"OUATITW: Shot by Shot" by Frayling?

[dave jenkins]

Chatting with Drink last night, he suggested something that hadn't occurred to me. I assumed the title referred to the fact that Frayling is going through the film, in sequence, analyzing each separate camera set-up as he comes to it. That may in fact be what the book does, but Drink's idea is that there is a play on words going on. Given the fact that Angeli Novi's on-set photographs are being featured, each of the "shots" referred to could be those. And of course, being a film with a lot of gun-play, the title could even be referencing the discharge of firearms. It will be interesting to see what it is that finally gets published.

[drinkanddestroy]

Chatting with Drink last night, he suggested something that hadn't occurred to me. I assumed the title referred to the fact that Frayling is going through the film, in sequence, analyzing each separate camera set-up as he comes to it. That may in fact be what the book does, but Drink's idea is that there is a play on words going on. Given the fact that Angeli Novi's on-set photographs are being featured, each of the "shots" referred to could be those. And of course, being a film with a lot of gun-play, the title could even be referencing the discharge of firearms. It will be interesting to see what it is that finally gets published.

I actually thought that's what YOU were saying, when you mentioned "shots" and Angelo Novi, I thought you were saying that "shot" refers to "photos."  

anyway, what the hell, could be many double entendres. Triple entendres?  

[drinkanddestroy]

CJ, can you move this thread to the OUATITW board? i think that's where it belongs

[Herry Grail]

CJ, can you move this thread to the OUATITW board? i think that's where it belongs

I agree. Again, sorry...I'm doing penance through my new signature line.

[Novecento]

I assumed the title referred to the fact that Frayling is going through the film, in sequence, analyzing each separate camera set-up as he comes to it. That may in fact be what the book does, but Drink's idea is that there is a play on words going on. Given the fact that Angeli Novi's on-set photographs are being featured, each of the "shots" referred to could be those.

Probably a combination of both.

And of course, being a film with a lot of gun-play, the title could even be referencing the discharge of firearms. It will be interesting to see what it is that finally gets published.

Clever title.

[Herry Grail]

I watched OUATITW again last night...there are so few films I can watch multiple times over just a few weeks. I realize "shot by shot" is a pun, but I do hope Frayling gets into the profoundly complex character motivations and actions, which a scene-by-scene analysis could really explore:

1. Why does Harmonica make an appointment with Frank rather than just seek him out?

2. What is Jill really doing when she ransacks the bedroom? Is she that craven to just be looking for money? She settles down when she finds the mementos from her wedding, but surely she wasn't that frantic just to find her dress and bouquet?

3. Why does Cheyenne question Jill about Harmonica as though they had not seen him together at the posado?

4. Why does Jill tell Cheyenne he can keep any money he finds, and then act like she's giving it all up to go "back to civilization," when just the day before she seemed so dedicated to building a life out of her new circumstances?

5. Is Harmonica's quoting of Cheyenne to Jill ("one more killing") supposed to suggest that Harmonica is slightly supernatural? Of all his actions, that's the only one (eavesdropping on that one line) that seems completely unrealistic. If not, doesn't it make him seem kind of creepy? What is the actual point of his lurking around the night before?

6. Does Harmonica rip the frills off Jill's dress to reduce her to her true nature as he knows it, so that she can be "real"? (He's been researching things, even if only an afternoon has passed, and Frank knows her history.) Or is he trying to make her look sexy to attract the bad guys outside? Or does he know she will become the water-bearing Queen Bee of a new city, and he's just getting her dressed for it?

7. Does he send her out for water to bait Frank's men, or to get her used to fetching water because he knows the purpose for Sweetwater?

8. Why does Cheyenne (who's shown holding his rifle as if prepared to use it) let Frank's men get so close to Jill rather than doing away with them before they pose such an imminent threat?

9. Does Jill approach Wobbles because she's angry and means what she says, or is she getting him to lead Harmonica to Frank? (The latter option is what I assumed upon first viewing, especially because of their conspiratorial acknowledgement of each other afterward, but only if Jill truly expects to deal with Frank herself does later plot development make sense, as discussed below.)

10. Why does Cheyenne, who has a gang, sneak onto Frank's train by himself, like Harmonica does? Why not just attack it, as they do later?

11. This is the big one for me: what does Harmonica mean when he says "there's another bastard and he's getting further away"? Presumably he wants to go save Jill, yet we find later that he and Harmonica are happy to let her "deal with" Frank without interfering, only lamenting that she'll come back "if she comes back." As Dave suggested in another thread I started, is it because the two heroes are "postmodern" in their motivations rather than traditional, and therefore content to "let Jill be Jill" because she's self-sufficient and independent, almost a peer of theirs (or a mother in Cheyenne's case)? If that's the case, was Harmonica just wanting to get back to Frank to react to the resolution rather than influence it?

12. Why is there an old railroad track buried at Sweetwater (as discovered by Cheyenne)?

13. Does Jill's affectionate behavior toward Frank simply show that she's trying to make him feel confident he has dominated her, or is there more? I'm reminded of the complexity of Capucine's motivations in "Walk on the Wild Side," which can be inferred to suggest that she's a nymphomaniac rather than a traditional 60's-movie unwilling victim of prostitution.

14. Does Harmonica turn in Cheyenne because they have a conspiracy to help Jill? I would say yes, of course, yet the later deleted sequence where Harmonica turns his gun to face Cheyenne at the Sweetwater gate could be interpreted as indicating he feared Cheyenne would be holding a grudge. Normally I wouldn't bring up this point, because their plot seems so obvious, but the gun sequence also makes me wonder why the Judas dialogue seems so unironic.

15. Why does Harmonica call her "a remarkable woman"? Because she just coordinated a "solution" with Frank, including a rape he didn't try to intervene to stop? Do Cheyenne and Harmonica see an earthiness, a "manliness" in her that they admire? Do they not care about her honor because they don't view women and sexuality like traditional Western heroes? (And why does he seem so initially perplexed when she congratulates him? He just won her property in an auction!)

16. Do Cheyenne and his gang confront and kill Morton and his henchmen (newly "acquired" from Frank) to finally avenge Frank's framing of them for the McBain massacre, or to resolutely save Jill from their threat (while Harmonica took care of Frank himself), or both? (I've read that this confrontation was a result of Cheyenne's escape, but surely this was a different train altogether from the one taking Cheyenne to Yuma.)

17. Does the eye contact that Harmonica's brother makes with each one of the members of Frank's gang imply that he was one of them? If so, it suggests a more complicated nature to Harmonica's grudge, that his quoting of names to Frank throughout the film implies that he views Frank as a betrayer of men as well as a killer of them. (Also, how do I get a piece of that arch, LOL.)

18. Actually, this last one is a movie-making question, not a character-motivation one: Does the camera linger on Harmonica at the end (and the music switch to Cheyenne's playful theme) to make us wonder if Harmonica is going to turn around? There is a moment when their path veers to the left...is that a tease, or are they just avoiding something in their way?

I'm putting all this here because they are some of my own "shot by shot" questions and thoughts. They're not criticisms...quite the opposite; they're discussion points, and proof to me that this is a brilliantly complex movie about not only the Old West but about that Ancient Race itself.

[drinkanddestroy]

RE: #2, she is looking for money. she doesn't find it and decides to leave. she is about to leave when Cheyenne stops her

[stanton]

18. Actually, this last one is a movie-making question, not a character-motivation one: Does the camera linger on Harmonica at the end (and the music switch to Cheyenne's playful theme) to make us wonder if Harmonica is going to turn around? There is a moment when their path veers to the left...is that a tease, or are they just avoiding something in their way?

He he, that's easy. It is simply the wrong score. Originally the America theme plays on, or better the piece which is a variation of this, and which is called Finale. Paramount made a stupid mistake there and never bothered to change it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y4Ml1qRGHk

The Cheyenne theme comes only later as exit music over the closing credits or over a black image.

[drinkanddestroy]

@Herry Grail: regarding the end music, which stanton mentioned, see the article here
http://www.fistful-of-leone.com/forums/index.php?topic=10564.0

[dave jenkins]

amazon.co.uk is showing a release date now of 26 Sept. 2017.

[mike siegel]

It's gonna be great. I have about 100 behind the scenes NOVI stills from WEST and they are just great...

[drinkanddestroy]

I watched OUATITW again last night...there are so few films I can watch multiple times over just a few weeks. I realize "shot by shot" is a pun, but I do hope Frayling gets into the profoundly complex character motivations and actions, which a scene-by-scene analysis could really explore:

1. Why does Harmonica make an appointment with Frank rather than just seek him out?

2. What is Jill really doing when she ransacks the bedroom? Is she that craven to just be looking for money? She settles down when she finds the mementos from her wedding, but surely she wasn't that frantic just to find her dress and bouquet?

3. Why does Cheyenne question Jill about Harmonica as though they had not seen him together at the posado?

4. Why does Jill tell Cheyenne he can keep any money he finds, and then act like she's giving it all up to go "back to civilization," when just the day before she seemed so dedicated to building a life out of her new circumstances?

5. Is Harmonica's quoting of Cheyenne to Jill ("one more killing") supposed to suggest that Harmonica is slightly supernatural? Of all his actions, that's the only one (eavesdropping on that one line) that seems completely unrealistic. If not, doesn't it make him seem kind of creepy? What is the actual point of his lurking around the night before?

I'll try to answer some of your questions

IMO:

RE: #1: This is just movie stuff; no need to think too deeply into it. The movie works better, having the men waiting at the station, waiting endlessly ... because an appointment was made. Works better than Harmonica walking up to Frank and pulling a gun on him. Don't worry too much about it from a plot perspective.


RE: #2 and #4: My assumption always was that, after the funeral, when Sam advised her to leave Sweetwater and she insisted on staying, it's because she thought there was gold. She stays, and then I believe you immediately see her looking for the gold. The next morning, she realizes there is no gold there, and decides to leave. (Whether or not she would have left anyway even if she had found the gold, we can only guess.) But IMO, she stayed to look for the gold, and finding no gold, decided to leave. And that's why she told Cheyenne, if you find it it's yours, meaning, there's nothing there to find.

RE: # 3: The exact opposite is true. He is not questioning her as if he didn't meet Harmonica; He questions her because he has seen Harmonica! He sees this strange guy who is playing a Harmonica, quick on the draw, claims to have killed three men who wear Cheyenne's dusters ... he wants to know who this guy is. In a Western, anytime a strange man with a gun comes to town, all the gunslingers get suspicious. It's like in FAFDM – as in numerous other Westerns –  when The Man With No Name arrives in El Paso, he tells the little kid Ferndando: I want you to tell me if any new people come into town.

RE: #5: Harmonica's character is indeed supposed to be sort of supernatural-like. "Something to do with death." This is discussed extensively here http://www.fistful-of-leone.com/forums/index.php?topic=5032.0

[drinkanddestroy]

6. Does Harmonica rip the frills off Jill's dress to reduce her to her true nature as he knows it, so that she can be "real"? (He's been researching things, even if only an afternoon has passed, and Frank knows her history.) Or is he trying to make her look sexy to attract the bad guys outside? Or does he know she will become the water-bearing Queen Bee of a new city, and he's just getting her dressed for it?

7. Does he send her out for water to bait Frank's men, or to get her used to fetching water because he knows the purpose for Sweetwater?

8. Why does Cheyenne (who's shown holding his rifle as if prepared to use it) let Frank's men get so close to Jill rather than doing away with them before they pose such an imminent threat?

9. Does Jill approach Wobbles because she's angry and means what she says, or is she getting him to lead Harmonica to Frank? (The latter option is what I assumed upon first viewing, especially because of their conspiratorial acknowledgement of each other afterward, but only if Jill truly expects to deal with Frank herself does later plot development make sense, as discussed below.)

10. Why does Cheyenne, who has a gang, sneak onto Frank's train by himself, like Harmonica does? Why not just attack it, as they do later?

#6 - On the DVD commentary, Frayling says that tearing the white frills off the dress is both to make her less visible to the men lurking outside and it is more practical for work out on the West; the frills are to look pretty, for a woman wearing a dress in the city. Harmonica is preparing Jill for her job as earth mother to the railroad workers.

#7 – (As with many other issues,) I don't know if there is one answer to that. It can be whatever you want it to be. I certainly think it was to bait Frank's men, but consistent with the answer to #6, you can definitely say that he is also preparing her for her new role. So it definitely makes sense to say there was a dual purpose.

#8 - Again, that's a cinematic thing; don't expect people in movies to always act as they would in real life. It's more dramatic to have Harmonica kill Frank's men at the last second ... and then we find out Cheyenne has been lurking there, too, right?
For that matter, you can also ask what Cheyenne was doing there in the first place. Has he already fallen for Jill and want to stand guard to protect her from Frank's men, whom he knows will be back to get her? Or has Cheyenne simply decided to watch for Frank's men because he wants to take revenge on Frank for setting up the evidence to implicate Cheyenne? Or is it because he thinks Harmonica may be there and he wants to find out who the hell this Harmonica guy is? Or all three? 

#9 - Jill and Harmonica are definitely conspiring to get Frank. You see Harmonica following Wobbles after Jill speaks with him. It's possible that Jill also would indeed like to talk to Frank directly, but at least the main purpose of Jill's conversation with Wobbles is that she knows Wobbles will thne go speak to Frank, and Harmonica can follow him.

#10 - Perhaps at this point, Cheyenne is just trying to eavesdrop, to find out what is going on, why Frank set him up, etc. He's not necessarily interested in a major shootout of his gang vs. Frank's. And again, the movie works better this way, of Cheyenne alone here, saving the shootout for later in the movie 

[Cusser]

12. Why is there an old railroad track buried at Sweetwater (as discovered by Cheyenne)?

I think he finds a marking stake, put down by McBain.

[cigar joe]

12. Why is there an old railroad track buried at Sweetwater (as discovered by Cheyenne)?

McBain was a railroad man, (that's how he knew the trains would need water and why he picked Sweetwater for his "ranch") the route was laid out way in advance of actual construction why not get a wagon and haul a few rails and ties out and lay them in place so the station can be built around the tracks, remember he already ordered the wood, sign, etc, etc for the station, when the construction arrives they just have to connect it to what he's got laid out.