The competition is over and was actually much more lopsided than I expected. Rather than have you skip down to the bottom of the page to find out the winner, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (TGTBTU) scored a late, but decisive knockout. To be honest, I'm not sure there will ever be a movie made that can beat TGTBTU because it was so ahead of its time and defined filmmaking in many ways.
I decided to score each category with one of three conclusions: EVEN, EDGE or WINNER. Of the six categories, TGTGBU was the WINNER in two, had the EDGE in two others and the last two categories were EVEN. Scary that the best Wall St. could do was even in any category.
On to the scorecard:
1) Plot: EVEN
Wall St.: Set in 1986 (just prior to the crash of 1987), Wall St. shows the ethical pitfulls of the decade of excess. The movie centers on the internal struggles of Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) who is trying to make it rich on Wall St.; however, with the anchor of a nagging conscience based on his blue color upbringing. Bud Fox hooks in with power player Gordon Gecko (Michael Douglass) who takes him under is wing but also taints him with the insider trading. Bud finally succumbs to his blue collar roots and gives up Gecko to the feds when Gecko double crosses him on a deal to save his father’s airline.
TGTGBU: The basic story of "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" is actually a simple treasure hunt, but slowly develops over three hours with endless, unexpected twists and turns. Tuco (Eli Wallach) is a wanted criminal who collaborates with "Blondie" (Clint Eastwood) to run a scam where they split the reward for Tuco’s capture when Blondie shoots the rope around his neck as the lawmen hang him. Tuco and Blondie have a reluctant, tortured partnership though and just as they are breaking things off they each learn half of the secret to a $200,000 treasure. As they set out to find the gold together they cross paths with Angel Eyes Sentenza (Lee Van Cleef), another drifter and paid killer, who also learns about the treasure but is missing the details Tuco and Blondie hold. All three converge at the location of the gold to create what I believe is the best moving ending of all time.
2) Cast/Characters: EVEN
"Blondie" (Clint Eastwood), Tuco (Eli Wallach) and Angel Eyes Sentenza (Lee Van Cleef) form a compelling acting trio with combined performances that may never be matched again. However, Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen) and Gordon Gecko (Michael Douglass) are an incredible duo in their own right and while Wall St. doesn’t have a third character to compare with any of those from TGTBTU, the depth of supporting characters is very strong whereas TGTBTU falls off a cliff after their top three. Thus, I consider the category to be a tie.
3) Dialogue/Quotes: EDGE TGTBTU
This category took a lot of thought and was difficult to judge. At first blush, Wall St. appears to have the edge almost solely on Gordon Gecko’s incredibly insightful commentary on the stock markets. However, upon further review, many of the quotes are cliché and pithy. Don’t get me wrong, I love Gecko’s quotes and will always be in awe of them, but the lines in TGTBTU are much more genuine and the comedic undertone is sheer genius. The TGTBTU dialogue is genuine and layered, whereas Wall St. falls flat in comparison. There are two types of movie dialogue in this world…
4) Music: WINNER TGTBTU
WHACK…THUD. That’s the sound of Wall St. taking a blow to the chin and falling to the canvas for the first time. Ennio Morricone's brilliant musical score is an instant classic – always hitting the right note and underscoring the slowly building tension of TGTBU. I could mention Sinatra’s Fly Me to The Moon intro song as a great opening song in Wall St. but it’s not even in the same league artistically.
5) Cinematography: EVEN
This may be a shocker to some. TGTBTU is renowned for its breathtaking landscape panoramas and striking facial close ups. However, Wall St.’s cinematography is highly underrated and needs to be appreciated more than it is.
6) Ending: WINNER TGTBTU
This is the death blow for Wall St. In my opinion, too many movies get a free pass on their endings. It’s the ending that makes the movie. It’s what you are building toward and it’s what the audience leaves remembering. Wall St.’s ending is melancholy and anti-climactic. It’s also somewhat symptomatic and unavoidable. Still, it’s nothing noteworthy or memorable and arguably could have been more impactful.
On the other hand, TGTBTU’s ending is probably the greatest of all time. The Good (Blondie), The Bad (Tuco) and the Ugly (Angel Eyes) all converge at the cemetery where the gold is located and face off in a tense three way showdown. When they draw, Blondie kills Angel Eyes knowing Tuco’s gun was empty (Eastwood took his bullets out the night before). Blondie locates the grave where the gold is buried and utters Tuco’s patented “two types” line back at him for the first time all movie: “There are two types of people in this world…those with loaded guns, and those who dig…you dig”. After Tuco excitedly digs up the gold and starts hugging it. Blondie quickly stops the party when he orders Tuco up onto a flimsy wooden cross headstone to stick his neck in a noose. Blondie saddles up his horse with half the gold, looks back at Tuco (who is quivering as he tries to stay up on the cross) and says “two for you, two for me…just like old times”, leaving Tuco’s share of the gold at his feet in front of the cross as his neck hangs in the noose…Blondie rides off into the sunset as Tuco screams for mercy. Blondie disappears but seconds later is seen riding back as Tuco excitedly thinks he is coming back to save him. Blondie stops and there’s a gunshot and Tuco falls off the cross as Blondie ends the movie and their partnership by shooting him down from a noose one last time. The movie ends with Tuco yelling out: “HEYYYY...BLOND…you know what you are?...just a dirty SON-OF-A-B- [wahwahwah…whah, whah, whah….— the theme music cuts off ITCH and the movie ends].
