MOVIE REVIEW | The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)

“You see, in this world there’s two kinds of people, my friend: Those with loaded guns and those who dig. You dig.”

The title, the theme song, the lead actor.  Few things represent a movie genre more than The Good the, the Bad and the Ugly represents the Western.  John Wayne would come pretty close, but it’s his entire western filmography that gives him that reputation, not one particular movie that springs to mind.  But even people who have never seen this movie, the title, the music and the lead actor would be likely to spring to their minds when westerns comes up.  So what makes The Good, the Bad and the Ugly such a quintessential, mind springer of a western?

Tuco (Eli Wallach) is the Ugly, a Mexican outlaw plying his trade in Civil War America.  With a $2,000 bounty on his head, he’s captured by Blondie (Clint Eastwood), the Good.  But he’s not so good, because soon Blondie and Tuco have a lucrative partnership where Blondie delivers Tuco to small town authorities, collects the reward, then helps Tuco escape, so they can split the money and run the scam on the next town.

MOVIE REVIEW | How the West Was Won (1962)

“About 150 years ago, an idea took shape in the mind of a man named DeWitt Clinton. And in the way Americans have of acting out their dreams, it came to be.”

One of the biggest problems in big budget movies, is the tendency for studios to pile on more. More big name stars, mores special effects and action, more romantic interests, more, more, more. The theory being, if they put enough crap in there, everyone will find a reason to hand over their hard earned at the cinema. 99.9% of the time, this only makes movies worse. The more surface level glitter they throw on there, the more substance has to be taken out to make room. But sometimes, more really is more, and it actually pays off. And it pays off big in How the West Was Won.

Five short stories, following several generations of one family across half a century and an entire continent, the movie opens with Zebulon Prescott (Karl Malden), leading his family from the East Coast, to the new frontier in Illinois. Along the way, they meet and befriend a mountain man, James Stewart as Linus Rawlings. Soon, a Prescott daughter’s in love with him and they’re saving each other from ruthless bandits.