Ep 34 - For Few Dollars More (1965)

[00:00:00] Speaker A: A few dollars more. 1965. Two bounty killers, Manco and Colonel Douglas Mortimer, form an unlikely alliance with little trust between them. But no one is less trusting than gang leader El Indio, who is wanted dead or alive for a hefty reward. But to get to El Indio, the bounty killers must first go through his entire gang. On the bright side, if they can do it, it'll earn them a few dollars more. [00:00:35] Speaker B: All right, for you, all is more. This is 1965, the Sergio Leone classic. This is my first time visiting this one, as was with the last one, as will be with the Good, the Bad and the Ugly next week. Brian, I believe that's the same for you. And Will, is that accurate for you as well? This is the first time viewing for all three of us. [00:00:51] Speaker C: Yes. [00:00:52] Speaker A: Yeah, I think this is the first time for me. I think I've seen parts of the Good, Bad and Ugly, but not all of it. I'll see you next week. When I actually watch all of it. [00:01:02] Speaker B: I know it's iconic enough that I've probably seen a scene here or there and not realize that I've seen it, but I've definitely never watched it, like, even like chunks of it on TBS or certainly not the entire film. But I might watch scenes and be like, oh, yeah, okay, I've seen this interaction, but it never included what it was or how exactly connected to everything else. But anyways, that's next week. This week we're talking about For a Few Dollars More. This movie is the second one, the trilogy. But again, I think we talked about this last week. The trilogy is in reverse order. Right. So this is actually before A Fistful of Dollars. [00:01:34] Speaker A: Yeah, there's. There's multiple arguments to this. There's absolutely. Good, Bad, Ugly is first chronologically because it happens during the war. These movies happen afterwards. Some say that For A Few Dollars More comes next, and then A Fistful of Dollars finishes it out. But some swap those and it's really player's choice what their opinions are and how you want to swing it. [00:02:06] Speaker C: I would just like to say that in A Fistful of Dollars, the man with no name, who is now known as Monko, he was broke af. So not to spoil it because we're kind of jumping into the reverse order here, but he walked away with what looked like a whole pile of money stacked like dead bodies. And so apparently he either didn't get the bounty or the order isn't that way. I don't know. But if this one precedes A Fistful of Dollars Then somehow he lost a bunch of money along the way. [00:02:40] Speaker B: I was wondering that too, because he talks about in this one, want to take $10,000 and go and buy a house somewhere and settle down, maybe even retire. [00:02:47] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:02:47] Speaker B: And then he walks away with, I think he says $27,000 as well as, I think, the satchel with all of the bank money. He is living it up very well. I don't know how much time has passed between this and the next movie, but he has spent a ton of cash in between. Assuming this is the middle movie and the Fistful of Dollars is the first movie. [00:03:04] Speaker A: Hey, don't even worry about that. Jumping to next week, which is into the past. Blondie gets away with a huge sum of money, so it doesn't matter. [00:03:13] Speaker B: Fantastic. I did notice on IMDb that he's got a different. The next one. I was like, all right, we don't. Who knows what's going on with these. Yeah, I mean, they are sold as a trilogy, so I know that they're, like, put together in such a way. But I'm fully expecting we put this on YouTube. People will yell at us, be like, these aren't a franchise. These are separate movies. He's a different person wearing the exact same suit, doing the exact same things. [00:03:32] Speaker C: What little research I did has put this as the fr. The. The man with no Name franchise or the Dollars franchise. So, you know, it's. It's all over the place as a franchise. We're. We're locking it in for sure. And it is the same character throughout. I don't know why he goes by a different name at times, but I [00:03:49] Speaker A: don't know if that's true. [00:03:50] Speaker B: But apparently there actually was a lawsuit about it, and in court, they proved that he is not the same character. I didn't look into that too, too deeply. Do you know what I'm talking about? [00:04:00] Speaker A: Yeah, I read briefly about that. The producers of the first movie claimed rights to the Joe character. So Leon specifically said that this is not the same character in the movies. They just happen to wear similar clothing. Not even to that extent, but just that they appear similar or look similar, act similar, whatever. But that's why the name changes throughout. There's multiple reasons why you can believe one thing or another. Yes, the clothes are the same. Yes, it's Clint Eastwood. Yes, he acts the same in all the movies. But yeah, again, I. I go back to. This feels more like a Mad Max. And this movie made me feel even more like this is more like a Mad Max world where you're just following a legend of a tale of this character who comes across others and gets involved and somehow helps and then is on their merry way. This goes toe and toe with that, that same kind of ideology. So I'm, I'm down with that. Whether it's the same character or not doesn't really matter. It's the same mythology. [00:05:08] Speaker B: Yeah, I would agree with that for sure. Although I did, like, one of my complaints last week was it didn't feel like I knew what he, who he was, why he was doing anything, really anything about him. And we don't learn a ton more about Joe Blondie in this movie. And yet I feel like I know more about him just through his actions, through the way he presents himself. The fact that he is a bounty killer for sure in this one. Like, I liked knowing more about him and what his motivations were. And the fact that he did care about the money in this one. Did that work as well for you guys? Or that kind of kill some of the mystery of the man with no Name for you? [00:05:44] Speaker C: No, I, I, it really helped me get into it because like the last one, I was expecting this ronin who is just trying to be left alone, wandering. And he turned out to be a hustler. And in this one, I kind of recognized what was going to happen and I started paying attention for it. And he was, he's, he's a hustler, a bounty killer more in this one rather than trying hustle. But he's still out for the dollars. And so it was easier for me to get in touch with this film right from the jump. [00:06:13] Speaker A: That being said, I feel he's still a hustler because let me be honest. [00:06:17] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:06:19] Speaker A: Manco Monko isn't even the main character in this movie. As far as I'm concerned. It's Colonel Mortimer. He's the main character and he was the biggest draw for me in this movie. He was great. [00:06:31] Speaker B: I don't know if he is the main character per se. Yeah, definitely stole. He stole every scene he was in. Like, I loved Lee Van Cleef. I hope I'm pronouncing that properly. I loved his character in this. I thought he outperformed Clint Eastwood pretty much the entire time and was more interesting as a character. And that's nothing against Clint Eastwood. Like, that's hard to do. Clint Eastwood is a force and oh, [00:06:53] Speaker C: I felt everybody in this movie did an amazing job. Even Indio was an excellent villain. His psychotic glazed over look, smoking that cigarette, his fingers. Yeah, he was really good. Like it was over the top and I still believed it. I thought that was great. But I do, I do agree with you, Dan. The, the Le Van Cleef did steal the show when he came in and he's reading the Bible and he puts it down, but he's super scary. Dressed all in black. I didn't know what I was getting into. I didn't know where this was going to go. And then as I, as I watched him, I'm like, oh, he's just like epic badass. But he is a good guy. But not a flawless good guy, right? [00:07:34] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I don't. Yeah, I think all of the good guys in this are, are anti heroes at absolute best. [00:07:39] Speaker C: Well, I don't think a single person in this movie didn't stab somebody in the back at some point. There was so much double crossing going on throughout this entire plot. Yeah, that was probably my only complaint about the film is that after a while it felt to get a little bit long and I'm like, okay, so now this guy is going to double cross this guy and this guy's going to double cross this guy. Can we just get on with it? But that was about the only thing that I didn't like about this film. [00:08:04] Speaker B: Did remind me, did leave in or Colonel shoot. I had it written down. Mortimer. Did Colonel Mortimer ever stab Joe in the back or Manco in the back. [00:08:15] Speaker C: Shot him in the neck. But that was him into what he wanted to do to help him for cover and everything. But like he was like, if he [00:08:25] Speaker B: wanted to kill him, he'd be dead. [00:08:27] Speaker C: Yeah, he manipulated him for sure. And then when like they jumped, like Clint jumped through the roof and Mortimer somehow was already in the building with the safe and, and they, and they opened it up, they kind of had some different intentions of where they were going to go. It was always this untrusting partnership where they were always questioning each other. They knew they weren't going to kill each other per se, or at least they probably weren't going to. But it was always weird. And they're meeting in the streets with the little step on each other's shoe was so epic. I just loved that. It was so ridiculous and over the top. I love that scene though. [00:09:05] Speaker B: Yeah. That scene I had wrote down in my notes. Like it's like two dogs smelling each other's crotches for the first time. Like they're just kind of like checking each other out and like doing little circles around the other one. Just like, so what are you all about? Who are you and whatnot it was a really interesting scene. I really enjoyed it. And like, the guns in this movie, in this franchise are like magical. Right. Like nobody is this accurate this fast. And then in that scene, I believe it's that scene right where he starts like shooting his hat. [00:09:32] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:09:33] Speaker B: And like the laser noises as he's like shooting, the hat's going flying all over the place. And then he switch hat off and it's like it's flying straight up in the air every time he shots him. Like. The physics on this are something else. But I'm enjoying it. [00:10:07] Speaker C: They didn't have any holes in their hats from the bullets, so apparently they were like, I don't know, hitting the buckle or something. But nobody got a hole in their hat. So I mean. Yeah. So right from the start in this franchise, the shots are ridiculous. We're seeing people shoot around corners in the dark, shooting rope, you know, from the hip. You know, people shooting rifles from the hip and carving a heart in their armor. Just ridiculous stuff that doesn't happen. And so I was prepared for it in this movie and so I let that go. I would like to see more realism when it comes to that or an excuse for how they could be that good. Right. And it'd have to be some sort of sci fi, weird storyline thing that doesn't fit. [00:10:50] Speaker A: So. [00:10:50] Speaker C: So that bothers me. But there weren't too many other things in this movie that bothered me. I. I liked that we had, we had muzzle flares. Again, when somebody got shot, they didn't like stand up and do a twirl or a dance. They for the most part acted like they really got shot and slumped down. It was pretty good. Indie Indigos Indio's death was a little weird, but like all the, the gunfighting and stuff, it was a big improvement from the last one. We still didn't have squibs. I would have liked squibs. I think the movie loses some points because there's no blood in the gunfights and that kind of drew me out a little bit. They would show a bullet hole in the forehead or something when somebody got shot. Perfectly square in the forehead. But otherwise, you know, the gunfighting improved so much over the last movie. [00:11:38] Speaker B: I thought it was great. I would agree with that wholeheartedly. The only going back a couple of you did a bunch in one sentence there. My only issue with the gunfighting is it would have been cool if like Clint Eastwood was an amazing gunfighter. But literally everybody in this movie is like, got perfect aim 100 of the time. Like, even when he's trying to smoke up and he's in the den of thieves, like, some random guy shoots the cigarette out of his mouth, and he's just like, all right. And he starts again. You're just like, okay, so literally everybody can hit rope from 50 yards. [00:12:10] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:12:10] Speaker B: All right, sure. Like, that would have been a cool. Not, like a superpower, obviously, but if that had been, like, his thing. But it's just like, no, just literally everybody can do that. Is that hard, really? I don't know. [00:12:21] Speaker A: I don't know. I. I guess it doesn't bother me as much. A lot of. And I. I looked. I looked into it a little bit more because I was like, why am I enjoying this? What do I love about this movie so much? These movies so far is one. Leong treats these as. To me, they're. They're almost like stage plays that he's. He's using the same actors as different characters. Aside from Clint, who plays only one character. Maybe that's a Clint problem more than a Leon problem, I'm not sure. But multiple cast throughout. All three of these movies are cast as different characters throughout the three movies. So to me, it reminds me of, like, putting on theatrical productions and you're using same actors playing different roles, things like that. And that further goes to my research of Lyon, actually comparing these movies to commedia dell', arte, which is an Italian theater back in the 16th, 18th century. Very, very popular professional theater, where the characters are very social types, very stock characters. So you get, like, the Foolish Old man, which you can see in both of these movies, again, played by the same actor. The. The Coffin Builder. Yeah, the Grave Digger. And in this one, the. The Old man in the. The Know It All Man, I think. Yeah. And I believe he would have been in the third movie as well, but I. I read that he actually passed before the third movie was filmed. And so, like, you can see these very archetype characters throughout, and they're bigger than life, and they're very much represented, representing their stock characters, and that's about it. And so them having, like, this perfect accuracy and things like that is just all part of the show and all part of the showman in these movies for me. And it just all just blends in so nicely. If you compare it to, like, they're putting on a theatrical performance, they're amping this up, and you just. If you're in for the ride, you're in for the ride. And if you. If you can't buy in, then I guess you can get off the train at the. At the stop that you're supposed to get off. Not early, like Colonel Douglas Mortimer. [00:14:33] Speaker C: To me, they. They come off almost as, like, Greek gods. Like, they're all legendary. Some are Zeus and some are, you know, not. I don't know my Greek gods that well. Not Zeus. Right. But they're legendary, like, beings. And. And you're right. They come in. No. So did Gian. [00:14:55] Speaker A: I can't. [00:14:56] Speaker C: The Indio. He was somebody from Fistful of Dollars. [00:15:01] Speaker A: Yes, he was the bad guy. He was. [00:15:03] Speaker C: Okay, okay. I was like. I was, like, sitting there going, wait, doesn't he. They don't know each other. And, wait, where's the timeline? And then I'm trying to figure out. I'm like, okay, it's a different character, but, man, that sure looks like the same guy. Okay, now I get it. All right. [00:15:15] Speaker B: It was the guy who shot him in the heart pattern, right? [00:15:17] Speaker C: Yeah, that was it. Yeah, he's like. He's a rifle this time. So, yeah, that was. That was really cool, guys. I freaking love this movie. [00:15:27] Speaker A: I really love this movie, too. [00:15:29] Speaker C: I had so much fun watching this movie. I watched it by myself this time, and I was cheering, I was clapping, I was laughing. I really got into this film. It did get a little bit long in the middle, but I didn't care because I never knew which way it was going. I never knew for sure who the character was. I was very interested in everything. This was a fantastic film from top to bottom, and. And it took everything that I liked about the first movie, and it did all those things better. They improved on everything. There is one thing that got worse or that I didn't like. They just. It was. Everything was better. So if this is the sequel, the true sequel to A Fistful of Dollars, this is one of those few times where the sequel was much, much better than the original for me. [00:16:12] Speaker A: Nice. [00:16:13] Speaker B: I would agree with that. This one also stepped up significantly for me. I don't know if I can give it quite as high of praises as you are, I don't think. I think it improved in every category. Yeah, I think I would say I agreed in every category. I. I don't know that I could say that I loved this movie, but it was definitely significantly better for me than for. [00:16:33] Speaker C: Well, again, Western's not your genre, so it's. You're a tough crowd. What did you guys think about. Dan? What did you think about the special effects in this film? That was a hard spot for me to hit last time because it's Such an old film. And I'm trying to figure out what they had at the time, but what would be an accurate appraisal. This one, they seem to step up a lot of the special effects. Like, we had muzzle flare. The look of everything was much, much better. Cinematography improved even more so than. Than the previous. So I really liked it. But there were a few things. A few times when there was something that would happen that really took me out and I was like, whoa, that was a bad job on that one. What did you think about the effects then? [00:17:14] Speaker B: I think the best thing I can say is I didn't notice them. So even as you're asking, like, what were the special effects? My brain is kind of like, what were the special effects? Because they were so seamless in the film. Like, nothing took me out, Nothing like drew me. Like, in the first movie, there was that Gatling gun scene, which was. I'm sorry, laughable. Like, it was just everything about that just did nothing for me. And I don't remember anything like that in this film. Everything felt good. There was a couple of times you mentioned the actors dying earlier and how they didn't do that, like, stand up and dance before they died thing. You're right. There was a couple that were a little. Little odd, but for the most part, they were better. There was one specifically that I like, I had to rewind and check again something. Did they do a dummy there at one point where they're breaking down the stairs or. Yes, when they shot, when India was breaking out of the jail. And they shoot a guy down the stairs and one guy just collapses and he hits his head against that wall, like, there's no way. He doesn't and just lays perfectly still. And I was like, how? Like, he was running up the stairs a second ago. That is a live person and then that is a dead body afterwards. I'm like, that guy is going to the hospital when this scene's done. Like, I don't know. I don't know how they did that. He didn't hurt himself. So I was like, wow, that's. That's impressive for me. I didn't. I didn't notice the muzzle flare, but I also didn't notice there wasn't muzzle flare. So I'm just gonna agree with you that it was the lack of squibs didn't bother me. Like, the lack of blood didn't. Like, didn't feel necessary in this film. If there had actually been too much blood, that might have got to take, that might have taken me Out. [00:18:36] Speaker C: It didn't seem necessary like a, maybe a blackened hole or anything in the shirts, Any kind of a mark or anything. But I did not see any effect of the bullet on the person. [00:18:45] Speaker B: There's a couple where like they shot him directly in the head or the girl who commits suicide. Like, you do see it, but not on people who are wearing clothes. [00:18:51] Speaker A: Generally on cut. Only on cut scenes. [00:18:53] Speaker C: Yeah, there were. There were a couple. I don't remember all of them, but the one that really bothered me is Clint Eastwood was lurking around at night, or was supposed to be lurking around at night. And I'm like, oh, look, he's using black face paint so that they don't see him. And then it changes to a different scene and he's not. And I was like, oh. They were just trying to make it look like he was really dark in the shadows, but they had painted his face with like, with like charcoal or something. [00:19:24] Speaker B: Weird. Yeah, it's when he wondered about that. I was like, did I see that wrong? Were we looking at a different character? Because he's definitely not got any makeup on. And that was interesting. [00:19:34] Speaker C: It was. It just did not work the way they wanted it to. [00:19:37] Speaker A: And it was like a three second shot too. But you're like, wait, who is that? And then it cuts back and the lights are on. You're like, oh, it was him, I guess. Okay, that was weird. [00:19:47] Speaker C: Yeah. And when, when, when Indio died, his. His little death spasm where he's kind of hunched up. He was like a little weird. [00:19:58] Speaker A: I was like, really? [00:19:59] Speaker C: That's the final kill right there. Well, not the final kill. The final, final kill had. Shoots the guy 27. Oh, my God. Yeah. [00:20:10] Speaker B: And Van Cleef is like, are you okay? And he's like, I had a math problem or whatever. [00:20:14] Speaker C: It was okay, yeah, some humor into this. There was drama. There was sort of nudity. I mean, they didn't really show anything. The woman in the, in the bathtub in the very beginning, when Mortimer comes in, he's like, excuse me, miss. She was in the tub all naked, all by herself. The other guy was fully dressed. I'm like, what were they doing? Like, he's just watching her take a bath. Like, okay, I'm not gonna kink shame you. [00:20:39] Speaker A: But he was washing her man. [00:20:41] Speaker C: Like Mortimer, that woman was just like, oh, you're so handsome. What is going on here? That was weird, but it was fun. [00:20:51] Speaker B: There was a couple scenes I meant to revisit, but we see the scene you're talking about with the woman in the bathtub. He's hunting down a person who. He just saw the Wanted poster in the. The train station. I guess it wasn't actually a train station, but whatever. Am I crazy? Did the poster look anything like the person he was hunting down? Because I thought the poster looked more like him. When I first saw the poster, I thought he was the guy on the Wanted poster because he had, like a big mustache and, like a big hat and everything. We see the other guy, he's clean shaven and looks a little. Looks a little rough. He's got a weird teeth. [00:21:23] Speaker C: And I'm just like. [00:21:25] Speaker B: I would never have thought, like, if I walked past him on the street with the poster, I never would have thought, like, oh, that guy. That's who I'm looking for. Like, he just looks so different. I had to go back. I wanted to go back and check it out. I never actually did before we started recording. But that was one of those things where I'm like, really? All right. Interesting. [00:21:40] Speaker A: That much. Plus, he. I mean, he got the bartender to tell him where he was. So I guess he just knew who it was and didn't matter at that point. [00:21:46] Speaker B: Sure, I guess. [00:21:48] Speaker C: I like the Laughing Wanted poster of India. And every time you see the poster, they, like, overlay his cackling laugh. For some reason. I don't know why, but it was. It was a nice touch. Speaking of some of the sound effects that they had in this film, I thought most of them were great. I thought that they had really interesting music. The little chimes that they played. I would have preferred a different song. They ran it a bit long and [00:22:14] Speaker A: the chimes for the lockets. [00:22:17] Speaker C: For the locket, it was. I just didn't like the song. It wasn't a big deal. It just wouldn't. Wouldn't have been the little jingle I would have played for that sort of thing. But the music, they did the same thing. The first one, they kind of let the scenes run on a little bit long sometimes, allow the music to play out and it was okay. But sometimes it was a bit much. And sometimes they did seem to have maybe the. Just the volume. Like, I found myself turning up and down the volume because the music would get so intense and then it would go someplace else and I'd have to turn the volume back up so I could hear again. But what trying to do with the music, it worked for me. It was a bit much. I think that they could still put some polish on that area, but it worked. [00:22:58] Speaker B: This doesn't take anything away from the Movie, per se. I just wanted to mention there's a couple scenes where I liked the music, but the audio itself was vastly different from like cut to cut. So you'd have like one scene you're looking at Clint Eastwood and you have Van Cleef talking in the background. He'd be really loud and then you'd actually look at Van Cleef and he's talking way away from the microphone. That's weird that it's happening in the exact same scene. Like they're just cutting back and forth and the audio is changing so drastically. And there is the one scene where Van Cleef is talking to or Colonel Mortimer, I guess he's talking to the guy in the bank. And like there's a couple of scenes where like the audio is just a little desynt. But that bank scene where he's talking to the guy in not El Paso, but the bank he goes to before that, where his voice was nothing like his mouth moving around. Like that one for me was way out of sync and really distracting. [00:23:45] Speaker C: Speaking of mouth moving around and syncing the music, was this dubbed like the first one? [00:23:50] Speaker B: Yeah, I have to assume because that seems awesome. [00:23:52] Speaker C: That's what I thought. But there seemed to be parts where their lips were lined up with what they were saying and I'm like, are now speaking in English and they don't need to. To dub it or something. Like, because. Because for me there was some stuff that was. Seemed way out of sync and I'm like, okay, that's just dubbing, whatever. And then there were other parts where I. I thought that they were speaking in English because it didn't look like they were. [00:24:13] Speaker A: Also like, obviously Clint and Mortimer were speaking English throughout. Right. And I believe the bad guy, Indio, I think I read that he didn't speak. Speak English, but he learned the English words people taught him the learned how [00:24:28] Speaker B: to do his role for the lines [00:24:30] Speaker A: and spoke English throughout. Okay. And then. And then on top of that, it's not even. I can't remember that actor's name that played Indio. Where is it? [00:24:39] Speaker C: Gene Mario? [00:24:42] Speaker A: Yeah, he actually doesn't voice over his own bit. It's somebody else that does the voiceover for him. [00:24:46] Speaker B: Oh, okay. [00:24:46] Speaker A: For both. For both movies so far, they did [00:24:49] Speaker B: a good job with that of not even the same person. Like, I didn't. I didn't really catch on him all that much. Like the bank. There are a couple of scenes with extras and whatnot, but that bank scene was the only one that really took me Out. But the main characters, generally speaking, I didn't really have an issue other than there was a scene or two where, again, the audio flipped pretty hard when it went from cut to cut to cut to cut. But overall, I thought the audio in this movie was pretty good. Now, I'm not familiar with. I mean, Canadian guns in general, but specifically, you know, 18th century guns. There was a couple of times, like, again, the shooting the hat scenes, they sounded like laser pistols more than guns to me. I don't know what that was. [00:25:20] Speaker C: Ricocheting off the ground. And when they were ricoching off the ground, that was a more accurate sound kind of thing. [00:25:26] Speaker A: Hitting a hat. [00:25:26] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. But when you hit the hat in the air, you're not going to hear anything. It's going to go through cloth. That's it. [00:25:31] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:25:32] Speaker C: And. And it's not going to shoot the hat up further in the air. Certainly not straight up. It's just gonna go through the hat. The hat's barely gonna move, really. But, you know, it was fun. The gunfighting is just one of those things where I. I look at this. So we talk about it being like this Mad Max genre of characters or how they're kind of. We don't know if they're changing or evolving or the same character or whatever, but it's all in the same kind of world or whatever. And also the. The fact that these characters are absolutely epic. So, like, in this world, you just have a handful of people who can make these miracle shots with every bullet. And that's just the world we're working in. And I'm just accepting it and going with it because otherwise I'm going to get frustrated by the unrealistic nature of it. And that's just the nature of this franchise, and I'm okay with it. I like when you can make something super crazy seem believable and have some plot that allows me to do that. But if you just want to have this be kind of like an alternate universe where Western guys can, you know, shoot the dust off a fly's ear at 100 paces and. Fine. Okay. That's where we're at. [00:26:45] Speaker A: I. I agree with that. I agree with that. I think it is. It's meant to be a heightened thing. It's meant to be a fairy tale of some kind of. Of looking back at the. At the west of these folklore heroes. Right. That can do all these crazy things. And I buy into that. Absolutely. I also wanted to bring right back to the beginning of the movie. I also just love the setup of this movie where you see the colonel and he's just like, comes in so hot and just doesn't give the guy a chance. Kills him, gets his bounty, doesn't even just kill him. I thought you guys would be so impressed. I'm surprised he didn't mention it. He kills the guy's horse. Yeah, no horse died in the first movie. You guys were upset about that. This guy straight up mercs the horse, then takes his bounty. Cold blooded killing. I also love that they set up at the beginning that he uses his stock to get extra range with his pistol. The guy was trying to shoot him, didn't have the range, he could shoot him, no problem. Love that setup because it's throughout the movie. And then you see Clint Eastwood's character come in and he gives the guy a chance. He plays poker with him, played for his life. He's gonna walk him out alive, but then he gets interrupted, has to kill him. That is what it is. But he comes across as more of a noble, caring person. And then throughout the movie, you see those character traits swap on these two characters. And I thought that was really, really cool. And you find that Colonel Mortimer is actually the guy who's just out for revenge and wants to do what's right to, you know, put balance back into the world and take the person who murdered his sister out of existence. Doesn't even want the money for it. And Clint is just like backs stabbing Mortimer, given the gang wrong directions, trying to lose Mortimer in, in half of the, you know, so he can take the bounty all for himself. Like, he is a selfish character. And that comes through at the end where at the beginning they kind of set it up as the opposite. And I really like that switch throughout the movie. I thought that was really smart and really well played. [00:28:49] Speaker C: I agree. I like the plot in this movie. I like the script to it. It's deep. It's got layers to it. There's a lot of things going on. It's actually complex to the point where it's almost too complex with the double crossing and the backstabbing and switching people around and switching teams and going left, going right and tricking people. There were sometimes like, well, let's go north. I think you should go south. Oh, we're gonna go east. And then Mortimer's like, I knew you were gonna go east. I was like, and I was waiting for something else. But he really just out fought him like seven steps ahead, I guess. Okay, that's fine. But what did you guys think of, of this? Of all the Double crossing and all the twists and the turns in the plot. Dan, did you like that or was it too much for you? [00:29:39] Speaker B: It wasn't too much for me. I didn't. It didn't really bother me. It felt. I was gonna say accurate for the time. Like I have any idea what accuracy at the time felt like. These are a bunch of men who are out for themselves, and that's all they really care about, and so be it. Now, there's a couple of times where I couldn't quite follow exactly what was going on. So there was a couple of questions I had for you specifically. Indio seems to care a lot about the one man who's in jail for four years and is excited when somebody breaks him out, right? Yeah. Yeah. Is that man a part of his gang after that? [00:30:12] Speaker C: I don't remember. He's completely forgettable. [00:30:14] Speaker B: Exactly. [00:30:15] Speaker A: I think he disappeared in the ranks, but I think he was part of [00:30:17] Speaker B: the crew because, like, three days later, once they break him out, they, like, he's so excited to get him broken out, and then he robs the bank, and he's like, hey, you, blue shirt, we're gonna kill everybody else, including the guy that I cared so much about breaking out of jail. And I'm just like, what? Like, why did you break him out just to kill him? Why don't just leave him where he was if you weren't willing to spend the money with him anyways? Like, and. [00:30:37] Speaker C: And honestly, Clint goes and breaks the guy out of prison, and he's like, he. Here's your friend. I want to join your team. I'm going to crack a joke about turning you into the police. I'm part of the team. Excellent. And it was really, like, just that fast. It really happened, like, just that fast. And I was like, we could have patted that out a little bit more. A little weak, but I really liked [00:30:58] Speaker B: this movie and you guys praising, like, the plot on it. It's kind of got me going, like, really, like, everything we've watched up to this point for, like, months now, Will has been like, oh, this is bad writing. And this one, you're like, this one's great writing. I'm like, is it? Well, it's fun and it's definitely Rule of Cool, but there is a lot of stuff in this. I'm like, does this make sense at all? Is this coherence? [00:31:19] Speaker C: It's the character arcs that is so cool about this. The three main characters here, Monaco, Mortimer, and Indio, how they interact, how they change, and watching them develop in Their goals and what they're trying to achieve. I mean, originally it's. It's a bank robbery and then it's a heist from, you know, you're trying to steal it from other people and you're trying to double cross people. There's a lot going on, and it's really complex. And I never knew which way it was going. It wasn't predictable. It felt fresh to me. And that's kind of amazing because it's such an old film. You'd think that these kind of ideas would have been overplayed or something, but they're not. For me, it was. It was really good. There were little things throughout the film where they didn't quite pull it off. Either a technical aspect or the dialogue was a little wonky, or somebody just believes something that they shouldn't believe or is or knows something that they shouldn't know. Or we forget characters that exist. Like you pointed out, Dan, somebody who he double crosses and kills even though he was hoping he would be out of prison. So there's little things throughout that cause problems. But the overall arc of this story and script really worked well for me. [00:32:28] Speaker B: Yeah, the audience is saying that it's actually the guy. He blames the stabbing death on. The guy's like, is that your knife? You better run. And then he shoots him. So he kills him himself. It's not even like, oh, maybe the stranger will get him. He shoots him himself, which makes even less sense in my brain. [00:32:42] Speaker C: But okay, sure, he's committed to getting that money, I guess. [00:32:45] Speaker A: He's crazy. [00:32:45] Speaker B: He's a psycho crazy. [00:32:46] Speaker A: I mean, and now you. You said we've been watching movies for months. I'd say the writing in this movie is far better than almost all of the Jurassic World movies put together. And Venom movies, for that matter. The. The storyline in this is much more enjoyable to watch and much better thought out than the majority of those films. [00:33:07] Speaker B: I'm not disagreeing with that. I am not saying that this movie is worse than Venom or Jurassic Park. I think there are definitely things in this movie that if you'd seen them in a different movie, you would have been ripping into it. [00:33:20] Speaker C: I think this is for. For me, Dan, you know how you came out with a hundred on Jurassic park, but there's still little things that we found and can laugh about. For me, that's kind of what this is. This one's a really high scoring film, but there's lots of little things that we can still pick apart and make fun of. But. But I. I Just really attached myself to all of these characters. I found them so intriguing and I didn't know where it was gonn point. And I was very enthralled. The only time is about when they were like stabbing each other and saying, you know, he did or you know, he killed his buddy with, with a knife and said he. I was like, okay, we've double crossed the double crossers again at this point. Like, like everybody and they bring in a new guy and he's, he's double crown. Like, okay, it got a little bit much at that point. But then the movie kind of turned the corner and we got to see Mortimer and his reason for chasing down India, which I kind of, I kind of knew anyway. But you see that play out at the end and that was really good. And the characters really come to develop Clint all for the money, lying, cheating, anything he can do to get all the money. And then Mortimer just wants his revenge. And. And that end scene, let's talk about that for a minute. That end sequence, when you know, the chime stop, you're gonna pick up your gun and shoot me. And Mortimer's look of like, he knows he can't get to his gun in time and he's. He. That was an amazing acting right there, showcasing. He knows he's gonna die, but he's still like, considering it. Like, there was a lot going on in his facial expression and not saying anything, you know. And then, and then Clint comes in and says, here, let's even this out. Here's my rifle. And then his facial expression changes because he's like, now I have just what I need. And. And it was a great sequence. And Clint sits down on the side to just watch it happen. He's like, I'm not even going to shoot the bad guy. I'm going to. You know, I'm giving you a fair shot. It was really cool. It was a really cool sequence for sure. [00:35:24] Speaker B: There's. I want to, I want to go back and I just want to see if I understand the scene properly because maybe you guys, maybe the audience can help me out. We see multiple times Indio having flashbacks. He's usually pretty high throughout this movie of a time where he walks in on what I'm assuming is two lovers. It looks like either a married couple or at least a dating couple, maybe a courtship. And over the course of the movie, we see that he kills the guy and rapes the woman. And then, spoiler alert, the woman ends up killing herself. Now, obviously we find out that that woman is Mortimer's sister. Right? [00:35:57] Speaker A: Yep. Yep. [00:35:59] Speaker B: In the courtship scene, before he kills him, it looks like he just crawls in through a random window. The boyfriend, husband. We don't. Doesn't really have a name. Gives the little brace, watch, timepiece, locket to. Again, I don't think she has a name. Mortimer's sister. Right. So why does Mortimer have the same one? [00:36:23] Speaker C: Probably. [00:36:24] Speaker A: I thought there was two actually in that scene. I thought it was, like, two timepieces. [00:36:29] Speaker C: Yeah. I think he picked the. The one up off the dead guy, and the one from the woman was Ms. Indio Stone. That was my understanding. [00:36:39] Speaker B: Okay, so I totally missed that then. If that's. And that's why I wanted to bring this up. [00:36:42] Speaker C: Dude was like a young Mortimer. That's what I first thought. I was kind of confused because he looked like a younger version of Mortimer. And then. And then, you know, they explained at the end. I'm like, oh, okay, sister. I didn't see the resemblance because I was trying to look at her boobies. But, you know, it was. Whatever. It explained it. I got there again, [00:37:00] Speaker A: you got there. That's all that matters. Okay. [00:37:05] Speaker B: Did. Did both of the lockets. [00:37:06] Speaker C: It's very th. Okay, yes. Distracting. [00:37:11] Speaker B: Did both of the lockets have a picture of the girl in them at [00:37:15] Speaker A: the end of the movie? Yes. Whether that's how they started, I don't know. It seems weird that you'd have a. [00:37:19] Speaker B: You give her a locket of herself like that. Yeah. [00:37:21] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:37:22] Speaker B: Okay. Why was he so obsessed with this random person that he had sex with 20 years ago or how. Whenever it was. [00:37:30] Speaker A: Yeah. I don't know. I mean, that's a little up. [00:37:32] Speaker B: Like, he doesn't seem the remorseful type. We don't know of any relationship going on between the two of them. She's so disgusted. She doesn't even kill him. She kills herself. Like, she's got to jump on him with a gun. She could have ended the movie real quick. [00:37:43] Speaker C: That was intense. It wasn't what I was expecting to happen again. And it was one of those where I was like, wow, that's powerful. That's. I mean. And for the time that this came out, like. Like, rape was probably not like, a thing that was displayed in movies very often. And that was pretty graphic. [00:38:00] Speaker B: I. So I was laughing because I was talking to my dad before watching the first one. I was like, well, I think we can probably watch this with the kids. It's from, like, 64 or something. He's like, I don't know. We should check the ratings. And looking at, like, the IMDb page, it's like, at one point, somebody says, you son of a gun. I'm like, yeah, I think we're safe. And then we go from that to this movie where there's, like, multiple women naked, a rape scene. I'm just, like, really glad I didn't watch this one with the kids. Like, that. That took a real dark turn. [00:38:22] Speaker A: Yeah. This one's rated R for sure. [00:38:24] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. [00:38:26] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:38:26] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:38:27] Speaker A: I think. I don't think we get to know all of Indio's backstory. I mean, he seemed to be, like, watching very intentful in the shadows. So you can. I think you can just let your mind fill in a lot. Maybe he was an ex lover of hers and now he's jealous and so he's gonna make her his again. Maybe he's been stalking her for months and this is. Was now the chance to get what he wants. There's so many, like, things that are possible that obviously they don't touch on. [00:38:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:58] Speaker A: Because I don't think it's important. [00:39:00] Speaker B: I don't think it's entirely necessary. I just want to make sure I didn't miss something. That's all right. I was really bringing it up for. To be like, oh, yeah, no, they. They mentioned X at some point. I was like, oh, okay. Sorry, I didn't get that. Okay. [00:39:09] Speaker A: But, yeah, to me, it's like, he did keep the locket. I. I feel like she was important to him. Not much is important to this guy. [00:39:16] Speaker C: Money. [00:39:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:17] Speaker A: That girl and the dude with all [00:39:19] Speaker B: the bullets, the only gang member he cared about. Yeah, I did. Like, because he uses that to his advantage throughout the movie. He's like, okay, when this. When this stops chiming, we're gonna shoot each other. So, like, that gives him. It gives the other person, like, a sense of hope, but it gives him an implied advantage. And then when he runs across Mortimer at the end, thinking he's got the advantage again, not only does he know when the chimes are going to end, but he also is the only one holding a gun. And then Clint Eastwood comes in and kind of evens that score. Like, Mortimer knows what's gonna long, it's gonna end for. He's got the same locket, so he doesn't have that advantage. And Clint Eastwood comes in and gives him the gun to take away that advantage. I thought that was kind of brilliant, actually. Like, he's a sociopath and he's give. What? [00:40:01] Speaker A: Dan, are you saying that was good writing? [00:40:03] Speaker B: Wait, I Never said it was bad writing. I'm saying there are parts. [00:40:07] Speaker A: Thank you. Thank you. [00:40:08] Speaker B: You're. You're taking a victory lap for no reason. I'm saying there are parts of this movie that if this was in any other movie, you would have ripped into. [00:40:14] Speaker A: I don't know about that. The. [00:40:16] Speaker B: When he goes to the hotel and he's upstairs for two seconds, and the guy comes running downstairs like, oh, I'm terrified of everything. If that had happened in the Fast and the Furious movie, there's no way you'd say that was good writing. There's not a. [00:40:27] Speaker C: Wait, wait. No, no, no, no, no. [00:40:29] Speaker A: Wait, wait, wait, wait. That. That scene was specifically for the comedy, so the speed of it actually helped the humor of the scene. That absolutely is good writing and well executed. The humor they put into this movie to make it such a dark movie with such funny scenes is actually astounding to me. It's amazing. [00:40:51] Speaker C: Can we. Can we speak for a moment about the hotel manager's wife, Mary? [00:40:57] Speaker A: Is that all you want to talk about now? [00:41:00] Speaker C: She was so memorable to me, and she had, like, two lines in it, but just her character, the audacity to put so much out there, including her cleavage in. In, like, the opening of this movie. I was like, okay, this movie's got some humor to it. They're. They're gonna put some funny stuff out there. So when he chased that guy downstairs, I actually thought it was kind of like he was getting his own bounty and he was gonna go kill the guy and there'd be a vacancy in that room or something. And I. I didn't know what was going on, but it worked for me. It was a very quick scene, but I didn' what was happening at the time, so I guess it didn't bother me. [00:41:40] Speaker A: It doubled down. The next time when he gets the servant to go up and pack Mortimer's bags for him and check him out, it made it that much funnier because he did it quietly. [00:41:53] Speaker C: I was like, what's going on? And then he comes down like, oh, my God. [00:41:56] Speaker A: Seriously, I love how Mortimer is such, like, a cool, calm, collected guy that he just lets it happen and lets it play out and be like, okay, let's see where this goes. It. To me, it's. It's very well done. It's very well done. I mean, I don't know. This thing kind of put spaghetti westerns on the map. [00:42:13] Speaker C: I don't. [00:42:15] Speaker A: It's hard to argue. It's hard to argue. It's the same with Jurassic park for. For Dan, he's not wrong. That movie impacted film Jurassically and Jurassically for multiple reasons. Right. The, the. The real effects mixed with the cgi. The big budgets Hollywood blockbuster movie, like, pushed movies forward in a way just like these movies did for the spaghetti Western genre. Undeniable to me. [00:42:48] Speaker C: I, I don't have much more that I can say about this film. I was very positive about everything. There wasn't much I didn't like. The, the few things that I had a problem with this movie, I. It wasn't a big deal. It was just things that they could have polished on a little bit more, pushed a little bit harder, and done a little bit more. I guess it keeps it from a perfect score. But then again, I never hardly give anything a perfect score. So for me, this movie was really solid. And you guys want me just going with my rating on this? [00:43:16] Speaker B: Yes, please. [00:43:17] Speaker C: All right. So after talking with you guys, it didn't fluctuate my, My score much at all. I'm giving this one an 89 out of 100. I just really had fun with this and I thought they did some amazing stuff with this movie. And again, like the original, some things needed more polish and a little bit more work, but the distance they went from A Fistful of Dollars to A Few Dollars More was monumental. The. I mean, they really knew what they were doing when they came into this and made a great story. And I liked the complex. The, the complex plot in this and so I really enjoyed it. It's. It's fantastic. I had way more fun going into this than I. Than I thought I would. [00:44:01] Speaker A: And that was one year later. [00:44:04] Speaker C: Yeah. Isn't that amazing? [00:44:06] Speaker A: Incredible. Incredible. I agree. [00:44:08] Speaker B: So this one, for me, I, I would agree with pretty much everything. Brian said it improved drastically. I think the music was better. The sound was generally better. The acting was loads better. I really can't say enough about Lee Van Cleef. I thought he did a phenomenal job. Stole every scene that he was in, which is not easy to do when you're going against. I'm gonna pronounce this wrong. Gian Maria Valente or Clint Eastwood. Both of them did great jobs. I just, I really connected with the Lee Van Cleef, Colonel Mortimer character a little bit more. The cinematography in this one was great. There's a couple of hiccups in weird places. Again, like the Clint Eastwood in the dark scene and stuff like that. But overall I thought this looked really well. Looked really well. I thought this looks really good. The, the deaths far better. The gun scenes way More interesting the plot. I don't. I didn't think it was as deep as Brian thought it was. I thought it was fine. Significantly better than the first movie. I actually could engage with significantly more. I don't know. And my enjoyment of this one. Again, I watched this one by myself, the last one I watched with my dad, but circumstances being what they are, I had to watch this one by myself. Sort of last minute. Ish. And I, I really did enjoy this movie. It did step up significantly. I will say till I die. Like, I'm not a big western fan. Like, this genre just doesn't really do it for me. But I had fun watching this movie. Will I watch it again? I have no idea. But for the one time that I did see it, I enjoyed it more than I thought I would. And I'm actually legitimately looking forward to the Good, Bad and the Ugly. Now, I gave this a 76, which is a significant improvement from the first movie, which I think I only gave 61 or something. So I, I'm not negative on this movie or this franchise. I just don't love it as much as you two do, it seems. [00:45:45] Speaker A: No, that's totally legit. And you, you said to yourself, you're not a huge western fan and that's. That is what it is like. If you don't like the genre, it's hard to like give the hugest of props. Right. Because it just hits different with some other movies. And that's. That's totally cool. All right, I agree again with all the sentiment that everybody has stated so far. I think this one had better characters, it had better acting, it had better direction. I think Leon learned a lot in the year that he made the first one. Clint learned nothing and did the exact same thing. But everybody else stepped up their game and it was awesome. And I, and I, I do believe in my heart of hearts is like the Mad Max. You know, Max goes in, alters something and, and changes the world in some way or the outcome of a situation in some way. I felt the same with this. [00:46:38] Speaker C: This was. [00:46:39] Speaker A: This is like Fury Road to me. Clint Eastwood's character comes in and affects Mortimer's characters arc for the better so that he could succeed on his journey. And then Clint goes off into the, into the sunset. Well, they both get to. Which is very nice. But Mortimer gets. He's the lead of this movie, like bar none. He's the furiosa of this movie. And, and it's worth watching if you, if, even if you don't like westerns. I think this is worth watching because it is just well done, and it's. You can see so clearly why it revitalized the western genre. Yeah. I love the comedic scenes input into this. Just to juxtapose all the darkness and really dark scenes throughout this movie. Lots of violence, lots of dark topics. And I think the. They balance that so well. And even in the comedic scenes, they. They played it so straight that it just made it so much funnier to me, and. And that's good comedy to me. So I love seeing that. I gave this movie an 88 out of 100, which is, I think, three ticks up from the first one. I still have a soft spot for the first one because I. I just love those interest stories and. And I love seeing where directors go from that initial seed of genius that you can see in that first movie. This one is better, though. This one is better. Yeah. All right. Super funny. [00:48:08] Speaker B: You guys want to yell a little bit? [00:48:15] Speaker A: Top score. [00:48:16] Speaker B: It is tied. Oh, yes, it is tied for the top score with Home Alone, which has no business being there, but still is because we refuse to do the other movies. [00:48:30] Speaker A: That's two quality franchises right there. Two quality franchises. [00:48:34] Speaker B: I almost put Home Alone on top, and I was like, I'm just gonna get. I've already getting hate. I'm just gonna get more unnecessarily. [00:48:41] Speaker C: I did not expect this trilogy to go to the top of the list, but after watching this last film, I'm okay with it. [00:48:49] Speaker A: It. [00:48:49] Speaker C: This last film took what was good about the first one and did everything I needed it to do and more. And if they can continue going in that direction, I don't think they can keep the. The jump for me was huge. I don't think it's going to be that huge in the next one going forward, but if they get better, this thing belongs at the top. It was really good because with so many times in our franchises, we see an epic film that creates the franchise and then cash grab after cash grab after cash Gr. This was a movie where they are perfecting their talent from one to the next, and I hope that continues into good. Bad Ugly [00:49:35] Speaker B: is one everybody talks about. I can't imagine it gets worse. I. I have to assume, having never seen it, it is going to be the best one in the franchise. But you're right. That's an interesting point. Most franchises start good and end poorly. This one seems to be just ramping up and getting better and better as we go. [00:49:49] Speaker A: Yeah, I. I do feel like this. A few. For a few Dollars More is better than the first one. A lot of people like the first one. Usually I think a lot of people's name is Good, Bad, Ugly, Fistful of Dollars, then For a Few Dollars More. But I think this one's better than I definitely. [00:50:08] Speaker B: I like this better. Way better. Yeah, it's, it's. Honestly, it's not even close for me personally. All right, and that's our rating of For a Few Dollars More. But what's yours? Leave a comment in the section down below. I' you we record this live over at Twitch TV themongoolie show so you can over there and hit the follow button if you want to see these live on Thursday nights or if you enjoy this content edited on YouTube, make sure you hit the like and subscribe button. It does help out the channel quite a bit. We'll be back next week for the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. So if you do want to see that, make sure you stick around so that I see you in the next one. [00:50:46] Speaker A: Sam.