Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Keeley Coleman The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Lachlan Coulson This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

Guillelmina The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

dbborroughs I had been always told this was a great film. What I found when I finally saw it was that it's a messy film.It's about a southern soldier who deserts to marry his girl who is about to give birth during a cholera epidemic. Eventually making it home he is refused permission to marry by the girls father. She dies, the baby survives and the father rides off with a friend and the baby. Picking up a monk they travel a short while before the baby dies. Dad swears revenge and after picking up some other bad man goes after the father of his dead lover.Things happen and only enough is explained to move things along. As I said to dad, I'm watching simply to see if they pull it out in the end. It never did.On some level the pieces work but as a whole this film just doesn't work.

mistymountain I'm not really a fan of westerns myself, but someone told me that this is a classic spaghetti western and that I must see it. Well, i did and let me tell you, I was not impressed. The casting first of all has something to be desired. They hired a South American actor, George Hilton to play an American soldier, John Warner, who goes AWOL to see his dying girlfriend, Rosa. Her father, Don Sandoval, a Mexican lord, despises Warner and blames him for his daughter's death.Well, Rosa died not necessarily because of childbirth, but probably from cholera. Don Sandoval is played by American actor, Ernest Borgnine. So, you have a Hispanic playing an American, and an American playing a Mexican. But wait, there's more. Warner reaches Don Sandoval's home, comes in, sees Sandoval and is about to leave, when Rosa's brother begs his father to let Warner see his infant son. So, Sandoval tells Warner to take the baby and leave. Warner hides out with the infant, and tries to get some milk for the baby while visiting a town, but the townspeople turn him away. Eventually, we don't know whether the baby died of starvation or from cholera. But, Warner swears that he'll get revenge for his son's death. So, for the rest of the movie, you see Warner and Sandoval plotting revenge against each other. But in the end, Warner's involved in a bloody shootout, and let's just say that Sandoval never got his.

lastliberal Saturday continues with another Spaghetti western with Ernest Borgnine and George Hilton.The story takes place during the Civil War. Hilton got Borgnine's daughter pregnant, and she died delivering. Hilton comes back to marry her, finds, out she's dead, and takes the baby, who dies because no one would defy Don Pedro Sandoval (Borgnine) and give him milk.After the baby dies, he flips and gathers some murderers to get revenge on all who were responsible, particularly Sandoval.Great knife fight between the two of them at the end, and I assure you it wasn't a bullet that did him in.Good action throughout.

Scarecrow-88 George Hilton has a big role in this spaghetti western where he portrays an embittered Confederate deserter whose infant child dies of cholera and starvation due to the apathy of others who deny him milk for the baby. In retaliation all those who he blames for the death of his child, especially one Don Pedro(..portrayed by a unsympathetic Ernest Borgnine who hates Hilton's John Warner so much he denounces his own daughter's existence because she fell in love with him), a wealthy man who practically owns the village of Los Cadres, the place where the cholera broke out, whose disease has created a widespread panic plaguing the surrounding areas. Evolving into a remorseless outlaw, with a growing pack of cutthroats and dangerous gunmen joining him, Warner sets his sights on destroying Don Pedro Sandoval in every way possible, blaming him for the death of his child.I think the major mistake of A Bullet for Sandoval is establishing, effectively I thought, Hilton's Warner as a legitimate tragic hero only to transform him into a murderous thug. I never personally thought Hilton was as good as some loathsome killer gathering a brood of gunfighters as he was a mistreated soldier, stripped of any form of dignity due to leaving his regimen before their battle against a major Yankee outfit because he took off with Don Pedro's son, who had informed him of his beloved's sickness and the child he never knew he had. Seeing a pitiful Warner, in a hopeless quest to find a sympathetic figure to provide him with milk for his baby really tugged on my heartstrings and I certainly found his situation devastating. Then, the film, after the baby's death, strips him of his humanity, and he becomes some outlaw collecting his own personal army..I never bought Hilton as an effective heavy, and believe in switching his personality costs the film some major dramatic punch. Borgnine, while attempts at showing a remorse for losing his daughter, while at the same time hating her for the love affair with Warner, never earned an ounce of empathy from me, and I imagine others will have just as hard a time caring about his fate. If anything, the film removes anyone to care about. That is a mistake, in my mind, that the film never recovers from. Almost every time he's on screen Don Pedro is berating someone, loudly barking at others for allowing Warner to roam free, failing to accept his responsibility for what transpires.As you expect, the movie prepares you for the eventual showdown between Warner and Sandoval. It's really about waiting and fate. How long will Warner and those he associates himself with last as a unit? When Sandoval and other ranchers plea with the Confederacy for man/firepower, will Warner be able to successfully avoid a court martial or certain death? Can Warner and those men not killed by the soldiers, attempting to flee a set-up after one of their own betrays them, survive in Mexico? Will they attempt to re-enter America? You just know that Warner and Sandoval will meet face to face to settle their differences. The major bugaboo that bothered me was the reason Sandoval hated Warner so much to begin with. There's mention that Sandoval thought Warner was only interested in his wealth and ranch, but to hate him with such guile, the film doesn't seemed too worried to address this very important question with great detail.There are some action scenes, but most of them lack vigor and punch. And, there are several build-ups to stare-down gunfights which never reach the level expected for this genre. There's lots of potential for A Bullet for Sandoval, but for some reason director/writer Julio Buchs doesn't wish to stage full scale shootouts which is a standard for any great spaghetti western. There's also enough story here to build from if Buchs had stay the course. Too bad.