GBU book project -updated website-

[Novecento]

If you don't have the money at the moment, steal it, borrow it, sell your mother in law....but buy it!!!

That just about covers my options right now Life's expenses right now have been squeezing me dry! I am so grateful to Peter for writing this book - I just wish people would stop creating all these new things that I can't resist buying Criterion's "McCabe..." BD will be another thing I just can't resist.

[cigar joe]

That just about covers my options right now Life's expenses right now have been squeezing me dry! I am so grateful to Peter for writing this book - I just wish people would stop creating all these new things that I can't resist buying Criterion's "McCabe..." BD will be another thing I just can't resist.

Ditto for me I have a major expense to get out of the way before I can order it.

[drinkanddestroy]

My new book came today. This one was packaged in a larger box. Still no bubble wrap, just some tissue paper in the box. But this time, the book itself was shrink-wrapped ... And it arrived in pristine condition  

[dave jenkins]

In da house!

This is the second-greatest day of my life (the greatest was when my sister-in-law told me she'd never speak to me again).

[dave jenkins]

A taster:

Back to Luciano Vincenzoni. What research did he perform?

I read a book about Sergio Leone by an English person.

Christopher Frayling?

Yes. It stated that Luciano Vincenzoni did the historical research. It wasn't true. Luciano Vincenzoni ordered most of the books from the Library of Congress, but I was the one who carefully researched the material book by book. I photographed parts of the books and distributed the photos to Simi, Santi, and the others.

p. 162

[drinkanddestroy]

A taster:p. 162

are you going to tell us who this interview was with, or are you going to keep us guessing until we read it ourselves?

[mike siegel]

Gianni - AD

[dave jenkins]

are you going to tell us who this interview was with, or are you going to keep us guessing until we read it ourselves?

I gave you the page number.

Moving right along:

Although the historical backdrop of The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly is clearly Sibley's New Mexico campaign, there are only scant references to any specific historical locations following the Betterville prison camp sequence. After being tortured, Tuco is taken to a railroad station. However, the railroad did not reach New Mexico until around eighteen years after Sibley's campaign, suggesting that the historical setting of the film shifts to the East, where the railroad was expansive. Furthermore, Gattling guns, seen in the Battle at Langstone Bridge, were almost exclusively employed by General Benjamin F. Butler, in the siege against Petersburg, Virginia, during the closing phases of the Civil War.

So far, so good. It seems he's opening the door for CJ's timeline. But then comes:

All things considered, a remarkable amount of historical research was done to ensure that "the Good," "the Bad," and "the Ugly" seek their fortunes in a plausible historical context, albeit with "Roman" embellishments.

Yikes, CJ, move your fingers before you lose them!

Just when it seems Hanley might be signaling acceptance of CJ's theory, it all gets transformed into "'Roman' embellishments." Oh well, it's a great book nonetheless.

The quotes are from p. 32.

[drinkanddestroy]

It's interesting that he mentions the Gatling guns in relation to Virginia.

On Frayling's BRD commentary - while I do not recall if he mentions in any way the connection between the Gatling guns and Virginia - at the moment that Blondie and Tuco are captired by the Union guards near Langstone Bridge, Frayling happens to discuss how someone (I think Carlo Simi?) said that parts of Spain look like Arizona and New Mexico (desert scenes) while other parts (where Langstone Bridge was filmed) look like Virginia. Again, I don't recall if he says anything about the Gatling-Virginia connection. But is that coincidental?

However, Frayling seems to believe that the Langstone Bridge battle is still supposed to be in the West -  a Leone fairy tale West. BecauseFrayling says that while there were some little battles in Texas over ownership of gold, the real pitched battles would have been in the East, so he is saying that Langstone Bridge battle being in the West is an example of Leone deviating from history.

Two points on that:
A) is it possible that, per Peter's comments on the Gatlings, the action has indeed moved to the East? Personally, I highly doubt it. If Bill Carson simply said "Sad Hill Cemetery" and did not mention that it's in the East, and if we do not see Blondie/Tuco specifically traveling east, we have to assume that they are still in the same region of Texas/New Mexico as they have been all movie long. So, even if historically inaccurate, we have to assume this movie battle is in the West.

B) But is it really true, as Frayling says, that there were no pitched battles in the West, just some small conflict over gold-mone ownership? From a brief reading of Peter's timeline - though I must admit I am no historian and could not digest all that thoroughly - it seems to me that there were indeed (a few) serious battles in the West...

(p.s. Frayljng's statement about the pitched battles historically all being in the East, and the West having only the conflict over the gold-mine ownership, seems to have come from a story Leone liked to tell about his historical research: in STDWD, Frayling cites Leone saying how  when he went to the Library of Congress to research a Civil War battle in Texas, the librarian told him there were no battles in Texas, but Leone insisted that they were, and after doing research, the librarian  admitted that Leone was correct that there was a battle over a gold mine in Texas. Leone used the story to show that he did serious research; that most other people, including librarians in the Library of Congress - don't do their own research, but he did thorough research. )

Finally, in regard to those battles over gold-mine ownership that took place in the West ... Is it also a coincidence that this movie is about a hunt for gold? Frayling citing Leone cites the battles over gold-mine ownership  simply as proof that there were indeed some battles in the West, but I just thought of this – is it a coincidence that this movie, which shows battles in the West, happens to be about a hunt for gold?

[cigar joe]

The West is anything West of the Mississippi, there were pitched battles in Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, and possibly East Texas.

[drinkanddestroy]

As long as there were even a few pitched battles in Texas or New Mexico, the Langstone Beidge battle scene would be historically ok.
To me, the bigger question is, were there such massive presence of troops all throughout the region; wherever Blondie and Tuco go, they seem to run into one army or the other.

[dave jenkins]

A) is it possible that, per Peter's comments on the Gatlings, the action has indeed moved to the East? Personally, I highly doubt it. If Bill Carson simply said "Sad Hill Cemetery" and did not mention that it's in the East, and if we do not see Blondie/Tuco specifically traveling east, we have to assume that they are still in the same region of Texas/New Mexico as they have been all movie long. So, even if historically inaccurate, we have to assume this movie battle is in the West.

Wow, have you read the thread on CJ's timeline or not? He makes an excellent case for the action moving to the East. Not only does he make the same point that Hanley does about the railroad, he states that the Union had no prisoner-of-war camps west of (IIRC)
Illinois. Further, he demonstrates that it was plausible to move along the Santa Fe Trail from New Mexico to the Midwest, even though the prisoners would have been on foot. Remember, when Al Mulloch returns at the 2-hr. mark to shoot Tuco he says something about having had to wait several months for his revenge. How to account for all this lost time? Well, if Blondie and Tuco had had to walk from New Mexico to Illinois it would have taken them months (I think CJ even calculates this). It then makes sense that, after leaving Betterville, Wallace takes Tuco to the train station. Clearly, we're in the East, or at least, the Midwest. Do the principals ever go back to New Mexico? CJ argues persuasively for Arkansas (please read his thread).

Although the battle at Langstone Bridge is heavily stylized (using weaponry that wouldn't have been available, etc.) I think the general flow of events in GBU follows plausible locations. That is, the micro-elements are fiction, the macro-elements, not so much. It is possible to look upon the second half of the film as set entirely in LeoneLand, of course, but there's no reason that the action can't occupy actual historical locations at the same time.

[dave jenkins]

The West is anything West of the Mississippi, there were pitched battles in Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, and possibly East Texas.

For our purposes it may be useful to refer to the East, the West, and the Far West when talking about Civil War locations. "The West" is a slightly anachronistic term in that it was once applied to what we now call the Midwest.

[drinkanddestroy]

I read CJ's thread a long time ago, but obviously don't remember it as much as you do 

How near is the Western town where Tuco shoots Mulloch in the bathtub, to Langstone Bridge/Sad Hill? Does not seem to me like they travel far

[Cusser]

There was a Civil War skirmish also in Arizona, near Piccachio.

Remember Tuco tells Blondie (in the restored scene) that the cemetery is far away?  And that they'd have to cross battle lines several times? That and the months it takes for GBU to play through, and the topography DO indicate that the cemetery Sad Hill was farther east.

Didn't I read somewhere that the Burgos area was specifically chosen for the bridge and cemetery scenes because it looked more like eastern US?