Sure, it's slow, and, as Jeremy_Urquhart said in his IMDB review, "I won't claim to have the ability to say anything new about this movie. It's been around for nearly fifty years, and is widely regarded as not just one the best Spaghetti Westerns of all time, but one of the best Westerns full stop. And it's not hard to see why: an incredible soundtrack, strong performances from the entire main cast, some surprisingly good humour and funny one-liners, a few tense sequences, a well-told story that doesn't rely on excessive dialogue or exposition, and consistently amazing cinematography and direction throughout. At least half the frames in this movie would probably make good paintings- no exaggeration." I couldn't agree more. ( )

I've seen some of the Fistful of Dollars movies and they were fine. But this was a masterpiece, and the sort of inexplicable kind, where I find myself asking why I'm so completely engrossed despite the fact that it's moving at a crawl. One of its tricks is to leave a trail of unexplained questions at every turn of the plot, including a huge overarching mystery behind the presence of one of the three main outlaws. Which is resolved at the very end, without feeling at all random or shoehorned in. ( )

A woman's new family is murdered, and various outlaws take an interest.

There are a number of great scenes - probably about half the movie - that stand up to the best bits of Leone's Clint Eastwood movies. A lot of the rest of it is dull, corny or misogynistic.

Concept: B
Story: B
Characters: B
Dialog: B
Pacing: D
Cinematography: A
Special effects/design: A
Acting: B
Music: A

Enjoyment: B

GPA: 3.1/4 ( )

Very long ad slow moving film, yet interesting. 165 minutes. ( )