For a Few Dollars More

Thursday, March 13, 2008

I can see that the Dollars trilogy is not unlike the Bourne series, with each entry being a marked improvement over the last. Sometimes I think of movies like this as "test run" films, experimenting with an idea or style before later perfecting it. For example, Gus Van Sant's Gerry being a test run for his Elephant and Last Days. Or Argento's The Bird with the Crystal Plumage being a test run for Deep Red (and, um, pretty much all of his movies). Or David Lynch's Lost Highway being a test run for Mulholland Drive (and then subsequently blowing the engine out on Inland Empire). This happens with actors and writers, too, but I find it most fun when applied to the auteur theory.

So For a Few Dollars More is a notable step up from A Fistful of Dollars, and in turn The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is another huge step up, to the realm of masterpiece.

What surprised me here is I assumed Lee Van Cleef was going to be the bad guy, but he's not, and actually just as much the main character as Clint Eastwood. In fact, he has a little back story, unlike Clint, and more motivation for his actions. So in some ways, he's maybe even more important. The two have a good chemistry here, and this helps underline one of the short comings of the first movie: he doesn't have a kickass partner. He has an amusing sidekick of sorts who doesn't do much, but the movies are a lot more entertaining when he has a Lee Van Cleef or an Eli Wallach to bounce off of.