This Raquel Welch western is one of Tarantino’s favourite films and it’s easy to see why. It’s not just because of the Kill Bill-style central drama about the murderous misadventures of Welch’s eponymous rancher turned gunslinger. It’s the surrounding material that’s quietly magnificent, and it includes a deeply lovely performance from Christopher Lee at his most naturalistic and unaffected as a kindly gunsmith called Bailey. Then there’s Stephen Boyd from Ben-Hur, entirely wordless yet black-clad and ridiculously suave as a mysterious sharpshooter called the Preacher. And watch out for Diana Dors playing a brothel madam, delivering an ear-shattering scream when Caulder executes her first villain.
The violence is gory, splattery and very 1970s, and there’s a misstep sequence — part comedy, part sleaze
