Run, Man, Run (Italian: Corri uomo corri, also known as Big Gundown 2) is an Italian-French Zapata Western film. It is the second film of Sergio Sollima centred on the character of Cuchillo, again played by Tomas Milian, after the two-years earlier successful western The Big Gundown. It is also the final chapter of the political-western trilogy of Sollima, which includes Face to Face, and his last spaghetti western. According to the same Sollima, Run, Man, Run is the most politic, the most revolutionary and even anarchic among his movies.
Contents
Plot
When Cuchillo returns to his hometown in Mexico he soon finds himself in prison, sharing a cell with a dangerous desperado, the poet Ramirez. Despite a pardon and release in one day, Ramirez hires Cuchillo to help him escape. Waiting for his release are numerous bounty hunters eager for the price on Ramirez's head. Evading the hunters, they make it to Ramirez's village, but only minutes before the revolutionary bandit Reza arrives. Ramirez is shot but before he dies, he passes information to Cuchillo regarding $3M in hidden gold, and charges him with returning it to the revolutionary leader, Santillana. Hot on Cuchillo's trail are French mercenaries serving President Diaz, Reza and his bandits, an American gunslinger, and Cuchillo's fiancé, Dolores...who simply wants Cuchillo to stop running and marry her. Deceptions and double-crosses rule as all parties race to discover the gold cache.
Cast
Tomas Milian: Manuel "Cuchillo" Sanchez
Donal O'Brien: Nathaniel Cassidy
Linda Veras: Penny Bannington
John Ireland: Santillana
Chelo Alonso: Dolores
Marco Guglielmi: Colonel Michel Sévigny
José Torres: Ramirez
Edward Ross: Jean-Paul
Nello Pazzafini: Riza
Gianni Rizzo: Mayor Christopher Bannington
Dan May: Mateos Gonzalez
Noé Murayama: Pablo
Attilio Dottesio: Manuel Etchevaria
Orso Maria Guerrini: Raul
Federico Boido: Steve Wilkins
Calisto Calisti: Fernando Lopez
Soundtrack
In addition to composing a large amount of film scores himself, Bruno Nicolai also conducted many of Ennio Morricone's film scores. In an interview in the featurette Run Man Run: 35 Years Running, director Sergio Sollima stated that Morricone, who was then contracted with Universal Pictures was not allowed to work for any other film company, but composed the score to the film without credit.