Sergio Leone, successful director of the Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns, chose the real American west for the setting of his next cowboy story. He packed up his favourite composer, Ennio Morriconi along with a beautiful Italian star, Claudio Cardinale, to play his feminine lead. He also coerced three Hollywood A-Listers to play the good, bad and sorta ugly cowboys. As 'cowboys' is a euphemism for 'gunmen' in this film, the viewer must be prepared for much accompanying noise as the hombres practice what they do best.
Other than bank robberies and Indian raids, almost every western cliche is dropped into the film; miners, mules, stagecoaches, the railroad, double-crosses, chewin' tobacco, a lady hostel proprietor, Arizona landscapes, the big showdown, revenge and eventually justice.
Leone is already accomplished in presenting attractive visual portraits and Morriconi has few peers in the creation of beautiful music. The tour de force performance though, and the one that lifted the film from just another western to a classic was presented by one of Hollywood's masters, Henry Fonda. Although Mr. Fonda's face was quite recognizable, his bearing and actions were surprisingly different from what I would have expected. Kudos to him!
My quibbles here in no way detract from the overall quality of this oater. Initially there were a number of pregnant pauses, too many and too long in duration for my taste. I also wondered about the two minute face-off as the opponents jockeyed for position in the ultimate showdown. It must have taken 12 hours to film, according to the changing position of the sun's shadows at the outset and conclusion of the final draw.
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