30 Westerns in Once

[cigar joe]

No I meant where are you purchasing "Jubal" from 

[dave jenkins]

No I meant where are you purchasing "Jubal" from 

Hadn't really thought about it. Amazon has it for a little over 11 bucks...........

[Groggy]

In re "Warlock", I happened to catch the last hour of it on AMC today, and there were two things which might have been used in OUATITW:

1) There's a scene where Henry Fonda's character kicks out a cripple's crutches from under him.  Done in a very different context, to be sure, but since he did the exact same thing to Mr. Morton, maybe Leone was thinking of that scene?

2) Also, during the "showdown" between Fonda and Richard Widmark, Fonda wears virtually the same outfit - dark blue jacket with a black shirt and black hat - as he does in OUATITW.  The only major difference is a gold watch chain hanging from his breast pocket.

Just a few minor observations.

[dave jenkins]

Groggy, good work. I guess we should keep Warlock on the list..........

[cigar joe]

Ok Caught "The Paleface" yesterday on TCM (they were doing a salute to Buster Keaton), and saw the "reference" to the fly sequence in OUATITW.

Its right at the beginning.

The Set up: An oil company swindels a tribe out of their land, the chief finds out and orders his warriors to kill the first white man that comes in that gate (what a gate  and fence is doing in an indian village is irrelavent, lol). Of course who comes through the gate but Buster Keaton with a butterfly net collecting specimens, lol. So he is annoyed by a butterfly that is obviously tied on a string that bounces up and down he finnally swings at it with his fist. Then he goes right into the village and captures a fly in his net. Not not of a reference, but ypou can see howe much Leone got out of it.

One thing to note that I discovered by watching the documentary on Keaton was that he really filled is period pieces with a lot of historical details some articles were so authentic recreations that they were donated to the Smithsonian Museum.

[dave jenkins]

I watched the new DVD of Jubal (the transfer is okay, nothing exceptional). I didn't see much that put me in mind of OUATITW, except for the fact that Bronson shows up as a mysterious stranger who helps Glenn Ford out. But because Ford is the hero, Bronson is nothing more than a sidekick and doesn't get all that much screen time. Still, a shrewd director watching the film might have gotten the idea of giving Bronson a starring role in a Western.........

[Groggy]

Also, Woody Strode's rifle at the beginning (and I know this has been commented on before) is identical to John Wayne's in "Rio Bravo".

[Groggy]

Okay, did some more digging, and here's the "Ace In The Hole" reference (the belt and suspenders line), spoken by Kirk Douglas's character:

I've done a lot of lying in my time. I've lied to men who wear belts. I've lied to men who wear suspenders. But I'd never be so stupid as to lie to a man who wears both belt and suspenders.

This is pretty close to Frank's line, but I agree with Frayling that it's more likely that it was a self-effacing dig by Leone (or Donati) on his own dress habits.

[dave jenkins]

But it could be BOTH a movie reference and a personal reference. Like the opening of DYS, where Juan pisses on the ants: the image may refer to a practice in Leone's childhood (as Frayling contends) but it also HAS TO allude to the opening of The Wild Bunch as well (don't tell me Leone didn't see TWB). A single element in a creative work can carry multiple associations, and there is no reason to fix on one to the exclusion of others.

Good work, Groggy. I've never seen AITH and I had a good laugh when I read that line.

[grandpa_chum]

you know i never thought of the ant pissing scene in regards to the wild bunch... i know it was a analogy for the revolution... but the ants took out the scorpion, now the revolution is taking care of the ants.

[dave jenkins]

So I'm over at dvdbeaver, checking out screen captures of the new Fox Westerns DVDs, all films I've never seen before, and.........on Samuel Fuller's _40 Guns_, is that a tight close-up of a pair of eyes in a Cinemascope aspect ratio that I see?

[dave jenkins]

Yup, I took a look at Forty Guns this weekend and it certainly has a couple of Two Beeg Green Eyes shots (although it's in black and white, so we can't really tell what color Barry Sullivan's eyes are). Sergio used his ultra close close-ups in Cinemascope better, but he must have been inspired to use them in the first place by Fuller's film.

Also, I notice that the title appears over the last shot at the end of Forty Guns; this was probably not the first film ever to do that, but this may have given Leone the idea for putting up "OUATITW" at the end.

[Groggy]

I doubt it's a reference, but . . . in "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance", in the scene where Valance and Co. beat up Edmond O'Brien in his newspaper office, notice how Valance and his thugs appear after O'Brien turns up the gas lantern.  Again, I doubt it's a direct reference, but it put me in mind of the swinging lantern in the saloon scene.

I think the concrete reference to "Liberty Valance" in OUATITW is that Valance and his gang are wearing duster coats during their robbery of the stagecoach with Jimmy Stewart.

[dave jenkins]

Groggy, Cigar Joe posted earlier about the swinging lantern originating in Red River, and that does seem the likelier candidate. Good call, though,  on the dusters in TMWSLV.

[Huey]

I once read that the scene where Frank is left sitting alone in the saloon before getting up to go outside, with a gunfight inevitable, is a take on the finale to The Gunfighter, an excellent but perhaps under-rated film starring Gregory Peck.