#but regardless I found that every single person I‘ve interacted with has been kind

[starlingstalk]

Oh btw I hope you‘re all aware I am twiddling my thumbs over every repost every ask every comment every nice word spoken to me like I am so surprised about how normal it is to just have people be sweet kind and supportive to each other on here?? Like idk maybe I‘m just used to TikTok and the weird way fandom culture has warped on there but nonetheless never stop please. Every time you are not being an ass on the internet but super nice is a time you are creating a safe and fun space!! :D And I‘m def feeling that!

[msindrad]

an insanely long crazy-ass post about the dollars trilogy, I’m so sorry y’all

I FOUND THIS POST. I DID IT. I FOUND IT. JESUS. I spent the entirety of my yesterday searching for it.

I’m going to tag everybody who participated in this discussion and whose posts I‘ve found while searching for this discussion on the off-chance that they still might be interested in, yeah, discussing these films.

@clinteastwood-blog @geekboots-blog @istadris @sybilius @bleak-nomads @thenotsobad-thebad-andtheugly @bloncos @mcicioni-blog @unrealthings @stephantom @colonelmortimer

Also, please feel free to ignore me and my analytical outburst if you don’t feel like talking about the films or talking about them with my crazy hyperfixated ass specifically, lol. I didn’t mean to be rude by calling you out of nowhere, it’s just that sometimes people get excited when there is an enthusiastic newbie in the fandom and gladly return to their beloved canons.

Anyway. The dollars trilogy.

I’ll start with The Good, the Band and the Ugly (and will probably make myself instantly unlikable by nitpicking things, (sigh)).

As stupid as it might sound – the film being an absolute masterpiece, a cultural milestone that is timeless, epic, work of genius, love it, will write and draw about it with pleasure etc. – I’m kind of inclined to find the GBU the weakest film in the trilogy storywise. Don’t get me wrong: the plot is interesting and strong, every scene is entertaining, smart, and instantly quotable… But.

There are a few things that make the story, taken holistically, weak to a degree, especially in contrast to the other two films. Now, let me explain my bold-ass claim.

The first reason I couldn’t even pinpoint for myself until my best friend asked me: yeah, it’s all cool and fun, but what has really changed at the end of the film? They stopped the battle/blew up the bridge (kudos for the pacifist message), they killed a few folks on the way including Angel Eyes, but what did the story amount to in the end? Was their relationship changed? Have they themselves learned something about life, universe and everything? Tuco is still on the rope, Blondie still shoots the rope. They both got their money, split it 50/50. Sure, now it’s an insane amount of money but will it make them reconsider their ways of life? I don’t know, and I don’t necessarily think so. They’re really back to square one. If you consider the graphic novel The Man With No Name canon, then (spoiler) Blondie gives his money away to help rebuild the monastery of Tuco’s brother, and Tuco himself doesn’t really invest his share in anything other than booze, and sex, and troubles, so. Then, Angel Eyes got killed off, but he had even less backstory/character arc than, for instance, Captain Clinton, not to mention that his image, as memorable as it was, kind of lacked certain complexity, so, does it really matter storywise (although he is a great, stylish character, but I hope that you get what I mean)? (Note: Angel Eyes should have been the film’s ultimate personification of the war (inhumanely ruthless, only interested in money, extremely goal-oriented etc.), which, the war, kind of is the main antagonist of the film if you think about it; but the way he was used in the plot, the way he acted, and was generally presented, communicated it only in a limited way, imo).

Everything about the adventure was fun, smart, entertaining, one of the best films ever made, I agree 100%, and I rewatched it with pleasure many times. But I believe that stories have to bring about some palpable change in their world in order for them to be successful and finished. The GBU, in my opinion, doesn’t do it because it doesn’t want to be a story-story, and it’s fine with just letting its characters exist in a magic Western/a cowboy fantasy/a fairy tale. And I guess it’s also one of the reasons why the story didn’t go anywhere from the GBU – there is nothing to add to a basis like that. And I can’t help noting that it’s super ironic that the only film in the trilogy that truly seems to be all about money-money-money has no “dollars” in its title.

Another thing that I think is super important: there is almost no female energy or presence in the film. And it’s not even a matter of representation that bugs me, although I think it’s very important. It just feels like there is a deficit of something vital that renders everything even sort of unrealistic. In AFOD we have Marisol and we have Consuelo Baxter, and they’re relevant for the plot, and they have goals, motivations… lines. In FAFDM we have Mary, who has only a few brief moments, but she’s memorable, endearing, and she has a small story/motivation of her own, and we also have Mortimer’s sister, who is EXTREMELY important, and who also isn’t just symbolic, she herself makes a plot-relevant decision on screen, although a really horrible one from my personal moral standpoint. In the GBU we have what? A prostitute that’s beaten up by Angel Eyes (I never watch this scene), another woman at the hotel where Blondie stays in that is shut up and called an old hag or something like it, and another woman that makes a comment about Tuco’s hanging. None of them are memorable or have motivations on their own, and to me it makes the film lacking some really important counterpoint in terms of dynamics etc.

And nobody needs me to describe all the things that the film is awesome at because everybody knows that the film is one of the best films ever made, so painfully gorgeous that it’s difficult to praise it. So, I’ll move on to the other two films but will briefly talk about Tuco and Eli Wallach.

Eli Wallach is considered one of the best actors ever to appear on film for reason, so, I’ll just say about my personal impressions from his performance: he really made me emphasize with Tuco. His acting is incredibly rich, nuanced, concentrated, and, imo, just leaves you no choice but to think of Tuco as a real complex human being, not a film character. And Tuco is a superb character. Over the course of the story he gets to be loathsome, humane, funny, silly, terrifying, and cunning, - often all those at the same time. That’s one hell of a captivating character who’s just very, very interesting to watch and to analyze, regardless whether you like him or not.

Then, we have A Fistful of Dollars. I’m a huge fan of classic adventure stories that are gen, plot-driven, and have smart main characters figuring out a way to get what they want without being destroyed by other characters for wanting or trying to get it in the first place. I think it’s very difficult and very rewarding to write a good story in this genre. AFOD is exactly this kind of story, and this kind of stories is only as good as their protagonists’ maneuvers are. And Joe is, like, a tactical genius (the barrel! the fire!). And it’s much better to rewatch the film to remind yourself of how smart he is than have me talking about it, so.

But apart from that he is also humanized by his deeply personal motivations that appear completely irrational especially in contrast to his clever manipulations of the Baxters and the Rojos. And he doesn’t do it egotistically, to “get the girl,” which wouldn’t make him particularly sympathetic one way or another. Sure, he makes a good buck at the end, but his primary motivation still is justice for Marisol and her family (and then protection of his friend). Additionally, Joe gets his fair share of punishment for providing said justice, which further humanizes him and kind of makes you worry about him. And Silvanito with his scolding, humor, and skepticism helps with it a lot, too.

And then, there is the fact that the film wants the audience to either want to be Joe or want to be with him, sometimes both at the same time. Everybody on screen is a single Joe’s wink away from swooning because how he practically oozes charisma (only Silvanito is immune to his charms). I can’t blame them, though.

And I also want to point out the last lines of the film: Joe says that he doesn’t want to get involved into politics because that would be too much for him, and I think that it’s very fitting. The film just showed how cool he is, but he knows his limits, and he knows that he operates on a different plane.

So, all in all, it’s a masterfully done story.

Finally, we have For a Few Dollars more. I love all three films, but FAFDM is my favorite, there’s no doubt about that. I’ll start with the fact that it’s perfectly structured and perfectly balanced. We have three big players, Mortimer, Manco, and Indio, and the film shows how dangerous and how smart each of them is, so that the conflict between them ends up being very, very suspenseful. Not to mention the fact that it takes Manco and Mortimer almost 40 minutes, I think, to finally properly meet – by that time we are already speculating who will be the winner in the end, how will they react to each other, how will they interact, how will they work together etc. We get to know them quite well first, and then their relationship allows us to explore their characters even deeper through their interactions, their differences, and their similarities. For some time, storywise they become a single unit. While the story of Indio’s assault on Mortimer’s sister is revealed parallel to the plot.  

Indio himself is terrifying as hell without being cartoonish. He is a really dangerous, broken man that is also methodical, smart, and ruthless. He is so bad that he kills the opponent’s family just to make him bitter enough to draw on him. And he is so bad that he is okay with killing off his own gang.  

Speaking of which, Indio’s gang is colorful. He has interesting interactions with them at the beginning, in that church. And Klaus Kinski made his Wild stand out to me. I swear, the moment he almost cries in that saloon when Mortimer takes away his cigar, I feel bad for him every single time. And when he recognized Mortimer, it was tense. He even had a cool witty one-liner after Mortimer said that he should come to him in ten minutes to help him light that match and smoke: “In ten minutes, you’ll be smoking in hell!”

By the way, Indio’s tendency to get unnecessarily physical with his gang looks even more unnerving when he touches Manco to check his wound/shares a smoke him with some clearly visible eroticized subtext, which gets even creepier when you realize that he is a rapist. I swear, I was worried about Mortimer when I saw the film for the second time – that is even though I knew the plot – because Manco brought up that family resemblance between Mortimer and his sister, and we all know what Indio did to her.

What else? I could bring up all sorts of things, the action, the final duel, the small smart details that allow the plot to happen the way it happens (e.g. how Manco manages to hide the bag with all the money on that tree before Indio’s gang capture him and Mortimer – only to re-collect that bag at the end of the film), the humor, the street kids and all the other cool-cool secondary characters (Joseph Egger’s informer probably is my favorite), the opening sequence and the title card (oops, already rambled about this one) really, anything and everything including the perfect chemistry between Manco and Mortimer.

But I’ll just say that the music in this film is special to me. Every single composition by Ennio Morricone is special, unique, memorable, and intriguing, it’s true, and so it feels redundant and banal to say something like this. The Ecstasy of Gold is almost extraterrestrial, the main theme of Two Mules For Sister Sara imitates actual mule sounds, how genius is that, etc., and you must be dead to not be enticed and mesmerized beyond words by the main theme of the GBU, which is a hymn of all spaghetti Westerns now, a universal call for adventure (I feel like a bad person saying this, but I’ve always wanted to joke that Ennio put sexy back into the “waah-waah”… no, I regret nothing).

BUT. To me personally, the music in FAFDM is as personal as the film itself, and dare I say even more important to the story than in the GBU, despite the theme of the GBU being a kind of Greek choir throughout the film. The personalized sounds for Manco and Mortimer accentuate their personalities to the point where they almost create a reflex in you. The pocket watch chime is literally part of the story and plays a huge, crucial role in the plot! And it’s decidedly one of the saddest musical scores I’ve ever heard. It’s minimalist, mournful, and yet also nostalgically bittersweet. It feels like a reminder that there’s no going back whatever that might mean in the actuality. And the famous moment where Manco asks Mortimer whether his question was indiscreet and Mortimer says that the answer could be… I feel personally touched whenever I watch the scene. For me, it doesn’t feel like just an amazing scene, it triggers some deep emotion that is hard to express and almost gives me the urge to cry. Something along the lines of respectful and compassionate “I’m sorry that it happened to you,” “I’m sorry that I can’t help you.” The feeling of personal tragedy is conveyed infinitely better than a three-volume backstory ever could.

And then, there is this huge potential for all the stories about Manco, and Mortimer, and Blondie, and Tuco, and Angel Eyes, and even Joe to explore... Well, I better stop here.

So, yeah. It turned out to be a crazy long post, and I‘m grateful to anybody who reads it till the end. And if you haven’t watched these movies please do. Cheers.