Italian original theatrical poster.
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The good, the bad and the ugly (Italian:Il buono,il butto,il cattivo), is a 1966 (1967 in the United states) Italian spaghetti Western film directed by Sergio Leone and starring Clint Eastwood as the man with no name, it also features Eli Wallach, Lee Van Cleef and music from the academy award winning composer Ennio Morricone. It is the third and final film in the dollars trilogy, acting as a very loose prequel to a fistful of dollars and for a few dollars more.
Plot.[]
The film his set during the American civil war. The beginning of the films shows the bandict Tuco (the ugly, Wallach), he shoots three bounty hunters and escapes from a deserted city. Then the story switches to Angel Eyes (the bad, Van Cleef) who visits the home of a soldier called Stevens, he interrogates him for information regarding a missing man that goes by the name of Bill Carson and a cache of confederate gold, Stevens knows Angel Eyes has been sent to kill him but before getting shot he gives a bounty to him to kill the man that has Employed his assassination. Angel eyes then kills Stevens and his son, he goes back to the man that had employed him to kill Stevens and in turn shoots him as well, keeping the promisehe gave Stevens. Then we see Tuco in the desert, he his aproched by more bounty hunters on the search for him but fortunatley he his rescued by the man with no name (the good, also called Blondie. Eastwood). After rescuing Tuco he gives him over to the law and gets the price on the bounty, Tuco his sent to be hanged but just before being executed the rope his shot down from the man with no name and Tuco escapes with him, we then know that the man with no name had planned Tuco's rescue and got the bounty anyway. He then abandons Tuco in the desert that after buyng gear gets his revenge on him by gun pointing him and pulling him through the desert on a horse under the sun without giving him food or water for days. While in the desert Tuco decides to finally kill the man with no name, just before shooting him he sees a wagon arriving from the orizon, he stops the wagon and descoveres dead soldiers amounted in the inside and manages to find a dying Bill Carson, the man hutters some words about a buried treasure and then asks for some water.When Tuco returns with water, he discovers Carson dead and the man with no name slumped against the carriage. Before passing out, he says that he knows the name on the grave. Tuco takes him, (they are both disguised as Confederate soldiers), to a Catholic mission, allowing the man with no name time to recover before the two leave, still disguised. They inadvertently encounter a force of Union soldiers (who they take for Confederates due to grey dust on their uniforms). They are captured and marched to a Union prison camp. At the camp, Corporal Wallace calls the roll, Tuco answers for Bill Carson, catching the attention of Angel Eyes, now a Union Sergeant stationed at the camp. Angel Eyes has Wallace torture Tuco into revealing Sad Hill Cemetery, but he confesses that only the man with no name knows the name on the grave. Angel Eyes offers the man an equal partnership in recovering the gold. He agrees and rides out with Angel Eyes and his posse. Meanwhile, Tuco is transported by train to his execution, chained to Corporal Wallace. Tuco tells Wallace he has to pee and jumps off the train with the Corporal. He then beats Wallace about the head with a brick, killing him, and lets the train cut their chain, freeing him. We next see Tuco wandering aimlessly through the wreckage of a nearby town, oblivious of the bounty hunter that survived at the start of the movie (Al Mulock), who tracks and ambushes Tuco. Despite the surprise, Tuco kills the bounty hunter. Blondie investigates the gunshot, finding Tuco and informing him of Angel Eyes's involvement. The two resume their old partnership, skulking through the wrecked town and killing Angel Eyes' henchmen before discovering that Angel Eyes has escaped.
Tuco and the man with no name find their way to Sad Hill Cemetery is blocked by large Union and Confederate forces, who are separated only by a narrow bridge. They are preparing to fight for it. Eager to disperse the two armies, man with no name and Tuco wire the bridge with dynamite. During the process, the two trade information, with Tuco revealing Sad Hill Cemetery and the man with no name saying that the name on the grave is Arch Stanton. The two destroy the bridge and take cover as the two armies resume their battle. They wait in the sandbags all night. The next morning, the Confederate and Union soldiers have gone. The two glorious scoundrels cross the river. Blondie happens upon a ruined church and tends to a dying soldier, giving him one last cigarette. Beside the soldier is a brown fringed poncho.
Tuco abandons him to retrieve the gold for himself at the cemetery. Frantically searching the sea of makeshift tombstones, Tuco finally locates Arch Stanton's grave. As he digs, the man with no name appears and offers him a shovel. Moments later, the two are surprised by Angel Eyes, who holds them at gunpoint. He kicks open Stanton's grave to reveal just a skeleton. Declaring that only he knows the real name of the grave, the man with no name writes it on a rock in the middle of the graveyard and tells Tuco and Angel Eyes that "two hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money. We're going to have to earn it." The three stare each other down, calculating alliances and dangers in a famous five-minute Mexican standoff before suddenly drawing. Man with no name shoots Angel Eyes, who rolls into an open grave, while Tuco discovers that the man unloaded his gun the night before. The man with no name directs Tuco to the grave marked "Unknown" next to Arch Stanton's. Tuco digs and is overjoyed to find bags of gold inside, but is shocked when he turns to back to him and finds himself staring at a noose. Seeking a measure of revenge for what Tuco has done to him, the man with no name forces Tuco atop a grave marker and wraps the noose around his neck, binding Tuco's hands before disappearing with his share of the gold. Tuco screams for mercy, the man with no name's silhouette returns on the horizon, aiming a rifle at Tuco. As Tuco screams in rage, he fires and severs the noose rope, dropping Tuco face-first onto his share of the gold. The man with no name smiles as Tuco screams at him and then rides off.
Trivia.[]
The film is considered a prequel to the previous two because the man with no name aquires his trademark poncho in it from a dead soldier. It is also set during the American civil war and in a fistfull of dollars a grave appears in the background with a date marked on it stating a year between the civil war.
Is currently ranked no. 5 on IMDB's top 250 greatest movies of all time making it the highest placed western on the list, as well as this director Quentin Tarantino stated that this is his "faviroute movie in the whole world" and he also named it the best directed movie of all time.