A Fistful of Dollars (1964)

Sergio Leone, why are you responsible for so many of my childhood years wasted gazing upon the landscapes and faces and facial landscapes of cowboys who grimly stare into the distance or into one another's eyes under a burning midday sun?

Because your westerns are bloody brilliant, that's why.

I must confess, beside some obvious US made westerns ('Shane', 'The Wild Bunch' or 'The Magnificent Seven', for example), I could never get into that style. I have never liked John Wayne and he seemed to be omnipresent in everything western related. I just couldn't connect. Now when they went to Italy and the Italian directors wanted to cash in on the success like they did with zombie flicks, that's when my interest was piqued. You see, the Italian ones were never verbose or obviously racist towards the Native Americans and relied more on atmosphere and mood than anything else. That always grabbed me.

Well, that and the music by Ennio Morricone, naturally.

Even though these were intended as an easy cash grab for the Italian studios, people like Sergio Leone made them their own and transformed the nature of the western forever. Heck, most people think about the genre as a whole as being comprised of only these kinds of films, which is no small feat.

This one is the first of the unofficial 'Dollars' trilogy (completed with 'For A Few Dollars More' and 'The Good, the Bad & the Ugly') and despite it being very, very good: it shows. Leone had not yet perfected his tensionbuilding in as few frames as possible and that makes this one feel like the odd one out. Not that this is a mediocre or even bad film, far from it. But the pacing is fairly quick, there's quite a lot of dialogue and the music, though quite excellent, is ever so slightly lacking that goosebumpy feel the other two have.

Don't believe me? Check the music box theme from the next one. Or 'An Ecstacy of Gold' from the last one and you'll instantly hear what I mean.

Clint Eastwood nailed his surly character with this one, though. A man of few words, rides into a Mexican town and decides to pit the two rival clans against one another for personal gain. But to prove he's not a total dirtbag, he does find some redemption in rescuing a family from the clutches of the Rojo brothers, especially Ramón. He's also the only character I don't really enjoy, but that is more due to Gian Maria Volonté's overacting in certain parts. Sure, it works for him, being the unhinged brother of the three, but it gets a little grating from time to time.

Nevertheless, this is a solid, A+ western and if you don't believe me: the final shootout is great.

Though just that inkling below the other two, I'm sorry.