A Fistful Of Dollars (Special Edition) [1964]

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Editorial reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review
A Fistful of Dollars launched the spaghetti Western and catapulted Clint Eastwood to stardom. Based on Akira Kurosawa's 1961 samurai picture Yojimbo, it scored a resounding success (in Italy in 1964 and the U.S. in 1967), as did its sequels, For a Few Dollars More and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. The advertising campaign promoted Eastwood's character--laconic, amoral, dangerous--as the Man with No Name (though in the film he's clearly referred to as Joe), and audiences loved the movie's refreshing new take on the Western genre. Gone are the pieties about making the streets safe for women and children. Instead it's every man for himself. Striking, too, was a new emphasis on violence, with stylized, almost balletic gunfights and baroque touches such as Eastwood's armoured breastplate. The Dollars films had a marked influence on the Hollywood Western--for example, Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch--but their most enduring legacy is Clint Eastwood himself. --Edward Buscombe

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Customer reviews

review by: Author of "The Ingredients of a Good Thriller" date: 2008-11-04 rating:
Brilliant western
This is the first Spaghetti western and a superb film. Both Clint Eastwood and Sergio Leone are on top form and the storyline, dialogue and action are tremendous.

A classic.

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review by: date: 2008-10-15 rating:
A cheap budget movie that launched a classic trilogy
A Fistful of Dollars was made on a shoestring budget of $200,000. Clint Eastwood even bought his own black jeans and poncho and brought them over from the US to the filmset in Almeria, Spain.

Clint rides into a dusty frontier town, San Miguel, where life is cheap. Situated just over the border inside Mexico, the town is a focus for smuggling and is run by 2 families - the Rojos (Mexicans) and the Baxters (Americans).

When a gold heist takes place at the expense of regular US and Mexican soldiers, the softly spoken gunfighter succeeds in playing each family against each other - while at the same time building up his finances in return for information.

This movie is a dark, minimalist film. Everything from the decor to the stoney desert is bleak and spartan. There's also little interaction with others apart from the feuding families, the owner of the empty bar and the (permanently busy) undertaker.

A Fistful of dollars is not particularly violent. Clint guns downs 13 bad guys in total but there's no blood and the violence is actually cartoonesque at times.

Overall, great music, a good concept and lots of action crammed into what is actually a rather short film (96 minutes).

The twin-pack DVD contains a raft of great extras if you're an enthusiast of the Sergio Leone films and this genre.

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review by: Spoon date: 2007-06-25 rating:
The film that started it all...
Fistfull of Dollars, introduced us to Sergio Leone's masterpiece that were Spaghetti Westerns. It also made clint Eastwood a star, and would lead to two extremely successful follow ups, For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

It introduced the world to Sergio Leone's sharp directing and fondness for extreme close ups, often copied since, but never really bettered.

Clint Eastwood stars as the man with no name, a remake of an old japaneese film called Yojimbo. Clint is perfectly cast as the clever gunslinger as a man of actions rather than words. Here, he plays two gangs off against each other, which all climaxes in a wonderfully memorable scene which reveals the full extent of Clint's cunning.

Deliciously topped off with Ennino Morricone's haunting score, Fistfull of Dollars is a wonderful film, bettered only slightly by its sequal and the third film, the sprawling epic which was The Good the Bad and the Ugly.

If you've seen the other films, it is well worth adding these to your collection, as its Clint in one of his best loved roles, and certainly his most iconic. (Only Dirty Harry would prove to be as equally iconic as the spaghetti western trilogy.)

So add to your collection and relive the golden era of spaghetti westerns at their finest!

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review by: date: 2006-11-13 rating:
A Fist full of Talent
This two DVD set is the best version to buy of this film. The remastering/restoration is excellent, so the picture quality is superb. The film itself needs little introduction, it wasn't the first Italian/European western, but it was the first that tried to be different from the standard US western.

Based on Kurosawa's Yojimbo (1961), this is the film that changed Eastwood from a little known American TV star of the early 60's into a movie Icon. Eastwood wasn't the first choice for the part, there were 4 or 5 preferred actors in front of him. But Eastwood was prepared to work considerably cheaper than these people and made the movie for $15,000.

All of this and more is revealed in the excellent commentary by Sir Christopher Frayling on disc 1. Having the commentary makes this version essential as Sir Christopher is THE expert on Leone and Eastwood.

I haven't even mentioned disc 2, well this contains documentaries and the usual stuff you associate with special editions. However there are two reasons to buy this version of the DVD. 1. The Film. 2. The Commentary.
Fabulous!


review by: date: 2005-04-13 rating:
Glorious
This film was Leone's first big film, and Clint Eastwood's first big screen appearance. To a fan of either this is essential: there is a proper 16:9 widescreen version (unlike the single disc versions) and has had the similarly excellent remastering that The Good, the Bad and the Ugly got. The extras are as good in quality as the latter's, but what this film is really about is the taut tension, the despicable villains and of course the legendary Clint Eastwood as The Man With No Name. Great dialogue that is often darkly humorous (the mule shootout for example) and all backed up by a great score from the legendary Ennio Morricone. To Western fans this is one of the pioneers of the genre. To movie fans in general, if you've ever seen a heavily built up gunfight (Dirty Harry, any John Woo film, and especially any Tarantino film) chances are the director has been heavily influenced by Leone's legacy to movies. Every red-blooded male NEEDS this film in their collection along with the other Dollar films that were undoubtedly Leone and arguably Eastwood's best work.

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For A Few Dollars More (Special Edition) [1965]
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Unforgiven [1992]
A Fistful Of Dynamite (Special Edition) [1972]

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Video . DVD & VHS . Refinements . Release Date (feature_three_browse-bin) . 1960 - 1969
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