20 Movies That Are Flawed Masterpieces

4. Duck, You Sucker (1971)

The great and legendary Italian director Sergio Leone only helmed a mere seven movies across the span of his wonderful career, four of which are usually considered by his fans and cinephiles alike to be genuine masterpieces of the highest order (that's the Dollars Trilogy, and Once Upon a Time in the West, in case you're wondering). But there are two other movies that also deserve to stand beside his more established works - the first of which is Duck, You Sucker, a spaghetti western set on the cusp of the Mexican revolution, and starring Rod Steiger and James Coburn.

The first thing to note about Duck, You Sucker is that it's not quite as polished as Leone's famous westerns - there's a roughness about it not glimpsed in movies like The Good, the Bad and the Ugly or Once Upon a Time in the West. It's also a far looser movie, less honed in places and not entirely successful in its attempts to convey a political message. Despite those flaws, though, Duck, You Sucker is a bonafide masterpiece. It is haunting, powerful and exciting, and features a dozen memorable sequences, all backed with what is one of Ennio Morricone's finest scores. As the kind of picture that only Leone could have made, it's relentlessly entertaining to start to finish: crazy, unpredictable and beautiful.