TeenzTen An action-packed slog

Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Ariella Broughton It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Deanna There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

TankGuy Two men, Colonel Pembroke(JAMES COBURN)and Eli Sampson(BUD SPENCER),stand in the middle of a fortress, Fort Holman, littered with dead bodies, in the aftermath of a bloody battle. The story is told in flashback and as the two men leave the deserted and destroyed fortress, the film begins from the start and depicts the events leading up to the massacre. During the American Civil war, a disgraced Colonel Pembroke is brought back to his union superiors after having escaped from a Confederate prisoner of war camp and been arrested for looting. It turns out that Pembroke was in charge of the garrison at Fort Holman, but surrendered to Confederate Major Ward(TELLY SAVALAS)and his rebel forces without a single shot being fired, which allowed Ward to take over the Fort without a fight. Although branded a coward and a traitor, Pembroke's superior officer gives him the chance top redeem himself, by re-taking Fort Holman. Pembroke selects 6 men to take with him on his mission,4 convicts, a dubious army Sergeant and Eli, whom he met shortly after his escape from the POW camp. As the men set out on their mission, we soon find out Pembroke's personal motivation for giving up the fort, and wanting to take it back...A REASON TO LIVE,A REASON TO DIE is one of my favourite Spaghetti Westerns,the highlight of the whole film has got to be the climatic battle inside Fort Holman.The whole sequence was spectacular, exhilarating,absolutely riveting and shot in a fun, exciting way.As with every other Spaghetti western, the stunts in this sequence are awesome, the shots of masses of soldiers being gunned down by Gatling Guns and pistols and furiously flinching, falling down steps and off of walls as they got shot were fantastic and sent my pulse pounding and adrenaline surging through my veins. The massive explosions were mind blowing and the shots of the wagon sheds angrily exploding with flames tearing them apart blew me away, I was completely awestruck by how I could feel the thundering impact of every explosion as the camera shook violently every time something was blown apart. Pembroke and his men kick ass and raise hell in rollicking Spaghetti western fashion as they throw packs of Dynamite over the fort walls and into the fort, destroying the entire place and taking out dozens of men and tearing up buildings. One part in this sequence which made me laugh was when Eli grabs two soldiers manning a Gatling Gun, bashes their heads together and throws them off of the fort wall. I was extremely impressed by the Fort Holman set and awestruck just by how vast and huge it was and how expertly designed and built it was.This final battle is the only action scene in the whole film and the director does a great job in building up to this explosive, ear shattering, all-guns-blazing finale.The cinematography was incredible, with stunning shots of the rocky, sun baked mountains, as I've already stated, the excitement and energy of the final battle is captured magnificently. The shots of the Steam Engine chuntering down the track early in the film were also excellent. I thought Colonel Pembroke was a strong character and was portrayed excellently by James Coburn, even though he gets very little screen time, Telly Savalas absolutely superb as the crazed Major ward, I loved the part during the battle in which he shoots a deserting soldier before screaming "There'll be no time for court martials, EXECUTION ON THE SPOT". Bud Spencer was magnificent and the guy who played the brutal union Sergeant also gave a decent performance, I also thought the dubbing was terrific, although the voices of James Coburn and Telly Savalas sounded genuine, I thought the rough, deep voices of the characters were cool/The storyline was appealing, interesting and marvellously gritty and the pacing was satisfactory with the men constantly getting closer to the fortress. The final scene between Colonel Pembroke and Major Ward was chilling, taut and really nail biting and shot in a mind blowing, gut wrenching way, I sensed a brief anti war comment at the end of the film when Colonel Pembroke cuts down the confederate flag, then throws down his sword and takes off his gun belt and throwing it on the ground. I had no fingers left after the men scaled the cliff face, the shots here were amazing too.Riz Ortolani's score was exceptional, the title music was beautiful, it reminded me of the music in the American westerns of the 40s and 50s.The hairs on the back of my neck stood up prior to the battle as Pembroke and his men emerge on a ridge and shoot two guys before Pembroke screams "GO GET EM" and the men charge towards the fortress and begin hurling dynamite over it's walls as the epic soundtrack plays in the background.A REASON TO LIVE,A REASON TO DIE is a flawless Spaghetti Western,it has an engrossing, intriguing and intelligent civil war storyline,fantastic script and characters, stupendous and brisk camera-work, a tremendous soundtrack which sounds magnificent in the film, dozens of intense and exciting scenes which are well directed, shot and paced and an electrifying,out-of-this-world action sequence to top it all off.10/10.

ianlouisiana I watched this film yesterday evening on ITV4 when I could have tuned into "The Hairy Bikers' Cookbook".Well,nobody's perfect. I can only imagine that ITV in its wisdom cut huge swathes of the storyline in order to fit it into their Saturday dead - time slot. Set during the War between the States the story opens on the eve of a mass hanging in a fort occupied by Union soldiers.For no reason that was apparent Mr J.Coburn and Mr B.Spence are brought to the fort in a waggon and the C.O. immediately seizes on Mr Coburn as the ideal man to lead a suicide raid on an enemy - held fort."I'll need 12 men" says Mr Coburn between drags on his cigarillo and delicate sips of his red wine that he has already pronounced as "good",denoting that he is a man of some culture. You see,Mr Coburn had been the officer in charge of the fort but had surrendered to the Rebs and been considered "yeller" although the fact that the Reb colonel had threatened to murder his wife and child might have concentrated his mind somewhat.Despite being handed his prize the odious colonel (Mr T.Savalas) went ahead and slaughtered Mr Coburn's family just for the fun of it. He doesn't get twelve men but plucks seven from the shadow of the gallows (including one wearing his late wife's crucifix,a point that is never explained or referred to again)and,with the promise of untold riches ringing in their ears,they set off,pausing only to have lunch at an isolated farm occupied by a family of psychos who they discover have trapped unwary Confederate soldiers and stolen whatever unwary Confederate Soldiers carry on their persons.then killed them.We don't actually see the bodies - a touch of sensitivity rather negated by the wholesale murder that occurs later in the film. They execute the Addams Family(There were four of them but I only counted three shots so possibly they lined them up one behind the other) and hop on a convenient passing Iron Horse. An awful lot of time is wasted as Mr Spence ingratiates himself with the reb grunts but eventually Mr Coburn and his scurvy crew get inside the fort and kill near enough every damn living thing except Mr Savalas who,with the dignity of an injured bull on its knees submits to the killing stroke of the sword wielded by Mr Coburn. That's the Code of the West - I guess. The music is intrusive,the guitar sounds a little flat to me,and the actual recording of the soundtrack is blurred. The dubbing is poor,the colour variable and Mr Savals's jacket as he faces his executioner is very untidy below the waist.He must have put it on in a hurry. Perhaps if anyone has seen a full - length version of "A reason to live,a reason to die",they can tip me the wink about Mr Coburn's wife's crucifix.It would be nice to know.

FightingWesterner Disgraced Union officer James Coburn saves himself and a few degenerates, including Bud Spencer, from hanging by suggesting a daring raid on the impregnable Fort Holman, currently being held by mad rebel General Telly Savalas. As the introductory crawl suggests, Coburn has greater motivations than that of simple patriotism.Inspired by The Dirty Dozen with a bit of Where Eagles Dare and The Wild Bunch thrown in, this is an entertaining Italian western/Civil War movie that makes good use of the massive sets previously built for the film El Condor.Generally worth recommending, Massacre At Fort Holman (also widely known as A Reason To Live, A Reason To Die, with Coburn dubbed by someone else and Bud Spencer apparently by character actor R.G. Armstrong!) sags some in the middle but things pick up and the final battle is fairly exciting.There's a great performance by the always cool James Coburn, while that of the supposedly insane Telly Savalas is actually more subdued than usual. He was much more zesty in Pancho Villa and A Town Called Hell, though this is still a better movie.

classicsoncall You know, I must have missed something here because this story just didn't make much sense. During the Civil War, Union Colonel Pembroke (James Coburn) surrenders his position at Fort Holman to Rebel forces, and once court martialed, makes an offer to Major Charles Ballard to take the fort back with a handful of men. When asked why he surrendered in the first place, he stated that it wasn't important, so we never do find out. Huh?With five outlaws saved from the gallows, and a soldier thrown in for good measure by the Major, Pembroke makes his way back to Fort Holman, dangling a five hundred thousand dollar promise of hidden gold to his rag tag band. Curiously, it seemed to me that once the bullets started to fly, Pembroke lost more men than he started out with, but then again, I wasn't counting. In what looked like the complete reverse of the situation at the end of "Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid", it appeared that Pembroke's bunch had the entire Rebel garrison at Holman surrounded, managing to destroy everything in sight while picking off a swarm of soldiers who never seemed to be seeking cover from all the gunfire. Holman's commander, General Ward (Telly Savalas) must have figured that being this close to the end of the flick, he might as well take Pembroke's sword to end it all. The set up seemed to suggest that Ward and Pembroke were mortal enemies, but if they were, I'm not going back to find out why.The print of the film I viewed probably didn't help matters any, it was a cheap DVD I picked up for a buck, and was quite dark and muddy throughout. I will give credit though to Pembroke's military ally Eli Sampson (Bud Spencer), he got an awful lot of mileage out of the old, hey the War is over gimmick. As for the half million in hidden gold - nope, it never turned up.