While Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name is the most memorable character from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, he is nowhere near the only important character, and another individual might even be more important. Directed by Sergio Leone, the Dollars Trilogy includes three Spaghetti Westerns, including A Fistful of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Eastwood starred in all three of them as The Man with No Name.
However, the best character wasn’t Eastwood’s The Man with No Name (who actually had names or nicknames in all the movies). The third movie, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, had three main characters. Eastwood played a similar character in all three movies. Lee Van Cleef appeared in the second and third as two different characters, including Angel Eyes in the last film. However, the best of the best was Eli Wallach, who only appeared in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly as Tuco Ramirez.
The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly Wouldn’t Be A Western Masterpiece Without Tuco
Tuco Was The Most Well-Rounded Character In The Movie
While Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name is the most famous character in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly cast, Eli Wallach’s Tuco is arguably the best character in the movie. There is also the argument that Tuco is the most important character in that third Dollars Trilogy film. Of the three main characters (Tuco, Blondie, and Angel Eyes), Tuco is the most sympathetic. He does everything he needs to get the job done to improve his life. Blondie and Angel Eyes are not likely to improve themselves by succeeding, but Tuco has dreams of something better.
The movie would never have worked without the three main characters. However, when looking at Angel Eyes, he is clearly the villain of the three, someone who could do anything to achieve his goals, no matter how evil or dastardly. As for Blondie, he is someone who never fills in the role of a hero, as he disrespects Tuco, betrays him more than once, and the movie never makes his actual motivations clear. He is not a good person, although he is a better man than Angel Eyes.
It is important to remember that Blondie and Tuco worked to get his bounty as high as possible.
However, of the three men, Tuco is the only one that seems like he could be a good man. Tuco seems to think that there is honor between them, which makes him always shocked when Blondie betrays him. What makes him so great, though, is that he is a complicated man. He is a wanted man, accused of murder and other crimes, although many of these accusations were never played out in the movie. It is important to remember that Blondie and Tuco worked to get his bounty as high as possible, so many of his crimes were likely fabricated.
Tuco seems like someone who could be a good man if not for his station in life, making him much more interesting than Blondie or Angel Eyes. While The Good, the Bad and the Ugly had no heroes, a trait of the spaghetti Western, Tuco was at least the most developed and interesting character, even more so than Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name.
Tuco Has The Best Lines In The Entire Dollars Trilogy
Tuco Is The Funniest Character In The Film
On top of his fantastic performance as Tuco, Eli Wallach had some of the best quotes in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. All three actors had some great lines in the movie, but Tuco really has a chance to deliver some memorable ones. It almost starts from the beginning when Blondie shows up to take Tuco from the sheriff, and he simply exclaims, “Who the hell is that? One b*stard goes in and another comes out.” This set up Tuco to be someone with no filter, and that made him all the more entertaining.
He also delivered some funny lines. When they met up with some Confederate soldiers, they had to pretend to be allies, even though Tuco had no idea what he was talking about. He quipped, “Hurrah for the Confederacy! HURRAH! Down with General Grant! Hurrah for General… What’s his name?” Honestly, it’s a surprise he wasn’t killed early in the film with his mouth, as entertaining as he is. However, by the end, Tuco had dozens of the best quotes in the movie, proving his value to the film.
Tuco Is A Career-Best Performance For Eli Wallach
Eli Wallach Won Several Awards For Other Movies
It is impressive how great Eli Wallach is in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Wallach is a great actor, with some great credits to his name. He won a BAFTA Award and earned a Golden Globes nomination for Baby Doll. He had major roles in The Magnificent Seven, The Godfather Part II, How the West Was Won, and he even picked up a Primetime Emmy nomination in 2007 and 2011 for his roles in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and Nurse Jackie.
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Eli Wallach Award Recognition |
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|---|---|---|
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Ceremony |
Movie |
Award |
|
Academy Awards |
N/A |
Academy Honorary Award (Won) |
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British Academy Film Awards |
Baby Doll |
Most Promising Newcomer to Film (Won) |
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Golden Globe Awards |
Baby Doll |
Best Supporting Actor (Nominated) |
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Primetime Emmy Awards |
The Poppy is Also a Flower |
Actor In A Supporting Role (Won) |
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Tony Awards |
The Rose Tattoo |
Supporting or Featured Actor in a Play (Won) |
However, his career-best performance came in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. From the first moment that he was seen, jumping out a window with a gun in one hand and a drumstick in the other, he set the table for the entertaining movie that viewers were about to witness. Even his evil moments, such as when he robs the gunsmith, he does with a sense of kindness and pride, making him more honorable than the two men he would ride with in this film.
Tuco matches Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name and surpᴀsses him in many ways.
He then had some of the best moments in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, highlighted by him begging Blondie not to die because they were friends. For Eli Wallach to embody a man like Tuco with such depth and kindness proves why he remains so memorable so many decades after the film’s release. It is obvious Tuco matches Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name and surpᴀsses him in many ways.
