ADDITION May 2008 - NOTE: We can confirm that the May 2008 - single disc edition released by MGM is an exact duplicated of the first disc from the 2-disc Collector's Edition. Same menus, same extras, same image and audio (same VOB files). It's a great deal if you don't want the supplements (you still get the commentary).

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ADDITION: NTSC Collector's Edition - Region 1 - May 07': Essentially this is exactly the same as the European Special Edition but has the much desired mono track. It has been transferred (progressively and properly) in NTSC. Extras are exact as well. Differences are in subs (CE is more accurate translation) and dubs but the new CE gets a thumbs up! Good work excepting we are still waiting for the long version. So far the Anthology looks good! I'll leave you with Finnur's comments below. 

Gary W. Tooze

These two releases are both from MGM and follow the familiar pattern of that studio's releases: First a barebones release comes and all the fans buy that, then after having that on offer for two years a Special Edition comes along with lots of extras and improved quality and packaging and all the fans go and buy it again!

This is probably Sergio Leone's least known film (Apart from the never mentioned Colossus of Rhodes) but it still is quite decent, even though it doesn't compare with, say, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly or Once Upon a Time in the West. Now about the DVDs:

Image Quality: The new SE is a clear winner in the areas of sharpness, detail, brightness/contrast and print quality, but the SE appears to be (most of the time, it seems to vary between shots) slightly cropped on the sides and bottom, whereas the old release is slightly cropped at the top. The colours are off on both. The old release has slightly oversaturated colours with red-blueish bias whereas the SE has leans towards greenish-yellow (See the newspaper capture) rendering skin tones unnatural in both editions. That being said both are quite watchable in any event.

You may notice that the SE version is three minutes longer than the old version. This is because a scene lasting three minutes has been restored to the film on the SE release. The shot directly succeeding this scene seems to be different between the versions. The two versions also use different titles, the old is "A Fistful of Dynamite" and the SE (despite the package title) is called "Duck You Sucker." Overall the SE has the better image.

Audio Quality: Ugh, this is where the SE release really disappoints, its only option is a 5.1 remaster that is quite probably the most screwed up remaster I've come across! The pitch correction applied to compensate for the PAL speedup makes everything sound brittle, but even that's the least of our worries here. The problem is that the track constantly uses incorrect musical cues for scenes, and for this film this is a particular issue. The 5.1 mix also uses in at least two instances censored dialogue, wheras the old DVD is uncut. The old DVD's mono soundtrack isn't super but at least it is the original mix. Old edition wins here!

Extra Material Quality: This is no comparison, the SE wins hands down.

Menus: The SE has animated menus although the animation is a little unimaginitive, it looks better than the older menus. SE wins again

Packaging: The Norwegian SE has cooler digipack design than both the UK SE and the Old version, but I do miss the artwork on the old release. I love that poster!

If you want the SE, try get the Scandinavian version like I did. The UK release has been cut by 6 seconds by the BBFC, to remove shots of horsefalls, but the Scandinavian is uncut :) The easiest way to tell between the two is the UK '15' certificate, obviously missing of the Scandinavian packaging. It's also worth mentioning that the old DVD is uncut, possibly by oversight of the BBFC at the time of submission.