Sergio Sollima’s The Big Gundown is a pivotal film in the genre of Spaghetti Westerns. Unlike, the usual ‘buddy’ westerns featuring two opposite characters who end up working towards a common goal, majority of The Big Gundown is about Lee Van Cleef’s search for a heinous criminal. However, it is this journey which becomes an investigation into how we perceive crime, the economic forces which dictate social actions, and how an individual makes a judgment on fellow human beings. Sergio Sollima along with Sergio Donati adapted a story by Franco Solinas (known for The Battle of Algiers), and Fernando Morandi to create a rare spectacle, one which delves on a range of issues from race, crime, to class divide which afflict our society.