This is probably the most famous “Revenge” movie ever made, and rightly so. Peck plays a man driven to avenge his wife’s death. He follows four men who escape from a hanging, and what a star studded crew: later film legend Lee Van Cleef; the handsome but vicious Stephen Boyd; the veteran Albert Salmi; and the introverted Henry Silva. They consider atrocity after atrocity, most of it caused by Boyd, and we see it more through the eyes of Silva, who evokes the most sympathy from the viewer. He serves more as an emplyee and guide.
With each act of retribution the audience secretly cheers Peck on, as do the other characters in the movie. Just what the writer and director intended. And then we are caught in the trap of “revenge” and the true message, when Peck comes to a horrid realization at the end.
True classic.