I have many thoughts about Sergio Corbucci's 1968 spaghetti western The Great Silence. It is a subversive western that is dark, dismal, and quite frankly has an ending that will blow your mind. People who grew up watching classic Hollywood was taken aback by its dark and intense ending which provides a good deal of emotion. Contemporary critics view the film as one of the best spaghetti westerns ever made not created by Sergio Leone...and he had some famous ones such as Django. The film did not have a true release in the United States because 20th Century Fox's Darryl D. Zanuck refused to screen the film because of its totally unexpected ending. It was released internationally and gained a following due to the use of international actors...mainly Germany's Klaus Kinski.
I mentioned in the previous paragraph how the film is known for being subversive. In the Western genre, people usually get a sense of what they want to see. The big, out-of-town hero comes into a town to save it from the bad guys and has a romance with one of the more important woman in town...usually a schoolteacher. Well, none of that happens here or at least not in the way expected. In terms of bounty hunters, many Westerns hold them with high esteem. In Corbucci's film, Kinski's character is dripping with evil. I liked how Corbucci changed things up with the setting. Many Westerns take place in the desert but here, he takes advantage of the snowy, desolate Utah mountains. The blood and violence is even more intense given the snowy setting. Also, there is an interracial romance unlike anything ever seen before. The white main character is a mute and begins an unlikely romance with a black woman, played brilliantly by Vonetta McGee, as they share a bond over loneliness and the people they lost in their lives. The romance is important as the film concludes because even for someone who has seen so many movies, I will still taken by surprise. Still, it's an incredible ending. Corbucci used his politics to create something new and subversive and still resonates today, more than a half-century later.
Loco (Klaus Kinski) leads a pack of bounty hunters that prey on any outlaw hiding in the snowy Utah mountains. Loco is known to show no mercy to his victims. Pauline's (Vonetta McGee) husband becomes the latest victim of Loco's. She decides to hire a gunman who goes by the name of Silence (Jean-Louis Trintignant) to hunt down Loco and exact her revenge. Silence has been, well...silent since he was a boy because he had his throat cut out. But as gunman, there is no better one around. However, everything he knows is about to be put to test.
By the late 1960's, casting actors who speak English in these types of movies have become common practice because it was believed that it helped improve international marketability. To bypass this need of an English-speaking actor, the Italian director decided to make his main character mute. Smart! Jean-Louis Trintignant did not need to use any words to convey his actions. His emotions on his scarred face and the way he draws his gun every single job says otherwise. He paired up well with Klaus Kinski who plays one of the better developed villains in this type of movie. Such an idea was rarely seen on screen in 1968 but Vonetta McGee was more than just a damsel in distress. She played a powerful woman seeking revenge and begins a steamy biracial romance in the process.
The Great Silence is a Western that is worth seeking out. It got a lot of attention internationally because of its unconventional, bleak ending. A happy ending was filmed but honestly it does not fit the story the way it was told. Sergio Corbucci directed his film with passion. Too bad it does not have the audience it deserved. In addition, he worked with composer Ennio Morricone to create yet another powerful score. When it was released, the film was heralded for going against type and it's all for the better. The excellent cinematography was able to capture the setting and use it for shock value when the time came. There were some minor issues. It was filmed as if it was a big-budget production but if you look closely, you may editing issues or maybe the sound/picture mixing is not 100%. Very minor when compared to a tight, explosive story that Corbucci gave us.
My Grade: A-
I mentioned in the previous paragraph how the film is known for being subversive. In the Western genre, people usually get a sense of what they want to see. The big, out-of-town hero comes into a town to save it from the bad guys and has a romance with one of the more important woman in town...usually a schoolteacher. Well, none of that happens here or at least not in the way expected. In terms of bounty hunters, many Westerns hold them with high esteem. In Corbucci's film, Kinski's character is dripping with evil. I liked how Corbucci changed things up with the setting. Many Westerns take place in the desert but here, he takes advantage of the snowy, desolate Utah mountains. The blood and violence is even more intense given the snowy setting. Also, there is an interracial romance unlike anything ever seen before. The white main character is a mute and begins an unlikely romance with a black woman, played brilliantly by Vonetta McGee, as they share a bond over loneliness and the people they lost in their lives. The romance is important as the film concludes because even for someone who has seen so many movies, I will still taken by surprise. Still, it's an incredible ending. Corbucci used his politics to create something new and subversive and still resonates today, more than a half-century later.
Loco (Klaus Kinski) leads a pack of bounty hunters that prey on any outlaw hiding in the snowy Utah mountains. Loco is known to show no mercy to his victims. Pauline's (Vonetta McGee) husband becomes the latest victim of Loco's. She decides to hire a gunman who goes by the name of Silence (Jean-Louis Trintignant) to hunt down Loco and exact her revenge. Silence has been, well...silent since he was a boy because he had his throat cut out. But as gunman, there is no better one around. However, everything he knows is about to be put to test.
By the late 1960's, casting actors who speak English in these types of movies have become common practice because it was believed that it helped improve international marketability. To bypass this need of an English-speaking actor, the Italian director decided to make his main character mute. Smart! Jean-Louis Trintignant did not need to use any words to convey his actions. His emotions on his scarred face and the way he draws his gun every single job says otherwise. He paired up well with Klaus Kinski who plays one of the better developed villains in this type of movie. Such an idea was rarely seen on screen in 1968 but Vonetta McGee was more than just a damsel in distress. She played a powerful woman seeking revenge and begins a steamy biracial romance in the process.
The Great Silence is a Western that is worth seeking out. It got a lot of attention internationally because of its unconventional, bleak ending. A happy ending was filmed but honestly it does not fit the story the way it was told. Sergio Corbucci directed his film with passion. Too bad it does not have the audience it deserved. In addition, he worked with composer Ennio Morricone to create yet another powerful score. When it was released, the film was heralded for going against type and it's all for the better. The excellent cinematography was able to capture the setting and use it for shock value when the time came. There were some minor issues. It was filmed as if it was a big-budget production but if you look closely, you may editing issues or maybe the sound/picture mixing is not 100%. Very minor when compared to a tight, explosive story that Corbucci gave us.
My Grade: A-