A Fistful of Dollars (1964)

Director: Sergio Leone

Stars: Clint Eastwood, Gian Maria Volontè, Marianne Koch
Runtime: 99 minutes

Synopsis: A wandering gunfighter plays two rival families against each other in a town torn apart by greed, pride, and revenge.

Performances: 7/10
Screenplay: 5/10
Editing: 6/10
Cinematography: 7/10
Score/Soundtrack: 10/10
Entertainment Factor: 5/10

Verdict: Sergio Leone's biggest contribution to Cinema is the Spaghetti Western subgenre. Birthed in the mid-1960s at a time when Western fatigue was starting to be observed amongst moviegoers, he managed to resuscitate it with his signature genre, mostly associated nowadays with the famous Dollar unofficial trilogy.

"A Fistful of Dollars" came out in 1964 and, for the first time, gave us Clint Eastwood's man with no name, a charming gunfighter, and the main antihero of that trilogy. With his blond hair, iconic squint, and laid off attitude, he definitely looks the part assigned to him. His cool factor is beyond the roof, but that's pretty much his entire personality in a film which, come to think of it, suffers from the same issue. Other than apparently being a rip-off of Akira Kurosawa's "Yojimbo" (which I haven't seen yet), it takes a very simple premise but never expands on it. Despite Ennio Morricone's perfect score, it felt an hour longer than it actually was due to the overabundance of filler scenes and clichés that, to be fair, may not have been considered clichés at the time. I simply lost interest in the narrative on multiple occasions as things were happening at an incredibly slow pace without true development to the central characters.

I don't have much to say about "A Fistful of Dollars", which best highlights my issue with it. It's a fine movie enhanced by a killer score by Morricone, but I won't be rushing to revisit it any time soon.

FINAL GRADE: 5/10