of a crony.

Now Rod is naturally pissed off and decides to intervene, so he rides to the robbed ranch and meets old John Storm (Franco Gula), the protector of the pretty owner Lori Waldamore (Femi Benussi). He also learns from him that a certain Mr. Tyson (Tom Felleghy) is behind all this and that Dodge is his henchman, blackmailing the ranchers, if necessary by force, in order to take their land cheaply. Just as well that four crooks from Dodge and Tyson cross their path and John thinks he's 20 years too old to teach them a lesson, so Rod can show what he's made of and shoots all four of them.

Back in town, there's an auction where Tyson is looking to snag a farm on the cheap, in a bidding duel Rod offers him "who are you and what do you want?". "I've heard that the land here is awfully cheap. I want to get me one". The repercussions of this humiliation are not long in coming and after he is threatened with ending up in a coffin, he kills the three scoundrels delivering the message. The farmers around Lori then want to hire him as a protector, but he turns them down. His motivation is only to buy cheap land. Lori is very disappointed: "Then you're just as bad as the others, if you want my land, you'll have to kill me". Rod remains thoughtfully in the saloon. Another four crooks from Dodge are too few to do Rod any harm. Now it's up to him to get his money back from Dodge, he surprises him in a room with a whore and knocks him out. He then makes his way to Lori's farm, just in time to free her from Dodge's men. But there are still some questions that need to be answered:

Can he win Lori's trust with this action?
Will he side with the farmers after all?
Will there be a final duel between Rod and Dodge?
Is a Winchester superior to a Colt?
Does love also play a role?

Antonio Mollica made a solid debut in the spaghetti western with Born to Kill, his second oeuvre in the spaghetti western called Saranda ("Dein Leben ist keinen Dollar wert", 1970) was even shown in German cinemas due to Dan Reed in the leading role, but not until 1972. Of course, this is not a gem of the genre, the logic for Gordon's actions is often non-existent, when suddenly four of Dodge's cronies are standing around in the area and he walks up to them and shoots them, without any real provocation or other action, it's probably just supposed to come across as "cool". Femi Benussis role as Lori is very limited and could have been expanded on the basis of her good looks, even if the shy smile at the end provides another highlight.

Gordon Mitchell had reached his zenith in spaghetti western in 1967 - 1968 (John the Bastard, Born to Kill, Beyond the law, If one is born a swine...kill him) and even plays a good leading role here, within the scope of his limited possibilities, before falling into the depths of a Fidani. Is he now in love with the beautiful Lori? If so, then smile or show it in some other way!

The music by Felice di Stefano is well worth listening to, matching the scenes, varied, sometimes a bit dusty, but the mixture makes it and clearly enhances the movie!

The movie is worth seeing, no wasted lifetime and all in all good average, rating 6/10.

Medium: English version in very good picture and sound quality with a running time of 81 minutes.

Deutsche Version dieses Texts unter Nato per uccidere Filmkritik

Written by Perdono