Eastwood's First Scoundrel Role

When I was younger, I used to think that Western movies were just plain dumb. It seemed like it always turned into a battle of the Good Guys (wearing the white hats) versus the Bad Guys (wearing the black hats) in a gun battle. They always seemed so formulaic that it was not worth watching. In my adult years, I have really developed an appreciation of the Western genre. There is a simplicity in it that is refreshing compared to the action movies of today. When you take a look at Western movies, you have to throw in one of the more famous Westerns ever made, “A Fistful of Dollars” starring a very young Clint Eastwood.

In this movie, it is safe to say that everyone wears the black hat; there are really no heroes to speak of in this tale of intrigue in the Old West. The setting is a small Mexican town where two families battle for control. Both families run criminal enterprises – enterprises that are competing for the same victims. The battles between the two have left the town in ruins, as the two groups continue to kill one another on a regular basis. Then a stranger comes into town (Eastwood) and sees an opportunity to make a lot of money for himself. He becomes a contract worker for BOTH families, moving from one side to the other and watching his take get bigger and bigger. Ultimately, we see the town erupt into a full-scale war, with Eastwood ending up the only winner.

This is the first of the “spaghetti Westerns”, a series of movies filmed in Italy and featuring low budgets. The cinema quality is not the best, and the dubbing of the audio will leave the viewer wondering if this movie was actually filmed in English in the first place. You will find, however, that the action in this film is top-notch. The gunfights are exciting, particularly Eastwood’s work. There is one scene where Eastwood’s character takes care of four men before they are even able to pull their guns. The gunplay in the film is fun to watch and fairly realistic. You don’t have any of those ridiculous scenes where the hero stands in the middle of the town and blows away ten or fifteen adversaries without ever getting hit. The producers seemed to have made a real effort to make this movie different than the other Westerns of that time.

In “A Fistful of Dollars”, you get a film with a very gritty and realistic feel. The scenery is very drab and bland, and really looks like what you would find in an Old West locale. The characters are very believable in appearance and attitude; greed and power drive them, which was a common theme amongst the fraternity of outlaws in those days. The various members of the crime families portrayed are all scoundrels, and the viewer will usually be happy to see any of them losing a gun battle. Of course, Clint Eastwood does the best job, playing his surly character perfectly. His trademark scowl was established in this film, and you can see pieces of many of his later characters in this original role.

For a rainy weekend afternoon, this movie is a perfect choice. It is a real classic, and helped set the stage for many good Westerns to follow. The later productions may have had better technical details, but this one was the one that established the modern Western movie. “A Fistful of Dollars” is no masterpiece, but rather a simple little movie that changed Western theatre. It is a film that any fan of cinema should enjoy.