The cuts were probably made to allow theatres to show the movie more times a day
I worked in a cinema during weekends when I was a student and I know many films with a running time of, let’s say, 105 minutes were cut back to some 90 minutes. Theatres in Holland had four showings a day, two in the afternoon, 2.00 - 4.15, two at night, 7.00 - 9.15. On the program were National News, International News, publicity and trailers; this part of the program lasted for about 25 minutes, then there was a break for coffy, candy etc. and finally the film.
That’s a possibility. And prune down the violence to get maybe a FSK 16 rating.
But I still don’t know why they cut out the first scene. After the credits was a sec of it visible, before the next scene started.
[quote=“Stanton, post:42, topic:173”]That’s a possibility. And prune down the violence to get maybe a FSK 16 rating.
But I still don’t know why they cut out the first scene. After the credits was a sec of it visible, before the next scene started.[/quote]
The first scene wasn’t in the version I saw in Dutch cinemas either. I remember I was surprised to see it when I first watched the film on VHS.
GBU was shown in Dutch cinemas in a heavily cut version first (I think it ran 2 hours and 10 minutes but I’m not absolutely sure); the so-called ‘complete version’ was not shown before the late seventies (after the uncut Once Upon… had become a smash hit), but it lacked the opening scene (and probably a few other, short scenes)
“A Fist ful of Dollars”. I probably don’t need to say that I was blown away by it, do I?
GBU, I believe…staying up too late and watching a show I probably wasn’t allowed to at the time! 
my first was django and a man called sledge
hm, no wonder you became such a fun of the genre. Django is one of the best.
That’s true, it’s my favorite SW and therefore favorite Western.
I would like to wish MERRY CHRISTMAS to everyone! I am new here as I’ve registered today (was guest time to time) so I just started a topic . My 1st spaghetti was the Good the Bad & the Ugly , what I’ve seen (on old VHS tape) 2nd was Texas, Addio but I was kid still , something happened & started to collect newspaper articles , about SW films , and tried to collect everything about SW. I am just curious you ALL SW fan which was the very first spaghetti western do you remember & seen?
(my bad this topic should move to Town Hall (general talk) .
Merry Christmas also to you and welcome,
weeeell, i´ve seen my first spaghetti as a kid, and it was GBU, second Django i think, and third Great Silence
then for many years i forgot about SWs, but…one day i´ve seen Fistful of dolls on Tv and then i started digging…
[quote=“tomas, post:51, topic:173”]Merry Christmas also to you and welcome,
weeeell, i´ve seen my first spaghetti as a kid, and it was GBU, second Django i think, and third Great Silence
then for many years i forgot about SWs, but…one day i´ve seen Fistful of dolls on Tv and then i started digging…[/quote] 
yes I am almost in the same boat , except that I’ve seen the dollar trilogy ‘backwards’ GBU , for a few dollars more & fistful of dollars. The Dollar trilogy of Sergio Leone is the ONE of those I’ve never forget & can watch thousand times . I was sad when I read Clint Eastwood & Sergio had an argue because of the money, can you imagine if they continue their way & work together ?? I like Clint & very respect him, but it was a mistake to leave Sergio. (IMO). ( hehe I bought my first poncho from Mexico just because I loved to see on Clint. )
yeah, i also read about some difficulties during shooting of Fistful of Dollars in Douglas Thompson´s book on Clint´s life - Sexual Cowboy
very funny stories
Topics merged, and welcome to the forum :)!
The very first spag that i ever saw was, GUNFIGHT AT RED SANDS and still watch it from time to time.
Once upon a time in the west and a reason to live a reason to die.
Probably the second one I viewed as the first. Don’t remember. 
I saw FISTFUL OF DOLLARS on opening night at a local theater in 1966. 12 people were in the audience. I was blown away by the music, Clint’s wardrobe, the action and the sets. I was convinced it was filmed in Mexico. It was one of those films that once you saw it you had to tell all your friends they had to go see this new kind of western. When FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE came out six months later again I went to the opening night and the theater was half filled by the time THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY came about 4 months later there was a line outside the theater.
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In that case, you Americans were smarter than we Dutch and Belgians. In Holland ‘Leone’ became only a hit in the course of the seventies, when Once upon a Time in the West was re-released, this time uncut (it had been released in a chopped-up version initially). One of the problems was that the western had never been a very popular genre where I lived (on both sides of the Dutch-Belgian border). The western was popular in Germany, England and (notably) the mediterranean countries, but not in the Low Countries, while in France people looked down on the genre as such, and only cared for artistic westerns, approved by the critics, such as Johnny Guitar, High Noon or The Left-Handed Gun. Only a handful of spaghetti westerns got a regular release in Holland, among them of course the Dollar movies, but it took Ennio Morricone to make the genre popular. While the chopped-up version of Once upon a Time in the West was largely overlooked (it ran only two weeks in Eindhoven), the soundtrack became a smash hit. Finally the movie was re-released and … you had to buy tickets in advance to get in. I had a weekend job in a cinema in Eindhoven and I remember the long lines in front of the cinema on friday and saturday night. Afterwards, the Dollar movies were released too and many other spaghettis got a late night screening.
Either Guns for San Sebastian or Five Man Army.
I was born in 1966 so first chance to knowingly watch a spaghetti was in the 1970’s, so no video’s or DVD’s so limited to the TV (3 channals at the time in the UK). I can remember being too young to stay up to watch the dollars trilogy when first on TV, but the trailers were brilliant. So my first spaghetti was limited to an early viewing time and the 2 mentioned films stick in my memory…I loved them both, i still like both films and both have excellent soundtracks.
As many others, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly on tv. Then followed the rest of the dollar trilogy in reverse order (For A Few Dollars More and then Fistful), then came Django and after that Once Upon A Time In The West. All of them on tv and that stopped my Spaghetti Western watching for a while because they seemed to be the only ones they got in that channel (I also have some memories of watching bits of Diamante Lobo, Sabata and Blindman). Then once the DSX DVDs started coming out I bought some and I’m still working in getting up to date with SWs. I never liked western movies before watching Spaghettis because I found them boring but I had always been a huge fan of Western comics, either humorous euro stuff like Lucky Luke or classic American like Lone Ranger. I found the Spaghettis to be closer in style to what I liked about the comics than the american westerns.