Angel Eyes (Lee van Cleef) is a very cool bad guy. Blondie (Eastwood) seems quietly bemused throughout, as if he knows, as do we, that he will prevail. Tuco (Eli Wallach) is hilarious if one-dimensional (he's greed personified). But what the heck is the deal with that excruciatingly long and pointless Civil War battle excursion? It made no sense whatsoever.
The context of the film had already been established earlier, when Blondie and Tuco are put into a POW camp (and meet up with Angel Eyes -- moving the plot forward), but this scene is worthless. All of a sudden, any momentum that the film might have had is diffused by this "statement" that war is meaningless. It is as obvious as an Oliver Stone film, and as off-putting. By the time the film gets back on track, one finds it difficult to care, and the three way showdown between the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, with its long shifting eyeball shots, plays like a satire on the classical western. If that is the point, then why is the majority of the film up to that point played straight?
Other Sergio Leone films are better than this one.
The context of the film had already been established earlier, when Blondie and Tuco are put into a POW camp (and meet up with Angel Eyes -- moving the plot forward), but this scene is worthless. All of a sudden, any momentum that the film might have had is diffused by this "statement" that war is meaningless. It is as obvious as an Oliver Stone film, and as off-putting. By the time the film gets back on track, one finds it difficult to care, and the three way showdown between the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, with its long shifting eyeball shots, plays like a satire on the classical western. If that is the point, then why is the majority of the film up to that point played straight?
Other Sergio Leone films are better than this one.
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