Expert: Mel - 9/28/2004

Question
hello, i got something in my mind that i need to clear out. the good, the bad and the ugly was filmed in english, but they did a italian voice-over for the original release. then, for the english version, they did an english voice-over over the italian version. and the english version voice of blondie's character is the real voice of clint eastwood. is that true, or am i all wrong? please correct me. thank you

Answer
Hello Francisco,

The film was shot with the actors speaking many different languages, mostly Italian, and the dubbing was part of the original version. Obviously Eastwood and the other American actors spoke in English.

Interestingly, in 1998 MGM released a DVD of the film that included sixteen minutes of scenes cut from the 1966 American version, in the Italian language only. They were a separate extra. That release prompted an effort to create the longest possible version of the film for theatrical presentation; MGM archivist John Kirk prepared the project for years and finally completed it in 2003.

There are eighteen minutes' worth of new scenes in this new release. Sixteen of these are the same standard Italian-only scenes excerpted on the previous DVD. Re-recording English dialogue for the new footage was the biggest "if" in John Kirk's restoration project, and thankfully both Eli Wallach and Clint Eastwood were interested and could make themselves available to dub the new lines. In Clint's case the dubbing didn't take long - he's just as laconic in the cut scenes as he is in the rest of the picture. Actor Simon Prescott imitated the voice of the late Lee Van Cleef.

The acting and voice quality is a reasonable match, although both stars' voices have changed over the years.   Prescott's dubbing of Van Cleef varies from scene to scene but essentially is good enough not to draw much attention to itself.

Here's an interesting site to read:

http://www.dvdtalk.com/dvdsavant/s1139gbu.html


Glad to be of help. Cheers........Mel.