For a Few Dollars More (1965)

Clint Eastwood is Monco and Lee Van Cleef is Col. Douglas Mortimer. Bounty hunters supreme, they wind up in El Paso, which has the most foolproof bank around. Both figure that reputation and the riches it holds will make it a tempting target for the bandit El Indio (Gian Maria Volonte).

They form an uneasy alliance, deciding that if they bring down the gang Monco will claim the bounty on Indio and Mortimer will take the bounty for the other members of his gang.

But serving justice to the half-mad but very sly Indio won’t be easy. They decide one of them needs to join his gang; Monco winds up with that job. They hatch a plan that calls for him to earn an introduction with Indio by breaking one of his allies, Pedro Sanchez, out of jail.

The ploy works. But it turns out that Indio knows secrets about the El Paso bank that his hunters are unaware of. And he’s not a very trusting bandit, especially once he’s got a vault filled with bank notes in his possession.

The question is: Can Mortimer and Monco trust one another? They might have to because otherwise, they’re outnumbered 15 to 1. And will have one another to contend with.

Review:

Sergio Leone gave us the most stylish Spaghetti Western to date when he directed “A Fistful of Dollars” a year earlier, starring Clint Eastwood and featuring a great Ennio Morricone score.

Turns out, he was just getting started. Eastwood and Morricone are back for this film, and Leone adds touches that would become hallmarks of Spaghetti Westerns.

Mortimer has an assortment of special weapons at his disposal. He also has a mysterious motive for wanting to kill Indio. Leone uses flashbacks scenes to hint at that motive, and there’s a prized pocketwatch Mortimer carries to let us know revenge against Indio is never far from his mind.

There are other devices used in this movie that Leone would reuse for his two classic Westerns to follow. The lead characters are introduced to us one by one, then slowly brought together. Then there’s the elaborately staged final gunfight.

Volonte returned for this film as well, and it’s his obsessed, crazed bandit that helps make the film such a success. His gang includes Klaus Kinski, who was appearing in his first, but far from his last, Italian Western.

And, of course, the film made a star of Lee Van Cleef, who had toiled in Hollywood for more than a decade playing small roles – often villains in Westerns. Reportedly, Leone wanted Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson or Lee Marvin for the role of Mortimer before settling on Van Cleef. But our introduction to Van Cleef is classic. He’s riding a train, reading the Holy Bible. He slower lowers it. And there is that face.

Directed by:
Sergio Leone

Cast:
Clint Eastwood … Monco
Lee Van Cleef … Col. Douglas Mortimer
Gian Maria Volonte … El Indio
Mario Brega … Nino
Luigi Pistilli … Groggy
Aldo Sambrell … Cuchillio
Klaus Kinski … Juan Wild
Benito Stefanelli … Luke “Hughie”
Lusi Rodriguez … Manuel
Panos Papadopulos … Sancho Perez
Mara Krupp … Hotel Manager’s wife
Joseph Egger … Old Prophet
Lorezno Robledo … Tomaso, Indio’s traitor

Runtime: 132 min.

Music: Ennio Morricone

Memorable lines:

El Paso bank manager: “To rob us would be so futile that only a complete fool would attempt it.”
Mortimer: “Yeah. Or a complete madman.”

Monco: “Tell me, colonel, were you ever young?”
Mortimer: “Yep, and just as reckless as you. Then one day something happened. Made life very precious to me.”
Monco: “What’s that? Or is the question indiscreet?”
Mortimer: “No, the question isn’t indiscreet. But the answer could be.”

El Indio: “Where are you going?”
Monco: “Well, if there’s going to be any shooting, I’d better get some rest.”

Mortimer, after shooting Monco in the neck: “That’s not bad. Indio sent four men to Santa Cruz and one man returns — a new man without a scratch. No. Indio’s no idiot. You ride up to him again and show him that little nick you got, he might believe you.”

Wild, referencing an earlier run-in with Mortimer in which a match played a key role: “You light another match.”
Moritmer: “I generally smoke after I eat. Why don’t you come back in 10 minutes?”
Wild: “In 10 minutes, you’ll be smoking in hell.”

Trivia:

Sergio Leone supposedly wasn’t interested in makng a followup to “Fistful of Dollars,” but the production company reportedly refused to pay him for the first film unless he did.

“For a Few Dollars More” film turned out to be even more of a commercial success than “Fistful of Dollars.” It became the highest grossing film ever in Italy and was hugely popular in France as well.

Clint Eastwood was reluctant to sign on for a second Sergio Leone film since he hadn’t seen “Fistful of Dollars” yet. He was sent an Italian-language version of the prior film, screened it at the CBS Production Center with friends and quickly agreed to do a second “Dollars” film.

Reportedly, Eastwood was paid $15,000 for “Fistful of Dollars,” $50,000 for “For a Few Dollars More” and $250,000 plus 10 percent of the gross for “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

Though he’d kept busy with TV work, Lee Van Cleef hadn’t appeared in a feature film since 1962’s “How the West Was Won.” He wound up making 17 more Westerns by 1977, always in a starring or co-starring role.

Carlo Simi, who has a cameo as the El Paso bank manager, designed the set for the town of El Paso. The town was also used for some scenes in “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”

After that film was completed, extras bought the town set and ran it as a tourist attraction. A hotel group eventually took over and it became a Spaghetti Western-styled theme park know as Oasys (Mini Hollywood).

Rosemary Dexter as Mortimer’s sister in For a Few Dollars More (1965)

Lee Van Cleef as Mortimer in For a Few Dollars More (1965)