We’ve been accused of not sufficiently writing about westerns, favoring instead film noirs, musicals and more glossy movies from Hollywood’s classic period.
There’s a quotient of truth in that observation, and today we thought we’d make modest amends by c0mparing a star-loaded Hollywood studio outing with a lesser-known (but now revered) spaghetti western import.
Which, we ask, was better?
Director John Sturges‘ Gunfight at the O.K. Corral tells the tale of the unlikely alliance of Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp in combating a nest of bad guys in a brief but deadly shootout in Tombstone, Az. in 1881. The movie is based on the actual incident, and is certainly compelling material for an action western.
Paramount Pictures spared little expense in the production of this over-two-hour, wide screen “oater” filmed on location in Arizona, and chocked full of big names. Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster play the two principals — Lancaster as upright sheriff Wyatt Earp and Douglas as the liquor-loaded cynic Doc Holliday.
The Hal Wallis production’s large and diverse cast includes some semi-heavyweights including Rhonda Fleming (snappy as always), Jo Van Fleet and John Ireland, especially good as chief bad guy, Johnny Ringo. Even the late Dennis Hopper gets a few solid scenes.
The picture has the look and feel of a “prestige” studio release. Douglas and Lancaster more or less play their big screen images. Douglas is the consumptive miscreant with a heart of gold. Lancaster is somber and humorless as the righteous sheriff. The plot moves along at a decent, logical pace, no surprises nor changes of pace.
Compare Corral to Italian director Sergio Leone’s wild and wooly western epic, The Good, The Bad, The Ugly, which hit theaters about nine years after the John Sturges outing.
As even the above one-sheet suggests, this is NOT an ego exercise for overpaid stars. At the time of its making, largely in Southern Spain and Cinecitta Studios in Rome, Clint Eastwood was a tv castoff, Lee Van Cleef (who also appeared in Gunfight) a Hollywood journeyman miles from stardom and Eli Wallach a solid character actor with strong stage credits behind him.
Nonetheless, Leone wrung superb, unforgettable performances from each actor, although a strong case has been made that Wallach as the Mexican bandit, Tucco, stole the picture. The supporting cast, of largely unknown Italian supporting players, acquits itself credibly. The characters in this movie are so convincingly nasty that they probably would never pass front office muster in a big-budget studio western.
Another vitally important point: the score for Gunfight was by revered Hollywood film composer, Dimitri Tiomkin, garnished by an opening credits vocal by singer Frankie Laine. Compare this to Ennio Morricone’s incomparable score for Leone which set a new high standard for film music.
Which movie is better? Need you ask? Take another look at The Good, The Bad and the Ugly, and enjoy.
Yes, Joe & Frank have seen the light at last… And it’s a credit to both of them for seeing how an important WESTERNS are as a genre that are often overlooked and dismissed as mere ‘oaters.’
To start with, comparing GUNFIGHT AT THE OK CORRAL with THE GOOD,THE BAD AND THE UGLY… Is really like the proverbial comparison of apples and oranges.
GUNFIGHT which was shot in 1956, is like another western classic made just a few years later called RIO BRAVO, and they both suffered from being too long, at least 20 minutes too long that you wouldn’t even miss…
And they were both about star power and sticking to the tried and trusted HOLLYWOOD assembly-line cinematic style and the fairy tale mythology of the West.
Now THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY was the total opposite, it broke all the rules of the genre.
Cinematically, THE GOOD is a better film with it’s photography and use of close-ups…
Both have great music scores, as the ‘guys’ have already noted.
But again, you can enjoy both, just like being a pop music fan and loving opera too.
GUNFIGHT is a pop western, and THE GOOD is really opera.
Sergio Leone couldn’t have made his spaghetti westerns without being a HOLLYWOOD western fan himself. He decided to take the genre to a new level and break with the rules and give it a grittier more violent feel, that Sam Peckinpah would later adapt for his classic THE WILD BUNCH.
Strangely enough, Clint Eastwood wasn’t happy with the finished movie. He later said it was bloated rather than expansive, and the only fleshed-out character was Tuco. But then, Eastwood didn’t like working on his final teaming with Leone, he didn’t like the director’s perfectionist way of shooting and he didn’t really like his part.
“The gun store scene (Eli Wallach as Tuco) was copied from an episode of the TV Series Zane Grey Theater (TV Series 1956-1961), “Backtrail” (1957), in which actor Dick Powell plays a retired gunfighter outlaw who is forced to take up the gun again. He visits a store and takes pieces and hones down a perfect gun. Sergio Leone was a big fan of the show. Sergio Leone was able to extend the scene much more, since he had a film feature length at his disposal. In the Zane Grey Theater version, actor Dick Powell paid the gun store owner, in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966), Eli Wallach as Tuco robbed him blind. Sergio Leone wanted to take away the politeness found in American westerns.”
GUNFIGHT had great parts for both Douglas and Lancaster, and you could say it was the first star “buddy movie” or at least so for a western. Of course everyone thinks BUTCH CASSIDY & THE SUNDANCE KID was the first and most definitive… But as with anything, it’s all subjective and about personal taste.
THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY is the better film, even though it’s not my cup of tea so to speak, but I do recognize it’s qualities just like I can understand why some people adore opera.
So-called film scholars, critics just rave about it… But more important than them, are the legendary devoted fans around the world that just about worship the movie.
They even make pilgrimages to the Spanish desert just like I and many other fans do to western locations in the United States -Monument Valley, Lone Pine, Sedona etc.
In 1966, the Spanish Army built Sad Hill Cemetery with over 5000 graves at Mirandilla Valley in Burgos for the final sequence in the movie. When filming ended, the set was abandoned just like they built it and for half a century, nature has been trying to reclaim it. Then in October of 2015, a group of film fans decided to start digging… and under 3 inches of ground they found the original paved circle. For months, people from all around Europe traveled to Sad Hill to unearth and restore the iconic film set.
As evidence of that pilgrimage, a documentary currently on Netflix called SAD HILL UNEARTHED, gives you a great insight into the movie and its making.
As for GUNFIGHT AT THE OK CORRAL… well, we’ll always remember it first and last for Frankie Laine singing that haunting song, just like he did with so many other great westerns!