- Year
- 1968
- Country
- Spain · Italy
- Runtime
- 101 min
- Director
- Sergio Corbucci
- Updated
- 10 Aug 2026
- Obscurity
- known (29/100)
- Also known as
- A Professional Gun · Revenge Of A Gunfighter
The Mercenary
Corbucci's Zapata western. A Polish gun-for-hire, a peasant revolutionary, and Jack Palance in a frock.
Sergio Corbucci's rousing Zapata western, in which a cynical Polish mercenary is hired to protect a Mexican mine and ends up entangled with a peasant who becomes a revolutionary. Franco Nero and Tony Musante play the mismatched pair, and Jack Palance is a memorably foppish, flower-loving villain.
Morricone and Bruno Nicolai provide one of the great spaghetti scores. It balances real political content with pure entertainment better than almost any film in the cycle, and the bullring finale is superb. One of Corbucci's most purely enjoyable films.
Trailer
The numbers
Nobody has rated this yet. Be the first to make a claim you'll have to defend.
Your call
Where to watch
Legal options in USA
Links open in a new tab (↗). Availability data via TMDB and changes constantly, so confirm on the service. Legal options only. Checked 23 Sept 2026. All options ↗
Discuss with AI
Open a chatbot with a question about this film already typed out. Useful for a second opinion, plot detail, or where to find a copy.
Filed alongside
▶ watchcultIf You Meet Sartana Pray for Your Death
The gadget-gunslinger spaghetti west arrives fully dressed in black.
▶ watchcultCemetery Without Crosses
The French corner of the spaghetti cycle: gaunt, ritualistic, and dedicated to Leone.
▶ watchcultThe Grand Duel
Lee Van Cleef, one three-way showdown, and the Bacalov theme you know from Kill Bill.
▶ watchcultFour of the Apocalypse
Fulci does a bleak, hallucinatory western. Four outcasts cross a hostile frontier. Most do not make it.
▶ watchcultDjango Kill... If You Live, Shoot!
Nothing to do with Django, and one of the strangest and cruelest westerns Italy ever shot.
▶ watchcultThe Big Gundown
Sollima's best. A manhunt that keeps turning into a political argument.