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

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is probably my favorite western film. I know some chickenhawk out there is groaning over this clean-cut American boy appreciating a spaghetti western over some good 'ol John Wayne, but hey, this has Clint Eastwood! And spaghetti westerns were filmed with an appreciation for the American Old West. How much more American can you get? In case you were wondering, spaghetti westerns were Italian westerns filmed usually in the arid plains of southern Spain with international casts who were later dubbed into English or Italian. Back in the day, Sergio Leone was the master of them, and aside from the hysterical dubbing, they pulled off an uncanny resemblance to the American Southwest. And how can I forget the iconic theme song:

The film deals with three bandits of different personalities (personified by the title) on a rat race for treasure, two of the bandits (Clint Eastwood and Eli Wallach) frequently cross paths with one another and reluctantly join forces, because both know something about the location of the treasure that the other doesn't. The unspoken condition is they can't kill each other, or all is lost.

Along with this story, comes some sharp dialogue that may surprise you in it's cleverness as being quite ahead of it's time. It's easy to see from films like this where Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez derived all the written moxie from their own works. And yes, while at almost three hours in length, it's a considerable time investement, they seem to fly by like you wouldn't even realize it. It's easy to become so engrossed in the adventure aspect of the whole movie; it's films like these that really make westerns come off as art. I highly recommend anyone to check it out at least once in their lifetime.

10/10

Peace,
- Jon