The Appaloosa (1966) revisited …


the ecstasy of gold / ennio morricone

Very (un)occasionally I look over My Favorite Pages (above). I don’t do this often because some of them were created years ago now – and they’re awful. Then I’m forced to fix ’em up. Back then I didn’t know how to operate WordPress very well – or edit images – and a few dozen other things. I’m no genius now, but I’ve gotten better. Such is the case of The Appoloosa (1966) starring Marlon Brando. My Page was awful. I consider this a great Western so it deserves much better treatment. Therefore, I’ve now beefed the Page up – included a bunch of stuff from my other posts and so on. Some images should still be re-worked, but t’s almost worth a look now.

The Appoloosa really is a great Western with several excellent scenes – some Classic.

Check out these two scenes: including the famous Scorpion Arm Wrestling scene:

This scene has a couple of stunning qualities. The first quality is that it has NO music. Did you notice that? It’s very rare for any film maker to exclude music from any scene of impact. But it works well here.

The other thing is Director Sydney Furie’s superb use of close up shots – something he employed to great effect throughout the film.

Furie lets the setting, the lighting, the composition, the dialogue, the Actors, and the close-ups deliver the impact. The effect is one of the greatest scenes in Western Movie history.

Emilio Fernandez
Marlon Brando
John Saxon

Likewise for this bit of film magic …

That’s how I always light my cigaros too.

Audios Amigos

Author: jcalberta

Howdy! I love Westerns. ... and the intent of MyFavoriteWesterns.com is to celebrate Western Movies/Film - old and new. This site will eventually show my top 30 favorite Westerns - or more. I will have original graphic work with regular updates. All this - and more ... Yee Haw ... !! - jcablerta / Moderator / Administrator

4 thoughts on “The Appaloosa (1966) revisited …”

    1. It’s funny because it’s not mentioned or acknowledged much. And I obviously think it should be. I hope you can tell by these 2 scenes that it has something to offer. 1966 was a stunning year for Westerns with ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’, ‘The Professionals’, ‘Alvarez Kelly’ ‘Django’, ‘Nevada Smith’, ‘El Dorado’, ‘Duel and Diablo’ among others being released. Maybe it got lost in the mix?

  1. Tremendous scene for sure. There is no question Brando was one of the greatest actors – when he wanted to be. And I consider John Saxon one of the most overlooked and underused.

    1. I should have mentioned Saxon. He is great in another Favorite of mine: Unforgiven with Lancaster, Murphy and Audrey Hepburn. And you’re right about Brando – he could be brilliant. ‘One Eyed Jacks’ is another Favorite of mine. Thanks.

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