My Name is Nobody

My Name is Nobody (1971) is a bizarre, uneven comedy Western. Produced by Sergio Leone but directed by Tonino Valerii (Day of Anger), it's a not-entirely successful spoof of Leone's own films, with some interesting material crowded out by excess goofiness.

Aging gunfighter Jack Beauregard (Henry Fonda) wants to retire and move to Europe, hoping to escape his reputation. Unfortunately, Beauregard runs into trouble when his brother (Leo Gordon) is gunned down by henchmen of crooked businessman Sullivan (Jean Martin), who is operating a phony mine for the Wild Bunch, a huge outlaw gang. Things are complicated further when a stranger calling himself Nobody (Terence Hill) shows up, goading Beauregard into an epic showdown with the Wild Bunch.

My Name is Nobody offers plenty of material for analysis. Leone and Valerii cheekily send-up their own Spaghetti Westerns and their American counterparts. It's hard not to consider Nobody, the cocksure youngster who worships Jack's legend, as an avatar for Leone and his peers' adoration and emulation of classic American Westerns, and casting Henry Fonda as Jack certainly helps this interpretation. Innumerable Western homages litter the film, from Nobody's Magnificent Seven-inspired fishing trick to Sam Peckinpah's name turning up on a tombstone, while the film re-stages entire scenes from earlier Leone films - a lengthy opening spoof of Once Upon a Time in the West, the hat-shooting from For a Few Dollars More. The movie's funniest gag has a photographer "directing" the climactic duel while peering through a camera lens.

Unfortunately, My Name is Nobody is problematic. The film awkardly shifts between off-the-wall, Three Stooges slapstick and reflective melancholy. Besides the usual end of the West stuff, we get a story that lurches from scene to scene with little flow or drive. The Wild Bunch subplot and Beauregard's vendetta are badly handled, while Nobody's clowning takes up far too much of the film. It seems like a serious Spaghetti Western mixed with a goofy spoof, and the two halves don't properly mesh. Perhaps this is intentional - the American Jack and the Italian Nobody inhabit two different worlds, after all - but it's not very satisfying. Moment to moment Nobody is amusing, but it doesn't amount to much of a whole.

Exactly who was in charge of the film - Leone, the domineering, first-time producer, or Valerii, a veteran director in his own right - is in dispute, with sources claiming Leone directed a few scenes or virtually all of it. Regardless, Nobody is a well-shot film, with lots of expensive-looking sets and locations, and creative set-pieces - especially the self-parodic opening and a creative carnival gunfight. Ennio Morricone's quirky score is arguably the film's highpoint, sending up his own work: the bouncy, laid-back Main Title, the duel music aping Once Upon a Time in the West's Harmonica theme, and of course, the Wild Bunch's theme with Ride of the Valkyries blaring on car horns and ocarina.

Terence Hill (March or Die) plays a variation on his lovable scamp from They Call Me Trinity. His gags are hit-and-miss but Hill's laid-back, effortless charm easily wins over the audience. Henry Fonda coasts through his part, and one figures he's paying Leone back for his great villain in Once Upon a Time in the West. Jean Martin (The Battle of Algiers) is oddly cast as a colorless bad guy. Supporting roles are an interesting mix of Spaghetti Western favorites like Mario Brega (Death Rides a Horse) and Antoine Saint-John (Duck, You Sucker!), and American actors Geoffrey Lewis (Dillinger), Neil Summers (The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean), R.G. Armstrong (Ride the High Country) and Steve Kanaly (The Wind and the Lion).

Ultimately, how much you like My Name is Nobody depends on how much you like cartoon slapstick and wackiness. There's enough action and grace notes to keep others interested, but overall it's underwhelming.