The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Italy / 1966 Directed by Sergio Leone Starring Clint Eastwood Lee Van Cleef Eli Wallach Color / 161 Minutes / R Format: DVD (R1 - NTSC) MGM Home Entertainment

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1998 Single-disc edition

New for 2009 Blu-ray Edition

9     6   10 = Highest Rating   Guest Review by Rod Barnett

Flourishing for a little more than ten years, the spaghetti western was the most popular and influential of all Euro-Cult film genres. It's hard to imagine what westerns made after 1964 would've looked like without the gritty ambiance and nasty violence that the Spaghettis brought to the mix. There had been a number of harsh, realistic westerns made in Hollywood (especially by Anthony Mann) but none of them were as dark or mean-spirited as the films coming out of Italy. Often criticized for being cruel and malicious, these films were beloved and sought out exactly for these qualities. Hollywood westerns were clean, sanitized entertainment when compared to the Spaghettis. Once the taste for pasta was acquired the world film market binged on these nasty little entrees. Hundreds were made before the genre died in the mid-seventies; though not all were good, the best of them showcase great filmmakers doing some of their most intriguing work.     The pebble that started the avalanche was Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars. Released in 1965, it was simply a westernized remake of Kurasawa's Yojimbo. It raked in millions worldwide and made Clint Eastwood an international star. Leone and Eastwood teamed again in For a Few Dollars More and in 1966 wrapped up what is now known as the "Dollars Trilogy" with the lengthy and ambitious The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. These three films are known for their dark humor, fascinating characters and operatic style, with many fans calling the third one the best Italian western ever made. I've always preferred For a Few Dollars More myself, but there is no denying the power of GBU. It's a fantastic film that (like most Spaghettis) exists in its own strange time and place seemingly outside any objective reality. It's never believable for a minute, with gunshots made from impossible angles and several anachronistic elements such as Gatling guns. But it's a great movie nonetheless.     The film follows three desperate criminals during the American Civil War as they search for a stolen cache of $200,000 in gold. Tuco Ramirez (Eli Wallach) is a wanted man with a $2,000 price on his head. On the run from several bounty hunters, a shifty gringo entrepreneur referred to only as "Blondie" (Clint Eastwood) captures him. Blondie's method of operation is simple and profitable — he turns over Tuco to the nearest marshal for the reward and then rescues him from the hangman’s noose at the very last minute so that the same trick can be played in the next town. He's even nice enough to split the money evenly with Tuco. This mutually beneficial arrangement goes well for a while until Blondie decides that Tuco will never be worth more than $3,000 and dissolves their partnership by abandoning him in the desert. Tuco manages to survive, making it back to civilization with one thought motivating him — revenge. At the same time another bounty hunter, called "Angel Eyes" (Lee Van Cleef), has come across information about a missing cache of Confederate gold whose hidden location is know to only one remaining soldier going under the name of Bill Carson. He sets out in search of Carson with only a rough description of the man. Meanwhile, Tuco manages to get the upper hand with Blondie and marches him into the desert to take vengeance in a slow and deliberate way. Just as the gringo is on the verge of death the twosome come across a runaway stagecoach full of several dead Confederate soldiers. One of them is still barely alive — Bill Carson. He tells Tuco of the hidden gold and gives him the name of the cemetery where it's buried, but only Blondie learns the name of the grave it's in. With Carson dead the two realize they'll have to work together to get the gold, but neither one trusts the other. Donning the dead soldiers' uniforms they proceed to a Catholic mission where Blondie recuperates. But as soon as they leave to travel to the cemetery's location they are captured by Union forces and thrown into a prisoner of war camp. In his continuing search for Bill Carson, Angel Eyes has somehow secured a position of authority in this POW camp. When new prisoner Tuco answers to that name he singles him out for attention. Angel Eyes tortures the story of finding Carson out of the hapless outlaw and, realizing Blondie isn't the type of man to break under pain, enlists him as a partner in grabbing the gold. But Tuco isn't out of the running yet. As the three men find their way to the Confederate graveyard it's anybody's guess who will come out rich and who will end up the cemetery's newest occupant.     Culminating in one of the greatest gunfight showdowns in movie history, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly is one of the best spaghetti westerns ever made and also simply one of the best of the genre regardless of country of origin. Funny, atmospheric, beautifully filmed and packed with fantastic ideas it has been described as the western taken to the Nth degree. Every element of the film is larger than life and twice as vibrant with plenty of loving detail turning it into an epic of greed and testosterone fueled emotion. There are many scenes in the film that give us a look inside the characters in sharp ways that lend a surprising depth to the story. At one point Tuco speaks to his missionary brother for the first time in years with Blondie secretly watching. The regret and anger the brothers express is sad and touching, as is Blondie's silent acceptance of Tuco's falsely happy version of this family reunion when he was witness to the ugly reality. Later in the movie Blondie and Tuco come across a riverside battlefield and are briefed on the tactical situation by a cynical, drunken Union commander who has seen more than his share of war's horrors. Learning of a way to bring the battle to a temporary end (and knowing the cemetery is on the other side of the river), the two outlaws employ some stolen dynamite to encourage the soldiers to move on. This idea of doing the right thing for the wrong reason is one of the themes I notice returning in later Spaghetti Westerns. This seems to come from a European sensibility because, after all, in America we like our good guys to have a heart of gold no matter how heartless they may act. And I can't fail to mention the amazing music by Ennio Morricone. It's truly classic and is one of the most recognizable and memorable scores for any film ever made. The maestro has written dozens of great scores but he'll probably be remembered most fondly for this one.

MGM's budget-priced DVD of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (released in 1998) is a good presentation of the movie but not a great one. There is a fair amount of dirt on the print as well as a few instances of damage that are very noticeable. The image is sharp and pretty colorful but I can imagine a better looking DVD being issued one day. The real incentive for fans of the movie to pick up this disc is the inclusion of seven deleted scenes totaling about 14 minutes that were cut from the film for U.S. release. The scenes range from brilliant to unnecessary but are all worth seeing; especially the sequence that shows Angel Eyes deciding to install himself in the POW camp to find Carson. Since these bits were never dubbed into English they are presented in Italian with subtitles and each one gives a little of the surrounding scenes to show where they fit into the story. Also included are the theatrical trailer and some brief production notes. The mono audio track is perfectly good but I wonder what a 5.1 remix might do to the dense and varied soundtrack as well as Morricone's incredible score. Perhaps one day there will be special edition, but until then, this disc will do quite well. 2/27/03

UPDATE A deluxe 2-disc Collector's Edition — completely restored and resmastered, with extended scenes and plentiful bonus features — was released by MGM in May 2004. In June 2007 Fox Home Entertainment (via subsidiary MGM) is reissuing the 2-disc version as part of the Sergio Leone Anthology box set as well as individually.

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