More Dead Than Alive

More Dead Than Alive is a decent film that starts off with a lot of great action, but it gets slow at times, especially with Ann Francis, who just plays a minor role in this movie. Paul Hampton who stars as Billy carries the movie with hilarious acting, but excellent! I am a big Clint Walker-Vincent Price fan, and the reason I purchased the DVD is because I wanted to see Vincent Price in a Western. He did a good job as did Clint, but if it were not for Paul Hampton; this movie probably would not fly. After viewing this movie, I have become a Paul Hampton fan, great performance! For anybody who is a Clint Walker fan, I highly recommend the movie "Snow Beast". For those viewers who love Westerns, More Dead Than Alive should be included in your library, because of good acting, action, uniqueness, repressed humor, and it is enjoyable.

An interesting concept. The man with a past that never let's him live a normal life. Clint Walker is sufficiently the bowhunk and Connie Francis is pretty and pert. Nice detail in making Connie an artist and independent woman in the 1880's. The score if you can call it that was horrendous. It sounded like a score to a bad animation film mixed with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. Who did this???? Other than that I like the film very much and the end fight scene between Clint Walker and Mike Henry is terrific. Mr. Henry did it so well I thought he was a professional stuntman. It turns out he was an accomplished actor. Bravo!

Yes, this is a change of pace from the standard American western. Instead of the usual action and movement, we get a lot of dialog exchanged in enclosed places, as if this were a TV drama from the early 1950s. While the results aren't bad, they're not recommended, either, which is unfortunate since there are ingredients here for a good movie, and the eclectic cast is better than average. In what other movie can you find "Cheyenne," (Clint Walker), "Dr. Phibes," (Vincent Price), "Tarzan," (Mike Henry), and "Altaira" from "Forbidden Planet," (Anne Francis)? Incidentally, while Clint Walker and Mike Henry possessed two of the finest physiques ever to strut across the silver screen, neither man takes his shirt off in this movie. What a waste!

OK, saw the movie on DVD, it must have just been released on DVD which is good for the other reviewers who were asking for it. anyway, the story revolves around Clint walkers character "killer Cain" who killed 12 men and went to jail for about 20 years. finally gets set free and tries to start a new life, but encounters problems along the way, and cant seem to keep a job until he joins Price's gun-shooting show. this really weird kid called henry (whos supposed to be i guess a kid of 18-19 but looks like late 20's) is with Price and is very good shooter but he is also a bit off his rocker and comes off as almost homicidal at times, constantly wanting Cain to kill people and add notches to his gun, but Cain simply wont have it. he knows the error of his deeds and wants to start a new. its a very good little B-western that i enjoyed, Vincent price is chews up the scenery as always which is a good thing. Clint walker,whom i never saw before this movie, was very good as the big gentle soul who tries to redo his life. my mom grew up watching him in Shiane and she loved him as a kid. so we watched this and it was touching, at times you can tell its very 60's looking. but price was so enjoyable, as always, and it was so sad to see him die. but he got really good screen time so i cant say i feel jipped. however, the REAL shocker, and don't read anymore if you don't want to be *SPOILED!!!!*................................... Cain, who now has a wife and property and looks to finally found his place, gets visited by some guy we keep seeing earlier in the film but isn't revealed who it is, and the guy just shoots him! yeah! the guy just kills him right away, and then tells Cains crying wife that Cain killed his father 20 years ago and deserved what he got...and then simply rides away with a look of pride for avenging his fathers death. movie ends with this and shots of Cains wife crying and Cain lying dead. its very sad and VERY shocking. but this i guess was maybe a popular thing to do at the time. maybe it was to show that "violence begets violence"?perhaps was influenced by those gritty spaghetti Westerns that Eastwood made popular. i don't know, but it was a very weird ending, especially when you think its all over. but don't let that put you off from this, its still very much worth seeing. but seriously, if ANYONE could bother to explain what the hell the ending was about, i'd really appreciate it! also, movie has a WEIRD music score that i compare to the movie "ryans daughter", 2 movies that have a offbeat musical score that doesn't fit. during prices dramatic death, they play weird kinda "circus" type music and its just weird and doesn't quite make sense for such a tense scene. must've been a 60's thing, i don't know. well, enjoy the movie!

Luke Santee's boys slip inside a fort(using caskets to hide in!)to rescue his brother out of a hanger's prison. Luke's brother is denied his chance to escape thanks in part to a prisoner named Cain who is soon let out as a rehabilitated man. Living a life outside bars without using a gun again, however, won't be an easy task. More mellow, with no interest in picking up a Colt, as proposed by traveling showman with cat-like grin, Dan Ruffalo(Vincent Price, in a wonderful change of pace, in a rare western role)for a role in his shooting gallery, Cain really wants to go legitimately straight, but in comes Luke Santee to make his life miserable. Roughed up by Luke and his men, no work available for released cons, Cain will have his hands full. Cain befriends a painter named Monica(the beautiful Anne Francis; Forbidden Planet)while encountering her in an abandoned town. Unable to hold a job due to his notorious reputation, he finally decides to join Ruffalo. Ruffalo has in his possession a Colt with 12 notches depicting the number of men Cain killed during his outlaw days before 18 years behind bars. Young sharpshooting Billy, very talented with a gun, who had idolized Cain, with dreams of living the life of a gunfighter, is the star of traveling show. Billy resents Cain(Ruffalo has a particular interest in him due to his draw of the crowd, bringing in big profit), and wants to upstage him, always engaging in intense arguments, often attempting to cause a gunfight. MORE DEAD THAN ALIVE carries that familiar theme of a man trying with all his might to escape his past, a past which haunts him wherever he goes. We see at the conclusion that maybe there's no way to avoid fate..a son, father, retired marshal still holding a grudge, there'll always be someone appearing out of the blue looking for revenge. Through the only friendship he's able to develop, with Monica, Cain could just maybe find the peace he's been looking for. He wants to help build a place with Monica as the two eventually fall of love. Billy, really immature even if he's good with a gun, is psychotic and unstable and it's only a matter of time before he'll be confronting Cain for a duel..interesting decision by the filmmakers, though, to go in a different direction with Cain getting the upper hand against his young rival. Particularly brutal is Price's fate, in slow motion, like a mutt in the street. I must say that I hated the music used in this movie, the upbeat score seems more suited for a slapstick comedy than a serious western about men with guns. Odd structure, too, setting chapters in the film through different seasons, also moving the pace a bit faster, eliminating chunks of story, like specific passages of time when life wasn't exactly kind to Cain(the plot is uninspired when it comes to the relationship between Cain and Monica, although Francis does what she can with a rather underwritten role). I also found the song which opens and closes the film particularly dire..it's a Dimitri Tiomkin knock-off that doesn't exactly work for this film, and, if anything, sounds really outdated and corny. Plenty of bullets and blood, though, including a spirited brawl between Cain and Luke within the old buildings of the abandoned town. Billy whimpers and sobs when anyone puts him in an uncomfortable position, and his fate shows how pathetic he is when the gun isn't available for use. I think the major flaw of the film is the diminishing of Luke Santee's character after setting him up in such a way at the beginning. Clint Walker is rather a bore, if I were to be truly honest, but he's a beefcake so I can see why he was used in the role of Cain. Paul Hampton really steals the film in the most colorful part of Billy, a certifiable headcase who stirs the pot, the one behind animosity, always a needling prick. Mike Henry is Luke Mantee, a mean criminal who isn't someone you hope to cross hairs with.

"More Dead Than Alive" is a good, solid Western drama. It doesn't really do anything special, and this viewer wouldn't consider it to be that offbeat, if indeed that's what it was going for. It's actually pretty familiar altogether, utilizing classic themes like the criminal who wants to leave his bloody past behind him, but can't deny who he was, and the changing times for the American West. It's got a little romance, and some potent violence in the "Wild Bunch" tradition. Certainly, it *looks* gorgeous (as does its leading lady, Anne Francis), and it is nicely acted. It's largely a vehicle for jut jawed Clint Walker, as the aforementioned former outlaw who vows to serve out his 18 year sentence. He gets out in the winter of 1891, and really tries to live a normal life. But most people won't give him a break, with the exception of traveling sideshow proprietor Dan Ruffalo (Vincent Price), who's attracted by the fact of "Killer" Cains' notoriety and hires him as a sharpshooter. He ends up raking in the big bucks, to the consternation of whiny "kid" (32 year old Paul Hampton), who doesn't like his star status to be threatened in any way. Walker is an old school tough guy, but also is able to create a reasonably likable character. You do want this guy to catch a break, even though the odds are against him. Hampton is memorable at being annoying and pathetic; now this is a character whom you *don't* like. The beautiful Ms. Francis adds a real human element since she is able to judge Walker as the man he is now, without factoring in his reputation. Familiar faces like Mike Henry, Harry Lauter, and Emile Meyer turn up, but it's Price that provides the film with whatever panache it has. He's clearly enjoying himself, but isn't excessively hammy. It's a treat to see him in this sort of setting. As was said, there's nothing great about this one - although there is one decent action sequence early on - but it remains watchable for 102 minutes. Viewers will be struck by the violent, unexpected ending. Seven out of 10.

First off.. "More Dead Than Alive" is available on DVD. The movie is an interesting ,offbeat Western .Perhaps Clint Walker's most accomplished performance(I know, not saying much) as a paroled gunfighter(Killer Kane), not allowed a fair shake by the good citizens of the Arizona Territory. He goes into business with a stovepipe-hatted Vincent Price(subdued) as a side-show trick-shot, but his past still travels with his present.Paul Hampton is a standout as the young fast gun dead-eye(though he's never drawn on a live person).He's like a hopped-up Owen Wilson.The locations are authentic and the situations believable.The score ..kinda goofy.Well worth a look.

More Dead Than Alive might not do much for a lot of western fans, and the reason for that is that it's so different from the rest of the genre. The western hero is meant to be big, strong, uncaring and a real sharp shooter; and in this film, that is everything that our central character used to be, and now he's going straight. For that reason, it might be more advisable to go into this film expecting more of a drama than a western as that's essentially what it is; a drama set in the once-wild west. Our central character is a man named Cain, who earned the nickname 'Killer Cain' thanks to the twelve notches on his revolver. After eighteen years behind bars, the killer is released but while he's no longer on the run from the law; he faces a different challenge as the West that put him behind bars is not the West that he's being released back into, and he quickly discovers that getting a job with his reputation is not the easiest thing to do. The only man who wants to employ him is circus ringmaster Ruffalo; but Cain lacks practise and the young assistant Billy is a better shot. Aside from provide a different sort of western, the film also tries to do a few other things and unfortunately there just isn't time for it all. There's a romance angle which stems off the main plot and that doesn't get nearly enough time spent on it, while the action sequences we do get feel more like an afterthought. My main reason for seeing this film is undoubtedly the presence of the great Vincent Price, who gives a memorable performance in a supporting role. Clint Walker takes the lead role and while it's not a standout performance and he looks a little young and clean to have been behind bars for eighteen years; he does make for a likable lead. Paul Hampton is a real standout, however, as the cocky young villain of the piece. The film provides good entertainment for the duration and it's not exactly taxing stuff, which ensures that the film is always enjoyable enough. The ending was a bit of a disappointment to me as certain characters were killed by the wrong people; but all in all, this is a memorable film and is recommended if you want a decent hour and a half of entertainment.

You know, I really can't complain about most of the acting in this film. Clint Walker, Anne Francis and the always wonderful Vincent Price do their parts very well, and individual scenes are very well shot and acted. The setting was the Old West coming to an end, and the people who made it finding it hard to adjust to more "civilized" times. "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" hit on these themes the same year and a lot better. This was convoluted, at best. WHere I think this movie lost the war was in the editing room, where someone had to take all these scenes, and string them together in a coherent movie. A great example is the opening of the film, where there's this elaborate prison break in a military prison involving hiding in caskets brought in for a hanging. And then we never see those characters again (I don't think) and they have nothing to do with the rest of the plot. I think part of the problem was Walker himself. He comes off as such a nice guy that you don't believe for a moment he killed 12 people. Or it was 12 complete misunderstandings. Vincent Price is pretty good in this. While he's mostly remembered for horror films, they only comprise 25% of his credits. He did a lot of roles like this and he did them well. Anne Francis is great as a liberated woman trying to reform a fallen man. What hurts the movie is Paul Hampton as the young gun, Billy. Honestly, his performance is so over the top, so grating and so silly, it just ruins the rest of the movie. One wonders why the more experienced actors didn't tell him to ratchet down a bit. Now that I've checked the spoiler box, let's get to the ending. A "Lawyer" who has been seeking Kane out throughout the whole movie shows up at his ranch where he's living a nice life with Anne Francis, and then shoots him in his front yard because he killed his father 20 years before. I think this is part of where the western was trying to be "Daring" and "Bold" instead of being a conventional western. But it just didn't fit because the rest of it WAS a conventional western. Final point, reading everyone else's comments. Yes, the music was strange and totally inappropriate for the scenes it was used in.

There are many films which the great actor Clint Walker made and a few became the foundation for the rest. In this film, which is one of his best, called " More Dead than Alive " is directed by Robert Spar and written by George Schench. It relates the unusual story of a multiple murderer, called Cain, (Clint Walker) who has paid the standard price for murdering several men, by serving nearly twenty years in prison. Now that he's out, he finds a job with Dan Ruffalo's (Vincent Price) wild west show. Earning honest money, Clain decides to capitalize on his infamous legacy while at the same time trying to go straight. Unfortunately, Cain's past is slowly creeping in on his peaceful life-style and it only a matter of time before it catches up to him. At the same time, Clain tries to teach Billy Valence an envious and arrogant reputation-seeking gun-slinger (Paul Hampton) not to make the same mistakes he made. The story is a moral one which has influence many a writer and director in the following movie years. For Walker, the least we can add is that this film has become a Classic. ****