The Story (continued)
Noticing
a well-dressed McCormick strolling out of the Hotel Bristol across
the street (accompanied on his arm by a Mexican chiquita, Senorita
Lopez (Jacqueline Dalya), flashing a low-cut dress and carrying a
parasol), the two rush toward him. Their former boss smoothly invites
them to talk business and have a drink in a cantina. They enter the
bar - shot in a mirror reflection - and are immediately offered an
excuse for not being paid: "The fact is, I haven't been paid
off on that contract yet myself. If I had the money, you'd get it
first thing. You know that." He then offers them more contract
work or partial payment (with the balance paid later).
Not wanting to be suckers again by getting all "liquored
up," they demand all their money "right here and now." The
burly McCormick reaches for a whiskey bottle and strikes Curtin across
the face with it. In a rough, dirty fist-fight, the two gang up and
finally wear their opponent down, beating the man senseless in the
brawl until he admits: "I'm licked." They extract and count
out their swindled pay from their defeated enemy's bulging wallet,
fling the remainder of the bills contemptuously at his bloodied body,
and then tip the bartender
"for the drinks and the use of the cantina."
At a water fountain while the two victorious Americans
bathe their wounds and rinse away blood after defeating their common
enemy, Dobbs suggests that they quit hanging around Tampico waiting
for a job. They'll only spend their money and end up being bums again
- "pushin' guys for dimes and sleepin' around in freight cars." Prompted
by Howard's stories of prospecting, Dobbs fervently proposes that
they consider "gold-digging" - with well-oiled, poetic
phrases:
Why not try gold diggin' for a change? Well, it ain't
any riskier than waitin' around here for a break. And this is the
country where the nuggets of gold are just cryin' for ya to take
'em out of the ground and make 'em shine in coins and on the fingers
and necks of swell dames.
Their "money would last longer" while they
lived more cheaply out in the open:
"The longer it lasts, the greater our chance of diggin' something
up would be!"
With the right equipment - picks, spades, pans, and burros - and the
experienced guidance of Howard who can speak Spanish (with the local
Mexicans and Indians), they decide that prospecting may be rewarding
without much effort:
Dobbs: (skeptically) He's too old to take along with
us, of course. We'd have to pack him on our backs.
Curtin: You can't tell about some of those old guys. It's surprising
sometimes how tough they are. I don't know what gold looks like in
the ground. I've only seen it in jewelry store windows and people's
mouths. Do you know anything about prospectin'?
Dobbs: Eh, not much, when you come right down to it.
Curtin: We might have real use for an experienced guy like that old-timer.
Dobbs: Let's go hunt him up right away.
Howard is delighted to be given the opportunity to
gamble on gold once more:
Of course I'll go. Any time, any day. I was only
waiting for one or two guys to ask me. Out for gold? Always at
your service.
By pooling their limited resources - their $150 each
with Howard's $200 of investment money, they have a total of $500
between them for their venture:
"If you don't take a risk, you can't make a gain." Still
short of funds, Howard doubts that it is "enough to buy the tools
and weapons and the essential provisions...Meat's one thing and bandit's
another. Bandit country is where we'll be going. We ought to have six
hundred bucks between us." Dobbs' feverish wish to hunt for gold
is quickly deflated and he lowers his head in depression. Only a few
feet away, the Mexican boy who sold him a lottery ticket days earlier
recognizes his lucky customer and demands his ten percent share for
having sold him the prize-winning ticket: 3-7-2-1 [an unlucky sum of
13]. The ticket wins a 200 pesos prize and Dobbs is thrilled by his
monetary gain:
Just look at that fat, rich, printed number! That's
the kind of sugar Papa likes. Oh, two hundred pesos! Welcome, sweet
little smackeroos. (He kisses his lottery ticket.)
Dobbs gives a percentage share of his winnings to the
boy and then decides to add the rest of his winnings, all 200 pesos,
to their stake so that their expedition can be properly financed:
(To Curtin) This is an all-or-nothing proposition,
ain't it? If we make a find, we'll be lightin' our cigars with
hundred dollar bills. If we don't, the difference between what
you put up and what I put up ain't enough to keep me from being
right back where I was this afternoon, polishing a bench with the
seat of my pants. Put 'er there, pard.
Making a huge show of his faithful partnership, Dobbs
extends his hand toward Curtin for a handshake in a jovial expression
of camaraderie, in front of a 'framed' closeup of Howard's face.
The prospector knowingly looks up at the two of them, realizing full
well what gold can do to such demonstrations of brotherly feelings
and vows of undying comradeship.
In the next scene, the trio are in the third class
compartment of a rattling train (crowded with Indians and Mestizos)
headed from Tampico for Durango, toward the remote Sierra Madre Mountains
in search of gold. Holding a map on his knees, Howard discusses with
Curtin (while Dobbs dozes) how they must stay off the beaten track
- with allusions to the ever-present dangers:
We gotta go where there's no trails at all - where
you can be positive that no surveyor or anybody who knows anything
about prospectin' has ever been there before.
All of a sudden, the train's brakes are applied and
it jolts to a halt - as bullets sing through the windows of the coach.
Mexican bandits attack the train from a hillside and from horseback.
Howard shouts in Mexican toward the passengers: "Echense al
piso, pronto. De barriga, andenle." (On the floor everybody.
Lie down quick.) The three reach in their luggage for their weapons
and fire through the windows at the bandits, killing or wounding
some of them (joined by Mexican troops ready for the ambush).
The train picks up speed again as the last of the remaining
bandits, their disreputable leader - one who wears a gold-colored
sombrero and flashes a gold tooth - dubbed Gold Hat (Alfonso Bedoya)
- gallops alongside the train and trades fire with Dobbs. He brags
about his ability to shoot three of the bandits, but regrets missing
the leader - [the personification of the evil side of gold]:
That bandit with the Gold Hat that rode alongside
the train - I had my sights on him nice as you please, but the
train gave a jolt and I missed him. Sure wish I'd got him.
After the bandits are driven away, a conductor non-chalantly
announces that not too many passengers were killed in the ambush
in the dangerous, foreign territory: "Big boulder on the track
so train stop. Bandits get big surprise because soldiers on the train
waiting for them - not many passengers got killed."
Howard has picked up his map from the floor and continues as if nothing
had happened:
Now here's where we're bound for - hereabouts. It
don't show properly whether it's mountain, swamp, or desert. That
shows the makers of the map themselves don't know for sure. Now
once on the ground, all we got to do is open our eyes and look
around. Yeah, and blow our noses too. Believe it or not, I knew
a feller once who could smell gold just like a jackass can smell
water.
Later, outside a general store in the small village
of Durango, where the pack burros and supplies are selected, purchased,
and accounted for by Howard (with an experienced eye and knowledge
of the native customs and language), the storekeeper tells them about
where they are traveling - translated by a cheery Howard:
We're going into the country that's very wild and
dangerous. Have to cut our way through jungles and climb mountains
so high that rise above the clouds. With tigers so big and strong
they can climb trees with burros in their mouths...Good! Glad to
hear such tall tales 'cause that means mighty few outsiders have
ever set foot there.
They saddle their burros and soon are climbing into
the mountains of the Sierra Madre. After a few days, both Dobbs and
Curtin are in tow - sweaty, exhausted, and staggering to keep up
with the fast, jaunty pace set by the hardy Howard. Dobbs wants Howard
to slow down his blistering trail up the steep mountainside, dropping
to the ground with Curtin for a much-needed water break. With less
excitement than earlier expressed, Dobbs begins to show the first
signs of bitterness. He bickers, complaining about the older man,
and Curtin has second thoughts about prospecting:
Dobbs: Hey, if there was gold in them mountains,
how long would it have been there? Millions and millions of years,
wouldn't it? So what's our hurry? A couple of days more or less
ain't gonna make any difference.
Curtin: Remember what you said back in Tampico about having to pack
an old man on our backs?
Dobbs: That was when I took him for an ordinary human being - not
part goat. Look at him climb, will ya? (They both watch Howard climb
quickly up the tortuous, steep slope.)
Curtin: What gets me is how he can go all day long in the sun without
any water.
Dobbs: Maybe he's part camel too.
Curtin: If I'd known what prospecting meant, I'd have stayed in Tampico
and waited for another job to turn up.
Dobbs glances at a gold-streaked rock on the ground
and feverishly notices yellow glittering specks "like gold." They
euphorically splash water around, talking about striking it rich
in the "Mother Lode," and calling Howard back to examine
their find of veins in the rocks. Howard deflates the greenhorns'
expectations by identifying the veins as pyrites or fool's gold -
essentially worthless rock: "This stuff wouldn't pay you dinner
for a carload." With a jaundiced look, he warns them to be more
careful about wasting water: "Next time you fellas strike it
rich, holler for me, will ya, before you start splashing water around.
Water's precious. Sometimes it can be more precious than gold."
He winks knowledgeably at them - toward the camera - and proceeds on.
In the next scene, they are traveling across flatter
country, with hills dotted by cactus. Indifferent to the prospectors'
journey, nature buffets them with a fierce, howling windstorm - "a
norther" according to Howard -
"big winds from the north this time of year. When they blow hard,
this desert country stands right up on its hind legs." And then
they are soon cutting through thick jungle underbrush, cutting the
growth in the valley with machetes. Howard predicts that they are close
to their goal: "I reckon there's only a few more yards of this
heavy stuff. Pretty soon, we'll be out of this valley."
Then dripping rains fall on them, as Howard tirelessly pushes them
on. That night around a small campfire cooking beans on a skillet,
Dobbs and Curtin are too tired to eat and lie sound asleep next to
the fire, while Howard dines (and extols the great food) and then serenades
them with his harmonica.
Hey you fellas, how about some beans? Ya want some
beans? Goin' through some mighty rough country tomorrow - you better
have some beans!
The following day in the middle of the Mexican wilderness,
Dobbs is thoroughly beat, fatigued, and pessimistic. He admits failure
and wants to turn around:
Dobbs: You know what I'm thinkin'. I'm thinkin' we
ought to give up. Leave the whole outfit - everything behind and
go back to civilization.
Howard: What's that you say? Go back? Ha, ha. Well, tell my old grandmother!
I've got two very elegant bedfellows who kick at the first drop of
rain and hide in the closet when thunder rumbles. My, my, my, what
great prospectors, two shoe clerks readin' a magazine about prospectin'
for gold in the land of the midnight sun, south of the border, or
west of the Rockies, ha, ha, ha...
Dobbs (picking up a rock and threatening): Shut your trap! Shut up
or I'll smash your head flat.
Howard: Go ahead, go ahead, throw it. If you did, you'd never leave
this wilderness alive. Without me, you two would die here more miserable
than rats.
Curtin: (after restraining Dobbs) Aw, leave him alone. Can't you
see the old man's nuts?
Howard wonders who is truly "nuts" - calling
them two "dumb specimens":
Let me tell you something, my two fine bedfellows,
you're so dumb, there's nothin' to compare ya with, you're dumber
than the dumbest jackass. Look at each other, will ya? Did you
ever see anything like yourself for bein' dumb specimens.
Then he spontaneously dances a jig in front of them,
pounding his feet into the soil laced with gold while mocking them:
You're so dumb, you don't even see the riches you're
treadin' on with your own feet. (Howard bursts into laughter, howling
at them. He picks up some of the earth, as the two drop to their
knees scratching at the ground.) Yeah, don't expect to find nuggets
of molten gold. It's rich but not that rich. And here ain't the
place to dig. It comes from someplace further up. Up there, up
there's where we've got to go. UP THERE!
There's a further ascent that they must make. Howard
turns and points (with a camera pan shot) toward a towering mountain
peak behind them - or to the heavens, fates and beyond. The soundtrack
accentuates his words. By a stream, a close-up of water swirling
in Howard's mining pan dissolves into view. Dobbs and Curtin look
in amazement at the grit in Howard's pan, noticing that the gold
doesn't look "much different from sand...plain sand. It don't
glitter - I thought it would glitter." The old prospector emphasizes
that gold is arbitrarily valued - it's "some other guy's job":
It'll glitter when it's refined. That's some other
guy's job. All we gotta do is mine it and get it back there. You
know, gold ain't like stones in a riverbed. It don't cry out to
be picked up. You got to know how to recognize it. And the findin'
ain't all. Not by a long shot. You got to know how to tickle her,
so she'll come out laughin'. Yeah, it's mighty rich. It will pay
good...Oh about twenty ounces to the ton.
The amount that they can expect to mine each week is
dependent upon "how hard we work." Howard proposes pitching
their camp a mile or two away down the mountainside, just in case
somebody happens by. Filing a claim would also not be profitable.
Soon an emissary from a big mining company would turn up with a paper
in his hand claiming rights to the mine. Then, he grins at his companions:
Well, how does it feel, you fellers, to be men of
property?
After a few weeks, they have built a long, wooden sluiceway
to sift the dirt taken from the mine. Dobbs looks back at his former
innocence:
I sure had some cockeyed ideas about prospectin'
for gold. It was all in the finding I thought. I thought all you
had to do was find it, pick it up, put it in sacks, and carry 'em
off to the nearest bank.
They test their water sluice, opening the gate and
letting water run down to wash the sand and separate it from the
gold. Their gold-find brings temporary and tentative unity among
the group as they work side-by-side to mine the valuable gold dust.
One fateful night at their camp - a turning point in
the film, a close-up reveals a scale where the proceeds of the day's
work are weighed. [The division of their gold shares also divides
the unity of the group and escalates the growth of their mutual suspicions,
friction and paranoia.] Howard estimates that the gold dust they
have collected is valued close to five thousand dollars worth. Dobbs
is impatient to begin dividing the gold:
When are we gonna start dividing it up?
Curtin doesn't agree with splitting the loot so soon: "What
the use of dividing it at all? I don't see any point. We're all going
back together when the time comes. Why don't we wait until we get
paid for the stuff and then just divide up the money?" Dobbs
argues "for dividing it up as we go along. Make each guy responsible
for his own goods." Thinking himself the "most trustworthy
of the three," Howard thinks he could have guarded all their
portions. That would have been a better alternative than letting
the untrustworthy Dobbs ("a thief at heart") watch over
the goods:
Howard: Suppose you were charged with takin' care
of the goods. One day I'm deep in the bush and Curtin's on his
way to the village to get provisions. That'd be your big chance
to pack up and leave us in the cold.
Dobbs: (offended) Only a guy that's a thief at heart would think
me likely to do a thing like that!
Howard believes his age and slowness would keep him
trustworthy and prevent him from running away with the loot. Instead
of pooling their treasures together, they decide to evenly cut up
the proceeds three ways every night - that would relieve Howard of
the distasteful responsibility of watching all the earnings. Each
man will have to hide his share of the treasure from the other two:
Howard: After we save and got a couple of hundred
ounces, it'll be a nuisance carryin' little bags hangin' from our
necks, and each of us will have to hide his share of the treasure
from the other two - and having done so (he chuckles to himself)
will be forever on the watch that his hiding place is not discovered.
Dobbs: What a dirty filthy mind you've got.
Howard: Oh no, not dirty, not dirty baby. Only I know what kind of
ideas even supposedly decent people get when gold's at stake.
The gleam in Dobbs' glowing eyes is one of sinister
greed, guarded anxiety and imagined mistrust, as the old man weighs
the gold dust and divides the delicate grains of sand on the scale
into tiny bags. Dobbs begins to feel suspicious and fearful of his
two partners. |