Monday, November 30, 2009

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly was a violent film that showed the American West as a battle ground on the Mexican Border. In this movie there was a lot of gun shooting, whether it was shooting the hat off someone’s head, shooting and killing three men, or shooting to cut a rope around someone’s neck. In the classical Westerns there was not as much violence, the gun was a symbol for manliness not a weapon of mass destruction. Every cowboy, in The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, was after money as if they were starving dogs in a meat house. In classical Westerns the cowboys had a duty or a woman to motivate their actions. The Italian Director Sergio Leone represents his thoughts about Americans through the cowboy character. During the movie every cowboy is driving by money, they are constantly stepping on other people to obtain it. They kill for information, just as Sentenza, “the bad,” did in the beginning to the farmer and his son. Clint Eastwood also is driven by money, in the end he leaves with his half hung over his horse, as he rides off into the terrain. This drive for money is a depiction of the capitalist reputation given to all Americans by the rest of the world. Spaghetti westerns seem to make a satire of this reputation by over exaggerating the violence to show how much the cowboy wants the money. These super violent men go where they want, take what they want, and do what they need to do to get the cash.

Also in Navajo Joe the characters were also motivated by money. The outlaws chase the train in order to get the money that is stashed in the vault. They destroy and kill everything just to try and steal the vault. In the movie a doctor is motivated by money and he helps the outlaws for a cut of the profits. The director depicted everyone as money grubbing low lives. An example is Navajo Joe who walks away from helping the town because no one has offers to pay his price. Navajo Joe protects the city only because everyman was willing to pay him, a dollar a kill. The villains and the hero in this were also very violent also. This violence in both films can be the directors’ thoughts on the Vietnam War which was also very violent and gory.

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