For the month of May I decided to dive into the Western genre since the summer movie season, releases at times a lot of Cowboy films long before Superhero films at times were great but sometimes get annoying, though not that I'm complaining because if I was born in the fifties and lived through a lot of Western's, I'll admit I would be annoyed so, I guess generations speak for themselves I guess. Before I chose A Fistful of Dollars, I originally picked Tombstone since it was another film from Late Val Kilmer that everyone remembers. Unfortunately, I had a bit of mixed emotions not because of Val Kilmer in fact Val Kilmer was the best part of the whole movie, it was everything else. But don't you all worry, I'll be getting to Tombstone soon. For now, let’s get to a great Western that was always a good back up almost like watching the original Vacation hatting it so much and then using Caddyshack as a backup for me getting to sleep.
A wandering Gunfighter (Clint Eastwood) arrives in the Mexican village of San Miguel during a power struggle among Sheriff John Baxter and the tree Rojo Brothers. When a regiment of Mexican soldiers bearing gold is waylaid by the Rojo brothers, the mysterious gunfighter is hired by Esteban to join the gang, but he plays one side against the another.
Two years ago I had this dilemma of watching a movie for the first time and then having a mixed emotions, that was watching the original Vacation with Harold Ramis and Chevy Chase in the starring role and I slowly realized how much I F**KING hated the movie with such fire and passion that I couldn't sleep as for which I decided to watch another Harold Ramis movie Caddyshack. Two years now, I didn't expect to reach this same dilemma and although Tombstone wasn't all bad mainly because Val Kilmer was the best part there was the rest of the movie where I had a mixed of emotions but, granted will get to Tombstone later I promise you. For now, let’s talk about the first installment that made Clint Eastwood a household name. In all honesty I never quite remembered the last time or first time I sat down and watched a Fistful of Dollars other than I heard that this was the first installment in the Man with No Name trilogy and so, back when cable TV was a thing, I would record movies that I haven't seen and A Fistful of Dollars was one of those movies that was on my radar and so, the rest became history. The interesting thing when you look at A Fistful of Dollars, is that yes this film was the first of many to start off the Spaghetti/Western genre moreover was the launching stardom to Clint Eastwood's success as well as the first leading role, but in strange but yet understandable reasons was that this movie was originally a American/Italian remake to a 1961 Samurai classic, Yojimbo directed by legendary Japanese director, Akira Kurosawa and if you look at both films, they do in fact share the same plot furthermore Kurosawa did in fact respectfully complimented Sergio Leone on his film but still told him that it was his film so, the two men settled out of court and Kurosawa and his production company got 15 percent of the movies revenue, and if you haven't seen Yojimbo I would highly recommend watching the film it's a great watch if your big on Japanese animation or films. Granted, even though A Fistful of Dollars it is, in a sense a remake to Yojimbo, moreover shares the same story premise, but the film is still incredible to watch from start to finish. But most importantly it started off a new kind of Western genre that at time we've never seen before mainly when you look at some of the western's from the forties and fifties they were always the hero's getting the girl or being an example to the American youth some of which came from the Television shows and sure John Wayne in some of his films he wasn't an all perfect hero especially when you watch The Searchers. But A Fistful of Dollars was one of those films where they introduced the Antihero but more importantly grounded down the Western genre in a sense of the Old West not being a grand place to live and you really had to protect yourself to survive. A surprising factor was that Clint Eastwood at first wasn't' the first choice to play the lead, it took actor Richard Harrison to convince Leone to cast Eastwood, upon which would be his first big break. At the time though Clint was still working on the TV show Rawhide and his contract with the show prohibited him from doing any movies in the United States. Though Eastwood had to go Europe to film the movie and surprisingly they didn't have any trailers or portable bathrooms for which they had to go out beyond the bushes, Clint even states that he was kind of tired, of playing the conventional white hat hero, who kisses the girl moreover said it was refreshing to play the antihero in a movie for once. Now, don't get me wrong I can go on and on about how great the movie is from Clint Eastwood, to Sergio Leone's direction to even Ennio Morricone's grand music score the film itself became a pioneer for the Spaghetti Western genre moreover had every up and coming filmmaker from either US or Europe, to say that you can go to parts of Spain or Italy or even Mexico and make a movie with whatever budget you have and literally make it work even if the movie was good or bad. So, for the beginning of the summer movie season I would highly recommend watching A Fistful of Dollars even if you’re getting tired of one-to-many Superhero movies or Disney just making one too many crappy movies.
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