Spaghetti Westerns didn’t completely begin with Sergio Leone’s 1964 film “A Fistful of Dollars,” but his film certainly set a new bar — and created an international audience — for these films. This film revitalized a genre that had been slowly dying by getting rid of the black hat/white hat type of story that instead focused on characters who had a lot more gray in them. And this film is really the film that set Leone on his way to making the types of films he’d continue making throughout his career. Join us — Pete Wright and Andy Nelson — as we start our Man With No Name Trilogy series with a conversation about “A Fistful of Dollars.” We talk about how this film changed westerns and what its European sensibilities brought to the film that those in the US latched onto. We discuss Clint Eastwood and why he got involved in the film, and look at what he brought to his role as Joe. We chat about the other cast and how they hold up with Eastwood. We discuss the interesting cinematography that in so many ways came to define Leone’s style, as well as the standard practice at the time in Italy of post-syncing all of their audio which leads to all of the actors feeling slightly out of sync. And we talk about the violence in the film and discuss how people felt about it at the time along with how it ended up influencing films to follow. It’s a great start to Leone’s unofficial (but well-marketed) trilogy and we have a blast talking about it. Tune in!
Film Sundries
- Original theatrical trailer
- Original poster artwork
- Art of the Title
- Flickchart
- Internet Movie Firearm Database
- Zombie Map App on Kickstarter
- Robin Williams interview with Marc Maron on WTF — 2010
- DC Barns wins a walk-on in Star Wars VII
