By Rick Anderson

For Grays Harbor News Group

In the interest of accuracy, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” ought to be retitled “The Relative Good, the Seldom-Seen Bad and the Scene-Stealing Ugly.”

The best-known of Italian director Sergio Leone’s spaghetti Westerns is far more complex than its simplistic title suggests. It is not a movie everyone will enjoy, but it is so well-crafted that it attains a type of grandeur unusual in a Western.

The 1966 film will be shown Saturday and Sunday in Hoquiam as part of the 7th Street Theatre’s Silver Screen Classic series.

Clint Eastwood stars as Leone’s iconic Man With No Name, called Blondie (aka the Good) in this film.

In a story set during the American Civil War, he is a bounty hunter running a confidence game in partnership with the outlaw Tuco (the Ugly), played by Eli Wallach. With Tuco boasting a rap sheet as long as Shaquille O’Neal’s arm, Blondie turns in the outlaw to pocket the reward, then rescues him from the gallows. With the reward money in hand, they hit the road to repeat the sting operation in another locale.

Eventually, the two become aware of a large cache of Confederate gold buried in a remote cemetery. Angel Eyes (the Bad, played by Lee Van Cleef), a sadistic mercenary who masquerades as a Union Army sergeant, also learns of the treasure.

The problem is that none of the trio knows the exact location of the gold, so they are forced to rely on one another to find it.

That’s pretty much the entire plot. It’s a tribute to Leone’s moviemaking skills that, with so thin a story, he is able to sustain audience interest in a film that lasts nearly three hours.

The movie climaxes with a truly memorable three-way shootout at the cemetery that seemingly would reward the man who draws last. That scene — and its ingenious resolution — is worth the wait.

Until then, it is the uneasy alliance between Blondie and the conniving Tuco (who spend much of the film attempting to double-cross each other) that sustains the narrative. The magnificent cinematography (it was shot in Spain) and Ennio Morricone’s mournful musical theme help fill in the gaps.

Nevertheless, this extremely violent and frequently profane film is not suitable for children. Even some adults might find the excessive length off-putting.

It’s a stretch to call Eastwood’s character “the Good.” Quick on the trigger and not above abandoning Tuco to gain a higher percentage of profits from the sting, he is a paragon of virtue only in comparison to his rivals for the gold.

But Eastwood sells the character by playing it with his customary tight-lipped authority. This was the last of the Italian Westerns that made him a star and paved the way to his legendary Hollywood career.

Still, Eastwood reportedly was fearful of being upstaged by Wallach. Those concerns were justified. Alternately gregarious, comic and ruthless, Tuco provides much of the film’s energy and nearly all of its humor.

Sketchily developed and all but disappearing during the middle portion of the movie, Van Cleef’s Angel Eyes is the least memorable of the main characters. However, he was an unlikely beneficiary of the film’s success.

Typecast in such classics as “High Noon,” “Gunfight at the O.K. Corral” and “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” as a scowling villain destined for a cheap funeral on Boot Hill, Van Cleef surprisingly was chosen as the hero of several spaghetti Westerns after Eastwood transitioned into American films.

He even enjoyed a brief stint as a leading man in the U.S., taking Yul Brynner’s role as the gang leader in one of the sequels to “The Magnificent Seven.” His romantic pairing with the much younger Stefanie Powers in that film (“The Magnificent Seven Ride”) failed to make movie magic, however, and Van Cleef returned primarily to character roles until his death in 1989.

His character in “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” is guilty of all sorts of despicable acts — at one point slapping around a prostitute.

To Leone’s astonishment, Van Cleef refused to play that scene. The actor said he had never struck a woman on or off-screen and wasn’t about to start, regardless of the script’s requirements. A stunt double was eventually enlisted to impersonate him.

So if the Good wasn’t all that good in this film, the Bad might not have been that bad after all.

“The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” will be shown Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. at the 7th Street Theatre.