Western
1 hour and 39 minutes
Rated: R
Written by: Victor Andrés Catena, Jaime Comas Gil, and Sergio Leone
Directed by: Sergio Leone
Produced by: Arrigo Colombo & Giorgio Papi
Cast:
Clint Eastwood
Marianne Koch
Josef Edger
Wolfgang Lukschy
Gian Maria Volontè
This is the man with no name. Danger fits him like a glove.
While European filmmakers had dabbled in the western genre for as long as their American counterparts, the general European-filmgoing public didn't pay much attention to this particular genre up until the mid-1960s. Prior to its success, it was the peplum, or genre of gladiator movies, that Italian filmmakers and audiences set their interests on. Much like the spaghetti western craze that followed it, peplum films even utilized waning American actors to their benefit (Christopher Reeves was a popular name within the genre). But, of course, genre fads die off and are replaced with new interests. With the release of Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars, the spaghetti, or Italowestern, had finally managed to grab a foothold with audiences not just in Europe, but across the globe.
But what set A Fistful of Dollars apart from the Eurowesterns that came before it? How did Leone manage to find success with his visionary film that so many other Italian filmmakers missed out on? The biggest and most obvious answer to these questions is that Leone managed to create something completely different within an already familiar genre. Whereas the Eurowesterns that came before it attempted to copy the much more popular American-made westerns in both stylization and characterization, Leone threw all of these genre hangups entirely out the window. Gone is the likable hero riding in on a white horse to save the day. Gone is the damsel in distress that serves as a romantic driving force for the film's hero. Gone is the man in black antagonist whose motivations seem to be purely evil, and completely polar opposite to the driving forces of the morally incorruptible protagonist. Gone are the Native Americans, grossly misrepresented. No, Leone's film may not be the first Eurowestern to physically exist, but as far as the precedents it established, A Fistful of Dollars is unquestionably the first ever true spaghetti western.
The film's hero, an antihero known only as the Man with No Name (yes, the coffin maker refers to him as, "Joe" throughout, but one gets the impression this character might refer to all yankee men with this namesake) replaces the typical morally pure western hero archetype. The Man with No Name is only interested in one thing and one thing only, his own self preservation and enrichment. While there are indeed moments of good that shine through from this character - his rescuing of Marisol and reuniting her with her family, as well as his saving Silvanito in the film's climax (this is perhaps mainly because the Man with No Name is fiscally indebted to Silvanito) - one gets the impression that these slight motivations of good and morality driven actions are not as important to the characterization of the Man with No Name. The point is made clear from the start. This is a man who enjoys profiting from toying with and killing other outlaws. He is not really a man who can be trusted. And yet we as an audience are endeared to him. Leone understood the irony behind taking an otherwise unlikable character and placing him at the center of the story as the "hero.". It allows for this fantasy world of the Wild West to be built around him. If he's the most likable or trustworthy figure, then surely the rest of this world is going to be gritty, brutal, nasty, and nihilistic in nature - all of which Leone creates here and would become staples of every spaghetti western that would follow A Fistful of Dollars.
Helping to further convey this gritty and hardedge vision of the west are the film's technical aspects. Cinematographer Massimo Dallamano gave the film an overall bright and sun-scorched image, so much so that even sequences filmed at night feel impossibly bright, as if there is no where to run and hide from the hard gazes of outlaws. While the film lacks the overall grand imagery that would become prominent in Leone's follow up westerns, as well as some of the westerns helmed by other Italian filmmakers, A Fistful of Dollars uses its ultra-low budget to its advantage. The single location of an out-of-sight, lawless bordertown feels genuine, and matches the rundown, gritty tone that permeates the story of the film. Similarly, the town's open and empty feeling also mirror the inescapability and hopelessness that Leone wished to create with his vision of the west.
The film's performances are remarkable, especially when considering the cast was comprised of either actors who were relatively green in experience and at the time were nobodies. Clint Eastwood obviously embodies the Man with No Name with all the conviction and believability of a seasoned character actor. There is a clear reason why this has remained his most iconic character that he has portrayed, maybe only rivaled by Dirty Harry. The supporting cast is equally impressive, with José Calvo as the irritable Silvanito constantly reminding the man with no name of the ugliness and realities of the world he occupies. These sequences serve as a sickly comedic reminder of the rather grim undertones of the movie. Most astonishing is spaghetti western icon Gian Maria Volontè as the film's villain Ramon Rojo. As Ramon, Gian creates a deeply ugly and twisted villain - a sadistic killer - but one who serves to mirror qualities present inside the film's hero. The two are opposite sides of the same coin, or maybe even just the same side of the same coin, one half of which is just a little more gritty. The exchanges between Volontè and Eastwood throughout the film are unquestionably the most enjoyable moments within A Fistful of Dollars and the final showdown between the two - while maybe not as epic in terms of scale in comparison to the conclusions of Leone's other westerns - is truly remarkable to behold, and the tension therein is both palpable and powerful.
The glaring problem with A Fistful of Dollars, despite all its amazing innovations to the genre of the western, is of course that it is a blatant ripoff of the Akira Kurosawa samurai film Yojimbo. This is unfortunate since Leone would later prove himself an ingenious storyteller - one arguably on the same level as Kurosawa - with his later films: For a Few Dollars More, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Once Upon a Time in the West, Duck, You Sucker, and Once Upon a Time in America are all brilliantly original and well-crafted stories. Why Leone chose to follow Kurosawa's story so closely - merely transposing its setting to the American west - is bizarre. Perhaps his confidence in himself as a filmmaker and storyteller had not yet reached the levels that it would once he achieved fame and respect with the release of A Fistful of Dollars.
Despite its unoriginal story, A Fistful of Dollars remains an incredibly innovative and important motion-picture that set the precedents and rules regarding all Italian-made, and really even American made, westerns that would follow in the wake of its enormous success. By throwing away the genre conventions and operating on his own intuition, Leone created a masterful film that can genuinely be called the first ever true spaghetti western.
9/10
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