Skip to main content
Close

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (1966)

By Pam Glazier · June 16, 2011

Screenplay Genre: Western

Movie Time: 161 minutes

1. INCITING INCIDENT

Blondie (Clint Eastwood) and Tuco (Eli Wallach) are in an unlikely partnership as “The Good” and “The Ugly” working together to swindle un-expecting towns as Blondie repeatedly collects on the bounty for Tuco’s capture and then sharp-shoots him free of the noose just before he is hanged. But when Tuco suggests the 50/50 partnership is not enough for him, it upsets the tenuous partnership, and Blondie decides to take all of the bounty for himself and leave Tuco stranded in the dessert, 70 miles from the nearest town, hands tied, no water. (28:03)

2. LOCK IN (End of Act One)

Tuco makes it out of the desert alive, finds Blondie pulling the same scam with someone else, and forces him at gunpoint to walk in the desert as he did, tied up, no water. (56:27)

3. FIRST CULMINATION (Midpoint)

Near death, Blondie learns where a huge stash of gold is hidden from Bill Carson (Antonio Casale), a dying Confederate soldier. Tuco now has to ensure Blondie’s good health in order to get his hands on that gold. He delivers Blondie to a mission hospital run by priests and watches over him. Fully recovered, Blondie is back with Tuco and they continue the tenuous partnership in the quest for the gold. (1:27:20)

4. MAIN CULMINATION (End of Act Two)

Blondie and Tuco, disguised as Confederate soldiers, are caught by a Union patrol and imprisoned in a P.O.W. camp. Sentenza (Lee Van Cleef), “The Bad” guy who has been after Bill Carson’s gold from the start, uses his rank in the Union P.O.W. camp to get Tuco alone and have the truth beaten out of him—but only Blondie knows precisely where the gold is buried. Sentenza knows Blondie won’t talk no matter how bad he’s beaten, and so he enters into partnership with Blonde instead while sending Tuco off to the gallows. (1:47:22)

5. THIRD ACT TWIST

Tuco escapes his imprisonment, and Blondie escapes Sentenza’s gang. Together they make it to the cemetery where the gold is buried, but so does Sentenza. A very intense showdown occurs. Blondie shoots Sentenza dead and smiles at Tuco when he realizes that Blondie has given him an empty gun. Blondie leaves Tuco balancing for his life atop a rickety grave marker with his share of the gold heaped just below him. Blondie rides off into the sunset as Tuco screams after him for help. Tuco is going to die… until Blondie, just like old times, shoots the noose from way far off. Tuco falls to the ground, safe. (2:55:22)