Wick's Review

Summary - Good 3.0

Good, legendary, and disappointing. Yes Sergio Leone’s classic is a good movie, legendary even. Disappointing too, a bit mannered and dangerously close to self-parody given its protracted length.

Whining out of the way, let’s now sing the praises of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

• The iconic title shoots through the story, even though the Good guy isn’t, really.
• The iconic music works in a weird sort of way.
• Three iconic stars, especially Clint Eastwood and Eli Wallach.
• Surprises that are well delivered, visually and plot-wise.

So just a good movie? Yeah. Faint praise? Yeah. So what if Tarantino and a host of big time critics consider it one of the greatest movies ever. Bully for them.

PS – Check out the trailer. It calls Eli Wallach the Bad and Lee Van Cleef the Ugly. Twice.
Whoops + Double Whoops. How do you get that wrong? Twice.

PPS – No their mouths don’t match the dialog. Spaghetti Westerns were shot in Italian. Capiche?

Acting - Great 4.0

Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name is called Blondie. Who knew? Old Blondie sure has charisma.

Eli Wallach’s cackling bandito is the most legendary role. However his cackling gets old after a couple of hours, especially because the movie’s sole lively part is essentially a one note performance.

Lee Van Cleef is full of understated malevolence. The Bad? Absolutely.

Film - Good 3.0

Sergio Leone’s classic hasn’t aged especially well, though it’s still iconic.

Edge - Risqué 2.5

Reality - Surreal 2.1

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