The Great Silence (Il grande silenzio) (1968)

Review: written Feb 2024

Stone cold classic. With the emphasis on cold.

Directed by Sergio Corbucci, who also made Django and numerous Bud Spencer and Terence Hill movies, this spaghetti Western is like nothing else in its genre.. and frankly, probably like nothing else, full stop.

Silence is the name of the mute gunslinger (Jean-Louis Trintignant) who comes at the behest of a young widow (Vonetta McGee), whose husband has been killed by bounty hunters led by Loco (Klaus Kinski). Silence has a moral code (he only shoots in self defence) and his own motives for supporting the locals and widow against the local business leader. Who effectively rules the town. As he is drawn to the woman, confrontation between Silence and Loco grows increasingly ineveitable. So far, so traditional spaghetti Western.. but the movie unfolds in often surprising ways.

Corbucci has had some hits and misses, but is sure footed in his direction here. Rather than a series of dramatically shot scenes loosely held together by plot or motive, the plot unfolds fluidly, and the acting is for the most part not as highly mannered as it can often be in this already stylised genre. Add to this the stunning location and Ennio Morricones memorable score, and you’ve got a superior spaghetti Western on your hands. Not difficult to see why Tarantino paid such obvious homage to it in “The Hateful Eight”.

Of the cast, Kinski gives one of his most reined in (pun intended) performances and is all the more chilling for it, and the widow is played by Vonetta McGee, who went on to star in blaxpoitation movies and have a notable career in the US.

I knew nothing about this movie when I watched it for the first time, and was genuinely shocked at the ending.. if you thought “Django” was dark, try this. Despite the beauty and brightness of the snow set scenes (The Dolomites filling in for Utah, pre-Great Blizzard of 1899), the tone is dark. Corbucci, always political and known for his left wing sympathies, pulls no punches in this indictment of ‘The State’ in which Capitalism rules. Brimming with cynicism brought on by the triple whammy of assassinations (Martin Luther King, Che Guevera and Robert Kennedy), this movie leaves you in no doubt as to what Corbucci reckons is the future if the world stays silent – giving the title a double meaning. If you’re in any doubt as to the director’s outlook, look at the character of the Sheriff. Much is made in the script about characters using the law to justify their actions, but the actual law, played by Frank Wolff (who played McBain in Once Upon A Time In The West around the same time) is at first inept, then the light comedy element, then increasingly the only honourable and dutiful man, before being abruptly sidelined.

So why do I stress how unusual this Western is? Well, long before Eastwood rewrote the rulebook for Westerns with “Unforgiven”, this movie is subversive not just for its political overtones, but for various reasons – the bleak ending, the spectacular snow drenched mountain setting instead of the desert, the (for-the-time) controversial interracial love scene, and for subverting most, if not all, your expectations of what characters motives and arcs may be. Leone’s movies glorifying the anti-hero and bounty hunters in particular, could not be further removed from Corbucci’s representation of that same group. The marginalised - the African American woman, the poor forced to become outlaws - have little agency or hope here – and the movie asks (and answers), can one man, however skilled or noble, really change a corrupt system?

Look, this won’t be everyone’s cup of tea – if you’re looking for a quick blast of fun, something to pass a Saturday evening that won’t trouble you any more by Sunday morning, then you might not be right for this. But if you’d like to see something a little unique, this perfect little movie full of imperfections, might just be the bleak provocateur to your thoughts you’re looking for. You might hate it, or you might be enthralled by it, but one way or another it’s a movie that will get you engaged.