images (2)Sometimes known as SARTANA THE GRAVEDIGGER, this film, second in the series, has Gianni Garko, billed as John Garko for the American release, finds our hero framed for the bank robbery of an impenetrable bank. Bounty hunters were hired as guards and one dressed in the distinctive style of the most famous bounty hunter of them all engineers the theft, leaving him holding the bag.

A reward is put on Sartana’s head.

Bounty hunters Hot Dead(Klaus Kinski) and Deguejo(Gordon Mitchell) take up the hunt.

Soon the real Sartana, alarmed at what’s going on, starts looking into it. Heimages (1) has an assistant, Buddy Ben(spaghetti vet Frank Wolff), that serves as his Watson in this detective tale. The trail leads the pair to Poker Flats where the game is wide open and crime running wild.

Sartana is less spectral here, more of a straight forward western character. The directing reins were taken over by Giuliano Carnimeo(billed as Anthony Ascott) after some fall out between the first film’s sono_sartana_il_vostro_becchino_john_garko_gianni_garko_giuliano_carnimeo_003_jpg_kmbsdirector, Gianfranco Parolini, and some of the production people. Fans were divided on the turn of the series with this film and it’s moody, episodic framing. It retained the violence and atmosphere of the first, but giving it a burlesque air in the Las Vegas style Poker Flats.

I liked it.

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