Review by Roger Carpenter
One of the things I enjoy most about films is the stories of how they came to be made. Many times this story is nearly as good as the film itself. And Duck, You Sucker…oops, I mean Once Upon a Time…the Revolution…oops, you’ll have to forgive me; I mean A Fistful of Dynamite has just such a story.
While Sergio Leone was busy making good money as well as a name for himself in pop culture, his contemporaries, like Visconti, Pasolini, and Rossi, were busy winning major awards from international film festivals and critical praise for their high-minded art films. And though Leone proudly stated in press releases and interviews that he was pleased he made cinema for the masses instead of for just a few hundred people around the globe, it was also a sore spot for him that the critics mostly ignored his cinematic offerings, even if moviegoers came in droves to see his pop art. So it was that, after his Dollars trilogy he set in motion not just another western, but one of epic proportions that would also address the critics. This was Once Upon a Time in the West, which did create positive critical praise in Europe, especially in France where Leone was very popular. And after four westerns in a row, Leone was ready for a break and turned to producing. The film was Giu la testa, literally, “keep your head down,” a story about a poor Mexican peasant just trying to earn a crooked buck during the Mexican Revolution who is duped into becoming a major player in the revolution.
Here is where the story becomes interesting. Peter Bogdonavich, fresh from his success with 1968’s Targets, was originally slated to direct, but he and Leone got along like oil and water. One of the sticking points for Bogdonavich was Leone’s insistence in titling the film Duck, You Sucker for America. Bogdonavich insisted this was not a popular American phrase but Leone, who was never fluent in English, was absolutely convinced the phrase was well-known. While Leone went through a succession of possible directors, he also went through a succession of stars. He wanted Eli Wallach to play the Mexican peasant, Juan Miranda, but since American money was being used for the film, the American’s wanted a bigger name, opting instead for Oscar-winner Rod Steiger, who was money in the bank at the time. Leone wanted Jason Robards to co-star as the Irishman John Mallory but that, too, didn’t work out. Neither did Malcolm McDowell, who was gaining in popularity but considered still too green by the studio execs. Enter big-name action star James Coburn. So, with everything set, Leone finally chose his longtime assistant director to helm the picture. But on the first day of production, Steiger and Coburn suggested they would send stand-ins who were “just like them” since they had signed onto a Leone picture, not a picture directed by someone “just like Leone.” And, just like that, Leone was directing his fifth western in a row.
But if the Dollars films were seen as violent yet ultimately silly adventure films and Once Upon a Time in the West was seen as at least a step in the right direction with regard to serious filmmaking, A Fistful of Dynamite was a much more mature and darker film.
Coburn stars as John Mallory, an IRA man who escaped the homeland after being ratted out. He’s angry and disenfranchised but wants to take part in a revolution somewhere, so he’s come to Mexico in a motorbike full of dynamite, hoping to wreak havoc on the Mexican government. He meets Juan Miranda, a peasant who could care less about the revolution and is more concerned with turning a buck any way he can. The film is about the friendship these two men cultivate as much as it is about revolution.
Along with Leone’s typical trademarks like extreme close-ups of faces and eyes, the blowing up of bridges, and long, languid scenes that are alternately praised for their craftsmanship and criticized for their length, Leone fills the film with comments about war and revolution. Many of these commentaries are easy to pick out even today. Made just a quarter century after WWII, contemporary Italian critics and movie goers would have had no trouble understanding exactly what Leone was after. The film even begins with a quote from Chairman Mao regarding the violence of revolution. Thus, we have a German soldier in a WWI-era tank looking very much like a Nazi, the murder of Mexican peasants in the trenches of a sugar factory similar to the murder of Jews in Dachau, and the murder of a group of peasants in a grotto, which references a very famous event that occurred in Nazi-occupied Italy in 1944.
So the film is definitely a darker tone than any of Leone’s Dollars films, but it is not without humor. I can see Eli Wallach playing the character of Juan Miranda. It was a part written for him and, even though Steiger owns the part and makes it his own, Wallach would have been excellent as Miranda. That said, Steiger gives an exceptional performance as the Mexican peasant, showing why he was Oscar-caliber. His facial expressions—helped along by Leone’s vast talents as a director and cinematographer—run the gamut of simple Mexican peasant who knows his place around rich foreigners to no-BS, let me tell you like it is. His acting is simply marvelous. He shows his gifts for light comedy as in learning to fire a machine gun, for portraying genuine anger, as in his lecture to John Mallory about what revolution really means for the poor, and of genuine sadness as he discovers the mass murder of innocents in the grotto.
Coburn is almost as equally gifted as the revolutionary-minded Irishman who begins the adventure thinking he is so much smarter than the peasant (and indeed, he does get one or two over on Juan Miranda in the beginning) but who begins to see the error of his thinking when his choices directly result in the loss of Juan’s entire family.
Leone was not known for making short films and this one runs 157 minutes. This led to contemporary critics charging Leone with an overblown ego as well as an overblown movie and many severe cuts for both content and length which contributed to the film’s poor performance in many international markets. As an aside, Leone did go with Duck, You Sucker as the title for the initial American release. This contributed to the film’s poor box office as no one wanted to see a film with such a title. It was quickly pulled from theaters and retitled A Fistful of Dynamite to more closely parallel Leone’s A Fistful of Dollars. Nevertheless, the film didn’t do as well as had been hoped, though nowadays, along with Leone’s other films, it has undergone a reevaluation and is considered a classic of the western genre. Personally, I love all of Leone’s films, right up through Once Upon a Time in America, another film that suffered from terrible cuts and, according to some, contributed to Leone’s premature death. While some critics still argue style over substance in the Dollars trilogy, A Fistful of Dynamite—no matter what title it goes under—has much of both.
While an earlier Blu-Ray release came with many excellent special features, Kino Lorber has ported all of those onto this disc and included many more, making this the absolute best version of the film to own. There are two audio commentaries, one by Alex Cox, author of 10,000 Ways to Die, an exhaustive study of the spaghetti western, and one by Sir Christopher Frayling, Sergio Leone biographer. Both commentaries are filled with information and insight but may be a bit too academic for the casual viewer. Nevertheless, I was fascinated with both from start to finish, especially since Cox and Frayling disagree on several points. It’s interesting to hear both perspectives.
There are several other featurettes that help to put Leoni and the film in perspective, including “The Myth of the Revolution;” an interview with co-writer Sergio Donati; a discussion of a Leone retrospective from 2005 with Frayling; a featurette on sorting out all the titles, re-titles, and different versions of the film; a short feature on restoring the film to its original version; a location comparison; trailers; radio spots; and two image galleries. So if the film itself isn’t long enough for you, there are plenty of special features to keep you busy.
This is a really nice Blu-Ray package that features the fully uncut version of the film in terrific quality and a plethora of extras to put the film in perspective. If you are a fan of westerns then you simply can’t miss this one. The film can be purchased directly through Kino Lorber at kinolorber.com or through Amazon.
