*** This review may contain spoilers ***
*Plot and ending analyzed*
A young man gets tussled up by what seem like lawmen, but he escapes them and heads off into the yonder. He comes across some building with a young guy guarding the entrance, and he lets him pass. He seeks lodging at the place and sees that there are many women and men present. One of them picks a fight with him, and another draws a gun on him but is shot dead. The place may be a brothel, it is hinted at but never overtly stated.
Later, the man also shoots the guy who had picked a fight with him earlier. And he is still allowed to be at the house after killing two of the men. That seems very odd. The leader of the ruffian men asks him if he wants to do a bank robbery job with them. He agrees, but infighting and jealousy take their toll. Soon they are ineffective at doing anything at all. And it turns out that the men were also double-crossed by the women, who actually robbed the bank. The plot is inconsistent and ridiculous, but at least they added some female spin to the mix.
As far as Westerns go, Mark of the Gun is extremely anemic and peculiar. They waste half the runtime at the old building, with nothing but talking and quarreling. It doesn't really pick up that much later, but then it does start to resemble a regular Western again. The producers make decent use of some old abandoned building for the ending shootout. I saw a few familiar faces like actor Ned Romero and actor Paul Sorensen.
The lead man is so inept and does not have any charismatic qualities at all. He barely speaks as well and that makes him extremely irritating. The rest of the cast is tolerable for a no-budget Western movie. It is not a particularly enjoyable viewing, but it is somewhat interesting to find these low-end movies. The movie looks like from 1962 or so. It probably was locked up in a vault and the dates are incorrect.
Grade: C -
*Plot and ending analyzed*
A young man gets tussled up by what seem like lawmen, but he escapes them and heads off into the yonder. He comes across some building with a young guy guarding the entrance, and he lets him pass. He seeks lodging at the place and sees that there are many women and men present. One of them picks a fight with him, and another draws a gun on him but is shot dead. The place may be a brothel, it is hinted at but never overtly stated.
Later, the man also shoots the guy who had picked a fight with him earlier. And he is still allowed to be at the house after killing two of the men. That seems very odd. The leader of the ruffian men asks him if he wants to do a bank robbery job with them. He agrees, but infighting and jealousy take their toll. Soon they are ineffective at doing anything at all. And it turns out that the men were also double-crossed by the women, who actually robbed the bank. The plot is inconsistent and ridiculous, but at least they added some female spin to the mix.
As far as Westerns go, Mark of the Gun is extremely anemic and peculiar. They waste half the runtime at the old building, with nothing but talking and quarreling. It doesn't really pick up that much later, but then it does start to resemble a regular Western again. The producers make decent use of some old abandoned building for the ending shootout. I saw a few familiar faces like actor Ned Romero and actor Paul Sorensen.
The lead man is so inept and does not have any charismatic qualities at all. He barely speaks as well and that makes him extremely irritating. The rest of the cast is tolerable for a no-budget Western movie. It is not a particularly enjoyable viewing, but it is somewhat interesting to find these low-end movies. The movie looks like from 1962 or so. It probably was locked up in a vault and the dates are incorrect.
Grade: C -
