High Plains Drifter

Another western, huh? A genre I'm somewhat hesitant to explore thoroughly, but I certainly do enjoy Clint Eastwood in these kinds of roles. In fact, one of my favorite films as a child was A Fistful of Dollars. I find that Clint Eastwood really makes the genre of the western much more enjoyable for me- his hard attitude, chiseled features, and just the general bad-assed-ness of his characters lend a nice cheesy element to these films. These types of westerns are totally unmistakable, and that's another reason I can appreciate them.

High Plains Drifter was of course, a treat. Eastwood's character was so over-the-top and stereotypical, it was hard not to enjoy watching, if even for reasons bordering on the cynical. I've always thought it interesting that many of the films sharing this genre, the Spaghetti western, are made in Italy. It seems that the Italians go through phases in their film making, from ridiculous exploitation films featuring gratuitous gore to spaghetti westerns to art films. It would seem the Italians are pretty diverse...but I digress.

In terms of analysing this film and how it relates to both American society at the time it was made, and how it relates to ideas of what the west and that time in American history in general was like. The first obvious comparison one can draw is with Stagecoach, which is an extremely over-romanticized vision of what the west was like, featuring various stereotypes of the time, from the haughty, rich artistocratic woman and the dashing man who comes to her rescue for no reason other than his apparent sense of honor to the chivalrous vagabond with the murky intentions. These are things that I find to be slightly annoying about some early westerns, and with regards to this, High Plains Drifter makes no attempt to romanticize the west in such ways. Our hero is by no means a good person- he is ruthless, and is almost ostentatious is his lack of interest in other people or other people's problems. Indeed, the hero nearly results in the demise of the entire town in the film due to the pursuits of his own selfish pleasures.

One image I really enjoyed during the film was near the end, when Clint Eastwood's character forced the town's resident to paint the town red. We've all heard the phrase "paint the town red" before, but I found it interesting to see a real, literal representation of that. Also, the type of red that was used was a very deep, blood-colored red, and the buildings stuck out from the drab surroundings in such a way that I found to be aesthetically pleasing, perhaps even artistic.

One thing I notice about westerns (this is not necessarily a critically relevant thing) is that all the characters seem to be drinking either beer or some unlabeled brown liquor, probably whiskey, at all times. These guys must have livers like steel, how are they functioning when everyone is drinking booze all day long? Even in Stagecoach I noticed it, and it wasn't just the doctor. These people never have hangovers and seem to be mentally capable more or less at all time. How's that for idyllic? Move to the wild west- drink all day long with no detriment to your health or mental state!

I really wanted to think of some ways to compare High Plains Drifter to the Vietnam war but was only able to come up with a couple of theories. The first theory is that Clint Eastwood's character can be said to be kind of like the United States' involvement in Vietnam. A country that was in serious civil unrest, the United States swept in on it's steed of liberty and attempted to act as some kind of big brother by protecting South Vietnam and defeating the Vietcong. Clint Eastwood's character's intentions were not so noble (not that I presume to know the true reason the United States got in Vietnam, but the whole stranger saves unfortunate city from destruction motif is there in both situations. Another theory is that during the Vietnam era the United States was in such internal turmoil it could be said that the country, like the town of Lago, was destroying itself. Protests, violence, and so on were common during the Vietnam era, and Lago itself was full of internal violence, condoning and turning a blind eye to a murder.

All in all High Plains Drifter was a fun film to watch. Spaghetti westerns are usually fun, at least for a while. And if you haven't seen any of them, check out some of the ones from Italy- Sergio Leone/Ennio Morricone, there are lots of classics there, and the music in those films is usually very good and very recognizable.