Transfer over Wayne and Eastwood — Lee Van Cleef is right here to steal your scene! Certain, John Wayne and Clint Eastwood are virtually synonymous with Westerns (and for good cause), however Van Cleef is probably the most under-appreciated and neglected common of the style. His hawkish, piercing eyes and naturally intimidating demeanor make him a simple antagonist, however his talent as an actor reaches manner past his skill to imply mug.
He’s good. Really good. If the rarity of him touchdown starring roles convinces you in any other case, assume once more — Lee Van Cleef, understandably however unjustly typecast as merciless, scheming villains, is a hundred percent film star. He intimidates in Excessive Midday with little to no strains of dialogue. Together with an untouchable Eli Wallach, he steals The Good, The Dangerous, and The Ugly out from underneath Clint Eastwood. In criminally underrated Spaghetti Westerns like Dying Rides a Horse and Day of Anger, Van Cleef steps into the blinding limelight of main man and shimmers. Whereas it’s true that Eastwood, Wayne, and Golden Age superstars like Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda dwell extra comfortably within the stratosphere of being family names, Van Cleef completely deserves to be talked about among the many ranks of probably the most essential actors in Western movie historical past.
There’s no such factor as an amazing hero and not using a nice villain, proper? Nicely, Lee Van Cleef is virtually the finest (and most constant) actor taking part in a villain within the Western style. By his magnetic performances, he helps elevate each image he’s in by serving as an intense opposing pressure to his “good-guy” co-stars. Maybe most generally identified for taking part in the titular Dangerous — or Angel Eyes — in The Good, The Dangerous, and The Ugly, Van Cleef shortly turned typecast after a wordless however memorable function within the Oscar-winning Western Excessive Midday. Lingering within the background, smoking cigarettes, taking part in a harmonica, and all the time trying on along with his steely eyes, Lee Van Cleef is arguably probably the most memorable of the desperados that arrive unwelcome in Gary Cooper‘s city. He doesn’t want any of that pesky dialogue. He simply stands within the background trying robust, and it really works.
It’s extra of the identical within the John Wayne-starring The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. Van Cleef sticks to the background, his strains of dialogue few and much in between, meanmugging each goddamn individual within the body. It’s a disgrace that his character is punched out by Wayne’s and rendered ineffective for the remainder of the film — he made a convincing scoundrel that ought to have made it to the climax. After all, most notable are Van Cleef’s roles in Sergio Leone‘s {Dollars} trilogy. Displaying up within the second and remaining movies, the actor performs towards a top-form Eastwood as antagonist characters.
In For A Few {Dollars} Extra, he performs a rival bounty hunter to Eastwood’s Man With No Title. Although he finally (considerably reluctantly) joins forces with the Man to be able to obtain a mutual aim, Mortimer (Van Cleef) is a extra compelling character than the principle protagonist. All of Eastwood’s teeth-baring and cigar-sucking aren’t with out their worth (the person is an icon, in any case), however there’s not often a second the place we’re curious as to what he’s considering. He’s a bounty hunter. He goes round taking pictures individuals. What extra do you should know?
Van Cleef, although, wanders throughout the film wearing an imposing all-black outfit, trying like a manifestation of Dying itself. Mortimer is shrouded in thriller, with an enigmatic previous that helped the character turn out to be attention-grabbing. Eastwood’s Yojimbo-turned-gunman is enjoyable to observe, however it’s actually solely when taking part in off of Van Cleef that he actually impresses. The 2 behave like long-lost twins (they each shoot a helluva lot of individuals and are good at it) however are performed completely in another way. Van Cleef breathes extra persona into his function. He brings to his character complexity that makes him any individual to each worry and empathize with. He wins this spherical.
Once more, it’s for The Good, The Dangerous, and The Ugly that Van Cleef might be most remembered, and for good cause. Because the film’s sadistic, cold-blooded villain, Angel Eyes mows down a person after interrupting his breakfast, slays one other in his mattress, and backstabs anyone that he must to be able to get what he desires. Simply take a look at his first look within the movie, through which he seems on the horizon, approaches the digicam, and unsaddles from his horse whereas Ennio Morricone’s magnificent rating booms over the soundtrack. He scans the panorama along with his intense gaze, and that’s all we have to see that is one nasty bugger. When he reveals up in the course of the movie’s monumental climactic standoff — the most effective in your entire style — he brings with him the type of unstoppable chaotic pressure that makes him an ideal antagonist. In a movie with three indelible performances, Van Cleef arguably walks off with the award.
When requested by Johnny Carson if he’s ever uninterested in taking part in unhealthy guys, Van Cleef expressed satisfaction with being typecast. “They’re fairly good characters, really. They’ve obtained lots of depth — a few of them,” the actor mentioned. It helps that, not less than within the Western style, Van Cleef is the heavy to forged whenever you need a fearsome, imposing character to rival your character. He’s simply so rattling good at it. Usually distractingly so.