30 Westerns in Once

[Groggy]

Groggy must have modified his view, because later he pointed out the knocking-over-the-guy-with-crutches routine that is common to both films.

I modified my view upon watching the movie. As uncknown points out, there's a lot in Warlock, at least in the characterization of Fonda's character, that seems clearly reflected in OUATITW.

[Groggy]

Well I'm sure it's been said before, but the gun slide down the bar comes from My Darling Clementine.

Also note that Tuco's "When you have to shoot, SHOOT!" line in GBU is VERY close to Walter Brennan's advice to his sons: "When you pull a gun, KILL a man!"

[Huey]

I watched My Darling Clementine the other day and I would say this film heavily influenced Leone with some of the scenes in Flagstone resembling those in Tombstone:

• When Cathy Downs checks into the hotel in Tombstone, Fonda suggests to the hotelier that he should organise some hot water for her so she can take a bath.  In the hotel at Flagstone, Claudia is very intent on taking her bath in a tub of hot water.
• In the Flagstone hotel, Fonda looks as if he has just left the Tombstone barber shop again (and I believe a scene in a barber shop was filmed for OUTW but then deleted).
• The partly built church in MDC is the model for several incomplete buildings at Flagstone.
• The horse and buggy driven by Ward Bond into Monument Valley is reprised by Sam in OUTW.
• Both films feature a man who is terminally ill with tuberculosis: Victor Mature and Gabriele Ferzetti.
• An oblique reference but the way they laid out the McBain family's bodies on dining tables is reminiscent of Chihuahua being laid out on a saloon table for her operation, after which she died.
• Downs and Cardinale both arrive in town looking for a man they loved and have now lost.

[Groggy]

The only thing I'll take issue with is this one:

Both films feature a man who is terminally ill with tuberculosis: Victor Mature and Gabriele Ferzetti.

Morton had "tuberculosis of the bones", a euphemism for a cancer or degenerative disease. If you read, say, Henrik Ibsen's work, various veneral diseases (the Doctor with syphilis in A Doll's House) are coded in similar terms. Tuberculosis is a respiratory ailment.

Plus there are many other Westerns with crippled villains, perhaps most notably Lionel Barrymore in Duel in the Sun.

Otherwise, a fine job.

To me, the most obvious OUATITW reference in My Darling Clementine is the bar scene, where the gun is slid down the bar to Henry Fonda during his first meeting with Mature.

[dave jenkins]

To me, the most obvious OUATITW reference in My Darling Clementine is the bar scene, where the gun is slid down the bar to Henry Fonda during his first meeting with Mature.

I'm wondering if maybe that's merely a genre convention. That is, it was an old move even when they did it in MDC. I haven't seen enough of 30s B-Westerns to be sure, though, so maybe Groggy is right. If it was original with MDC, then it sure set a precedent, cause it shows up in lots of TV Westerns, even in the Western episode of The Prisoner!

The two elements that leap out at me when I rewatch MDC now are both part of the OK Corral climax: the use of dusters, and the non-use of music. Ford wanted the film virtually scoreless, but Zanuck wouldn't stand for it. In the end, though, he didn't mess with the OK Corral scene. In some ways, that scene provides a template for Cattle Corner at the beginning of West.

[Huey]

The sliding gun is a good one.  I can't recall it being done in any films earlier than MDC but, as you say, it became something of a genre convention.  A variation on it was the underhand throw of the pistol to a friend, as in Jubal from Charles Bronson to Glenn Ford.

[Groggy]

Before enumerating them, I should point out some general effects that Leone used not only in OUATITW but throughout his career. One is a particular shot of horses from the pov of a driver on a buckboard or coach; we see this used in GBU between the time Tuco and Blondie leave the mission and before they are captured by the blue bellies. We see  a very similar shot in OUATITW on the drive from Flagstone to the trading post. The antecedent for these is a shot in 3:10 near the very beginning of the film when a stagecoach is held up by Glenn Ford and his gang.

A more likely origin of this is Stagecoach, which features several almost-identical shots.

[cigar joe]

I think I found another visual reference, was watching "Stagecoach" last night and noticed that there is a shot/sequence of  Louise Platt  as Lucy Mallory where she is walking to or from the stagecoach and wearing a very similar traveling outfit, hat, shawl,  etc., as Jill's in OUTITW.

[dave jenkins]

Interesting. Maybe marmota can comment.

[SeanSeanSean]

OUATITW is still so watchable after more than 40 years and i lost count on the number of viewings.
Had a chance this week to see it again (as it should be) on the big sceen, in the repetory house here in the city.

To my amazement, I was riveted to the screen for the 3 hours +.
A real testamonial to the greatness of Leone.

It was also good to hear audience reaction to some scenes as I remembered them way back when, like the chuckles to the 2 too many horses line, Cheyenne cutting himself shaving, etc... There always seems to be someone in the theatre who is watching for the first time. (Leone virgins  )

[SeanSeanSean]

I noticed something for the 1rst time in this last complete viewing, the locomotive of the train at Cattle corner with Harmonica on board is the same that brings Jill to Flagstone.
Number 71.
BTW, Moton's locomotive is different.

Harmonica's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW-jSa9_k3M

Jill's:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRs6CNV4T34

[Cusser]

I noticed something for the 1rst time in this last complete viewing, the locomotive of the train at Cattle corner with Harmonica on board is the same that brings Jill to Flagstone.
Number 71.

Yep.  Frank set up the meeting with Harmonica to be at Cattle Corner, didn't want to have his dirty work done close to himself if he could avoid it.  So I believe that's why that set up meeting wasn't in Flagstone.

[SeanSeanSean]

Yep.  Frank set up the meeting with Harmonica to be at Cattle Corner, didn't want to have his dirty work done close to himself if he could avoid it.  So I believe that's why that set up meeting wasn't in Flagstone.

That isn't my point.
Frank wasn't at Cattle Corner because he was at the McBain's as Harmonica says to Woobles. And Jill's train arrives at Flagstone when the massacre occurs.
So all these scenes supposedly occur at the same time.
I notice 2 different trains with the same locomotive.
Check out the number on the locomotive at Cattle Corner when Leone's credit falls in front of it. NUMBER 71. Just as Timmy is shot, the train bringing Jill is also NUMBER 71.

In fact, it's unfortunate because the narrative could have been that the same train brings Harmonica to Cattle corner and continues on to Flagstone with Jill on board. Now that would mean that both were on the same train.
But alas, when you look closely at the 2 trains, you notice that they are different. What I noticed is a flat bed before the passenger cars at CC which isn't there at Flagstone.

[drinkanddestroy]

Hey y'all, I just read through this thread for the first time, some really awesome stuff here. Great job!  

a) Just wanted to add a few things on Rio Bravo. None of these are certain, just some possibilities:

-- opening scene. a lot happens with no dialogue. (Though this concept reached it's peak in the opening scene of OUATITW, this sorta thing was prevalent throughout Leone's films).

--  RE: Fonda's walk through Tombstone in OUATITW: there is (at least one, possibly more) scenes where Wayne and Martin patrol the town (at night), it's all done in a way to invoke fear, as they know the bad guys could be lurking anywhere. Some of y'all mentioned 3:10 to Yuma as the reference for that scene; who knows which one Leone was thinking about; maybe a combination of 'em. Besides, I'd guess that sorta thing is probably a "convention of the genre" so maybe it can't be attributed to any one movie

-- there is scene in Wayne's hotel room where Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez (the hotel owner) is showing John Wayne the red underwear Gonzalez Gonzalez (I love that last name!) bought for his wife, and Angie Dickinson walks in on them, and then there is a running gag where she makes fun of Wayne, as if those were his. Well, reminds me of another scene in a hotel involving someone making fun  of another re: their underwear-- in FAFDM -- "Senor Martinez: I don't wear 'em!"  (btw, can the historians here answer this question: Were those women's knee-level shorts their underwear, or did they wear anything under that?)

b) It was mentioned in this thread that Harmonica's harmonica could be  a reference to Johnny Guitar's guitar. You may not have to go that far; in Vera Cruz, the Charles Bronson character plays a harmonica. On the other hand, maybe it is indeed a reference to Johnny Guitar, considering that both characters are named after their instruments. (dj and some others previously mentioned in another thread that there is a movie where Bronson played a mute Indian boy who communicated by playing harmonica, but I have not seen that movie).

btw, in The Hoods, (the book that OUATIA was based on) Cockeye plays a harmonica; but in the movie, he plays the pan flute. Maybe Leone changed it cuz he was afraid that if he used a harmonica in the movie, people would think he was referencing his own earlier film?

[stanton]

(dj and some others previously mentioned in another thread that there is a movie where Bronson played a mute Indian boy who communicated by playing harmonica, but I have not seen that movie).

That's probably from Run of the Arrow, but Bronson isn't the harmonica boy and not mute. He's the leader of the Indians.