:06:03
Instead, Clint Eastwood
is greeted by the local bell-ringer,
:06:07
who acts as a kind of chorus, like in a
Shakespearian play, or traditional theatre.
:06:13
The chorus tells him exactly what's going
on in the background to the town.
:06:31
In Yojimbo, the village in 19th-century
Japan is divided into two factions:
:06:36
the silk merchants
and the sake merchants.
:06:39
And the shambling,
itchy, bow-legged samurai
:06:42
with his sword strapped to his waist
:06:44
walks into town and sells his services,
first to one faction then the other.
:06:48
As we're told by the crazy bell-ringer,
this town is run by two factions.
:06:53
One is gunrunners,
and the other runs liquor.
:06:57
Eastwood rides into the main set
of Fistful of Dollars,
:07:00
which actually was
an existing set 35km north of Madrid,
:07:05
at a place called Hoyo de Manzanares.
:07:07
The set was built in 1962
for a series of Spanish Zorro films.
:07:12
It resembled a ghost town,
wasn't used for a while.
:07:15
It was redressed
by the designer, Carlo Simi,
:07:17
who put new frontages
on part of the town.
:07:20
Basically it was a pre-existing set.
:07:22
They really hadn't got
any money to play with.
:07:25
Lots of references
to Easter and resurrection,
:07:29
and the idea of a town
of widows, a town of death.
:07:31
There's coffins,
there's bells, bell-ringers,
:07:34
there's Eastwood crucified
on the cantina sign.
:07:37
There's a resurrection towards the end.
:07:40
There's a Last Supper, when
the baddies all get together for a meal.
:07:44
It's riddled with Catholic iconography,
:07:48
which wasn't, I think,
a deep decision by Leone,
:07:51
simply that it would be recognisable
to a largely southern Italian audience,
:07:56
at which this movie
was originally pitched.
:07:59
The bartender, whose name
is Silvanito, is played by José Calvo,