by Vadim Rizov
Overviews of the spaghetti western inevitably begin with Sergio Leone, whose presentation of Clint Eastwood as the ultimate laconic Westerner grows more iconic throughout the genre-codifying trilogy of A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. Time progressively slows to a mythic crawl, as mundane quick-draw showdowns and bounty hunter pursuits become epic set pieces through sheer duration.
Westerns had been made in Italy and Spain before Leone (largely by non-Italians), but his worldwide success was unavoidably influential. Segments of Sergio Sollima's 1966 The Big Gundown anticipate 1968's Once Upon a Time in the West, with another swoony Ennio Morricone score emphasizing similar slow visual coups. A showy tracking shot through an obscure Mexican village starts with two women at market and stops at a criminal's face being lathered in an open-air barber's chair. The man in pursuit...
Overviews of the spaghetti western inevitably begin with Sergio Leone, whose presentation of Clint Eastwood as the ultimate laconic Westerner grows more iconic throughout the genre-codifying trilogy of A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. Time progressively slows to a mythic crawl, as mundane quick-draw showdowns and bounty hunter pursuits become epic set pieces through sheer duration.
Westerns had been made in Italy and Spain before Leone (largely by non-Italians), but his worldwide success was unavoidably influential. Segments of Sergio Sollima's 1966 The Big Gundown anticipate 1968's Once Upon a Time in the West, with another swoony Ennio Morricone score emphasizing similar slow visual coups. A showy tracking shot through an obscure Mexican village starts with two women at market and stops at a criminal's face being lathered in an open-air barber's chair. The man in pursuit...
- 5/30/2012
- GreenCine Daily
Lee Van Cleef has a long and respected standing in the Spaghetti Western industry. His career in Italian cinema has seen him feature in some of the best (The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly), some of the more mediocre (The Grand Duel), and some of the absolute worst (God's Gun) that the genre has to offer. But with films such as The Big Gundown and For a Few Dollars More on the CV, the duds are easily forgiven.
Another film that exonerates the horrendous wig sported by the man with the gunsight eyes in God's Gun, is Giulio Petroni's 1967 epic, Death Rides a Horse. It may be a simple, bog-standard tale of revenge, but it's one that's told with the style and visual appeal unique to the very best examples of Spaghetti Westdom.
The somewhat mundanely named Bill (John Phillip Law), a man who drew the short straw...
Another film that exonerates the horrendous wig sported by the man with the gunsight eyes in God's Gun, is Giulio Petroni's 1967 epic, Death Rides a Horse. It may be a simple, bog-standard tale of revenge, but it's one that's told with the style and visual appeal unique to the very best examples of Spaghetti Westdom.
The somewhat mundanely named Bill (John Phillip Law), a man who drew the short straw...
- 12/16/2009
- by Nick
- Latemag.com/film
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