“Where life had no value, death, sometimes, had its
price. That is why the bounty killers appeared.”
In the Wild West, a murderous outlaw known as El Indio
(Gian Maria Volonte) and his gang are terrorizing and robbing the citizens of
the region. With a bounty on El Indio's head, two bounty hunters, Monco (Clint
Eastwood) and Col. Douglas Mortimer (Lee Van Cleef), come to collect the prize.
Upon their first meeting, the two men view each other as rivals, but they
eventually agree to become partners in their mutual pursuit of the vicious
criminal one for the reward the other for revenge.
Many would agree most sequels to a successful film never
quite equals the original but for Sergio Leone each film in the dollar trilogy
eclipses the previous film. Many of us prefer For a Few Dollars More to the
other two. This second film in the trilogy Leone had a bigger budget to work
with so he was able to increase the production values, higher a second actor
(Lee Van Cleef) and retain both Clint Eastwood and Gian Maria Volonte from
Fistful of Dollars. The story was not borrowed or reworked from another film
like Fistful was but a fresh look at the West. Ennio Morricone outdid his
original dollars score and added another feathered cap of film scores.
Allessandro Alessandroni also was retained for his guitar and whistling. We saw
several supporting actors from Fistful also show up in this second film. From
Aldo Sambrell, Benito Stefanelli, Frank Brana, José Canalejas, Lorenzo Robledo,
Antonio Molino Rojo, Mario Brega and Josef Egger. These actors would become
regulars in the genre over the next decade.
The addition of Lee Van Cleef was pure genius as the U.S.
advertising campaign mad you think he was the villain. “The Man with No Name is
back. The Man is Black is waiting. How delighted we were to see Lee end up
another anti-hero teaming up with Eastwood to pursue Indio played to the hilt
by Gian Maria Volonte. When Clint returned to the states and left the Spaghetti
westerns behind it was Van Cleef who carried the torch as the leading American
actor in the genre. He no longer would Lee be stuck in secondary roles but
would rise to a star and become a cult classic.
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