The Good, the Bad and the Ugly / Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo (Sergio Leone, 1966)

The extended cut of the film is just not for me, although the photography is beautiful as always.

I think Iā€™ll never stop loving this film. Itā€™s been a constant source of inspiration to me.

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On the other hand, the shortened cut of the film is not for me. :wink:

I understand restoring scenes which were cut against Leoneā€™s will. But since the grotto scene was cut by Leone himself, why the hell did they put it back in? Does anyone know? Who was calling the shots over at MGM?

Stanton was, he loves the grotto scene but he just doesnā€™t want to admit it.

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Sorry. I didnā€™t intend to say that you did. I intended to agree with what I quoted, and you did say that!

The last time I watched it (I canā€™t remember if it was more than five years ago, or even more than ten years ago) it run for 170 min or something like that. Now I have watched the so called extended version. I spotted four scenes that I canā€™t remember to have seen before. They are the scene with the wounded soldiers mentioned above, a scene where Tuco searches out some old compadres, a scene where Angel Eye and Blondie makes camp, and Angel Eyes henchmen arrives, and a scene where Tuco is told the direction to his brothers cloister by a Northern officer. The first I think is good for the film, the three others not so good. Was there also scene from the crossing of the desert added? Did I miss something else?

[quote=ā€œLone_Gringo, post:517, topic:307ā€]
Stanton was, he loves the grotto scene but he just doesnā€™t want to admit it.[/quote]

I also heard heā€™s head over heels for the Django theme song.

True, but this is not the point here. Blondie enters the film in an entirely different outfit than in the two previous films. Then he is transformed throughout the film. His frock coat and his straw hat are left behind in the desert. Then in the prison camp Angel Eye throws him a bundle of cloths, with the sheep skin waist coat and the hat. Then in the scene with the dying solider, he covers the solider with his skin coat. Instead of retrieving it, he picks up a poncho. Only when he arrives at the grave of Stanton, he is fully transformed to the character we know from the two previous films. I think this is a pretty clear that Blondie the bounty hunter is in fact Manco the bounty hunter.

But he did, at least in GBU. Throughout the script he is consistently called Joe

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Another problem with the grotto scene is the slapdash way the script has been translated. Throughout the film, Tucoā€™s catchphrase is ā€œThere are two kinds of people in the worldā€¦ā€ - except here, where it suddenly becomes ā€œThe world is divided into two partsā€¦ā€ NO!

Thatā€™s what I find really weird too. If they wanted to do the whole ā€œlongest versionā€ thing, then they could at least have used seamless branching.

Similarly, itā€™s a shame the blu-ray of OUATITW didnā€™t allow seamless branching for Harmonicaā€™s ā€œrising sceneā€ between the train station intro and the McBain scene since that should not be in there either.

Ha ha - good point. I wonder how it works in the Italian?

[quote=ā€œDean, post:519, topic:307, full:trueā€]

Shit, you got me ā€¦

Iā€™m thinking about staring an online petition to ask MGM to release the grotto scene further on with the Django song, maybe they even can digitally insert Django and his coffin in the background, only small of course, so that films historians might notice it when they examine every frame of the film.
Than it is perfect, and brings new meaning to the filmā€™s civil war motives. Jesus, what a wonderful idea ā€¦

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According to Frayling, the shooting script, when this phrase came up the first time, translated Ā«the world is divided into two categories, JoeĀ». It was Mickey Knox, preparing the American version who came up with the phrase ā€œthere are two kinds of people in this worldā€, which was eventually used throughout the rest of the film.

It had been 11 years since I watched the theatrical cut, so I decided to watch it today. The only scene I missed was Lee Van Cleef with the wounded confederates. Other than that, I definitely prefer the theatrical version. Canā€™t wait for the Kino Blu-ray now. :slight_smile:

I love both but neither are perfect for me, only Leoneā€™s cut is. The shorter version feels a bit too rushed and lacks Angel Eyes, and the extended version has the Grotto scene. I prefer to watch the longer version and skip that sequence (even though I donā€™t believe in doing that but needs must), but the shorter version is near perfect even if not theyā€™re entirely.

On the documentary in the special edition DVD/Blu one of the guys restoring the film said he felt it was ā€œimportantā€ to include the scene to explain where Tucoā€™s bandits came from. I donā€™t mean to sound disrespectful but i think he was the only person on the planet. Itā€™s funny, I remember reading somewhere that Martin Scorsese helped restore the film but Iā€™ve never seen him credited, and I have to ask if he left the project because he didnā€™t want to go against Leoneā€™s wishes unlike MGM.

[quote=ā€œBill_Willer, post:527, topic:307ā€]
On the documentary in the special edition DVD/Blu one of the guys restoring the film said he felt it was ā€œimportantā€ to include the scene to explain where Tucoā€™s bandits came from.

He was probably friends with the person who thought that an over-dose of DNR would ā€˜benefitā€™ the initial restored release.

Perhaps Iā€™m just being cynical, but I canā€™t help but wonder if some of these ā€˜blindingly-obviousā€™ cock-ups, are simply ploys on the part of Companies to hack fans off, so that said fans will lap up the next ā€˜ultimateā€™ edition that comes along - hoping that all the previous boo-boos have been rectified.

[quote=ā€œToscano, post:528, topic:307ā€]
He was probably friends with the person who thought that an over-dose of DNR would ā€˜benefitā€™ the initial restored release.[/quote]

And the genius who decided to crop the image of the first blu-ray was likely a pal of theirs too.

Well Scorsese was indirectly at least associated with the Blu-ray of Once Upon A Time in the West which should have heeded more to Leoneā€™s original wishes too.

It is well-documented that the original film length is 4840 metres, equivalent to just under 177 minutes (December 1966, VM14 rating caused by the desert scene and the torture of Tuco, no cuts): whether this is due to the grotto scene or, more likely, the complete Tucoā€™s beating remains to be seen, what is certain is that, contrary to what is widely believed, the 174m30s Italian Blu-ray release does not correspond to the original Italian theatrical version.


One Damned Day at Dawnā€¦

Yes, meanwhile an Italian 35 mm copy is in the ownership of GBU fans, which includes the complete torture scene and the short segment at the and in which Clint says ā€œSorry Tucoā€ while mounting his horse. There are other even shorter segments in that copy, but not the grotto scene

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