An appreciation of 'il brutto' aka the late actor Eli Wallach

An ability to project villainy or cynicism or worldly power, often while mounted on a horse, was Eli Wallach’s calling card in the movies. But he also had a kind of stern, cerebral handsomeness.

For the film world in which he worked for more than half a century, Eli Wallach established his brand identity as “il brutto”, the Ugly, in Sergio Leone’s 1966 spaghetti western Il Buono, Il Brutto, Il Cattivo or The Good, The Bad And The Ugly (Lee Van Cleef was the Bad and Clint Eastwood, notionally, was the Good).