A Fistful Of Dollars
The
Story
The first film of the trilogy
involves an unknown stranger and his attempt to get rich by pitting two rival
families against each other. The film begins with the character of Joe (Clint
Eastwood) entering a desolate town where only two rival families, the Baxter`s
and the Rojo`s live on
each end of the town. Here the characters of Marisol the woman trapped because
of Ramon Rojo's (Volante) cheating and her child and husband are introduced.
Trapped in the Rojo house she can only see her family through a barred window
and has been ordered to forget them.
The
next scene shows Joe entering the town and being ambushed by members of the
Baxter gang who scare Joe`s horse by firing their pistol's, the horse bolts
and Joe is luckily able to grab on to a sign post outside a bar before the horse
leaves the
town. It is here that he meets Silvanito and discusses his plan to set the two
families against each other. Joe then goes to the Rojo household and shouts
to the occupants that he will kill member's of the Baxter family for them. He
then confronts the four outlaws who scared his horse and after some classic
dialogue kills all four before any of them can return fire themselves. After
this we see Joe in the Rojo household being paid for killing the four outlaws,
he is then offered a chance to join the gang which he accepts and takes up lodings
at the house. On the way to his room he bumps into Marisol who promptly carries
on walking.
When
Joe and Silvanito see an American convoy passing outside their window they decide
to follow and witness a deal taking place between the American's and the Rojo's.
Suddendly the Rojo's pull out guns and mercilessly kill every single soldier.
Later in the day Joe visits the Rojo's household and meets Ramon for the first
time. At this time Ramon announces that because another American convoy will
visit the town, it would be best to stop the rivalry so that the convoy has
no reason to stop and investigate. The Baxter`s are suspicious of this but still
go, by this time Joe and Silvanito have retrieved two of the dead soldiers bodies
from the convoy and placed them sitting up by a grave in the cemetry. Joe then
tells the Baxter's the whole story about the Rojo's and the convoy and tells
them that two of the soldier's are still alive and are in the graveyard. Joe
the informs the Rojo's that the Baxter`s have gone to the cemetary to save the
soldier's who can tell the story of the massacre to the authorities.
The Baxter`s and
the Rojo's are then involved in a shoot - out at the cemetary, where Ramon shoots
the already dead soldier's and claims they have beaten the Baxter`s to the soldiers.
During this time Joe attempts to break into the Rojo's household but is startled
when Marisol comes up behind him, not knowing who has startled him he turns
round and strikes, he is surprised when he sees that it is Marisol that he has
knocked out. Unsure of her condition he takes her to the Baxter household where
Consuela assures him that she his safe. When the rest of the Baxter`s return
Joe and Consuela discover that the son of Consuela has been captured and that
a trade will take place - Marisol for Consuela`s son.
The trade is running smoothly
until Marisol's child runs to her, Marisol is then unsure what to do, one of
the Rojo's rides up to her and is about to pull out his gun. Suddenly Silvanito
appears with a shotgun and also Joe makes a gesture that he too is willing ot
fight. But Marisol then decides it would be wiser to go to Ramon. That night
when he is staying with the Rojo's, Joe leaves in the middle of the night and
reunites Marisol with her family and tells them to leave. When he gets back
to his lodgings at the Rojo's, Ramon is there waiting for him.
The
Rojo's torture him for a while, but eventually Joe escapes the town. This anger's
Ramon, which leads him to firstly believing the Silvanito is hiding Joe. After
not finding Joe at the Bar Ramon believes that the Baxter's are providing Joe
with shelter. This leads to the Rojo's setting fire to the Baxter's house and
the death of all members of the gang including Consuela and John Baxter. We
next see Joe recovering in a cave outside the town, welding a piece of metal
for a purpose later realised in the film. Joe learns that Silvanito is being
tortured and will not talk, Joe decides to save him. Meanwhile in the town the
Rojo's tie Silvanito to a post, when suddenly an explosion occurs. From the
smoke walks Joe, taunting Ramon. Joe proceeds to walk to Silvanito when Ramon
pulls out his rifle and shoots. Joe falls to the floor, but then gets up and
continues walking. Ramon shoots again and again with no effect, he becomes more
aggrievated each time Joe gets up. Then finally Joe pulls out a metal breast
plate from under his poncho. Ramon and Joe face up ready for a shootout. Joe
shoots Ramon and Ramon falls to the floor.
The final scenes show Joe
leaving the town after saving Silvanito.
A remake of the Akira
Kurosawa film Yojimbo, the story runs almost concurrently through both films,
i.e. The hero saves a family and leaves the town having killed his enemies.
However the film includes an excellent score by Ennio Morricone and the direction
of Sergio Leone. Also it made Clint Eastwood and the character of "the
man with no name" instantly recognisible.
A success primarily in Italy, it later became successful after United Artists
picked the rights up for a measly $35,000. Also at this time the director of
Yojimbo, Akira Kurosawa sued for plagarism leading to a royalty payment. In
the States the film was an instant success grossing $3,500,000. It also changed
the way that the Americans made films, spawned a number of similar films, and
heralded the birth of the anti - hero. The
film was released to critical uproar as many deplored the violence, particularly
of offence was the lack of morality by Eastwood's character. In the US during
the 70's a new beginning was tagged on with a body double of Eastwood being
released from jail in return for cleaning up the town in the film.
