His character didn't add anything of significance to the story, and dragged down the pacing of the film.
Moreover, Beauchamp was just really annoying.
His purpose was to show the romanticized version of the wild West compared to the real thing.
shareThe character is extremely important he represent the romantic myth of the western of heroic shooters with ice for blood, English Bob beleive in his own myth always talking too much and breaking people balls with the queen and all that he was more like a bully who always is talking and making treats and no one want to respond to find out if he is just bluffin or is the real deal time pass and he end up beleiving he is all that, but he just kill a drunk man, shoot unarmed chinesse worker, and have a great aim but he is not this cold blooded gungslinger of the novels and the myth neither is Little Bill
The real deal was Will and it wasent pretty he was a cold blooded murder who kill woman and children and anybody who stand in his way is clear as an old man he is living a life of regret for his past he know he was a monster
The movie is critic of the romantic aura sometimes popular culture give to outlaws and criminals, violence is not romantic or pretty is terrible and create nothing but pain and regret
People can think character as Beuchamp and ENglish Bob have nothing to do with the story but they are vital for the final message of the movie and without them this movie would have been diferent entirely
Both represent the false idealistic view of the western when Beauchamp finally find the real gungslinger in the person of Will he is not fascinated anymore he is scare as shit, his line about the poetry liberties he take to write his histories is just brilliant, popular culture romanticied violence, outlaws, war and even criminals trought novels, movies, music and any form of popular art but is diferent watch Scarface tham live in a place like Juarez or Caracas and live and see the violence and this real inidividuos is diferent watch Saving Private Ryan than be in a real war and kill another soldier with families
This movie is just brilliant is a critic of the idealization of violence trough fiction but is not preachy about his message
English Bob beleive in his own myth always talking too much and breaking people balls with the queen and all that he was more like a bully who always is talking and making treats and no one want to respond to find out if he is just bluffin or is the real deal time pass and he end up beleiving he is all that, but he just kill a drunk man, shoot unarmed chinesse worker, and have a great aim but he is not this cold blooded gungslinger of the novels and the myth neither is Little Bill
He allowed the audience to see what a piece of shit Little Bill really is.
shareLoved English Bob's scenes . It showed Little Bills penchant for violence
sharePersonally I didn't like the way the English Bob character was handled and much less his writer sidekick.
For me it reeked of cheap story telling, lacking nuance and verisimilitude, worthy of an old Bonanza episode.
I don't hate Eastwood films, but he seems to telegraph some simple tropes just to get the expected reaction.
Yeah, Clint’s always been a little cheezy with his movies but gets most of it right!
shareIt is a plot hole really. He rides into town advertising himself even though the signs coming in indicate his kind is not welcome.
So instead of stealthily trying to make his way into town to meet with the whores he makes a scene. Why?
Even if there was no Lil bill law enforcement in his way he could have tipped off the cowboys he was in town to kill 2 of them.
The English Bob character serves a number of functions in the film, most simply the function of letting the audience know what the protagonists are in for when they come to town. The fate of English Bob shows the audience that Little Bill is a competent, no-nonsense, violent lawman. All that information is established for the audience with those scenes. It's a perfect example of a screenplay showing, not telling. A lesser film would have had some character telling another character what a hard-nosed, dangerous badass Little Bill is. English Bob's character lets us see that for ourselves. It's such an elementary story function that I'm surprised you think the character added nothing of significance.
shareHe's part of the theme. The theme is that legends don't coincide with reality and many times will get slapped in the face by it. The whole movie was full of it. Dangerous gunslinger losing and being humiliated, having his best days behind him. A Billy the Kid type killer lying about all his exploits and then breaking down when he has to face the terror of killing a man. A sharpshooter who freezes in combat.
English Bob was another cautionary tale. An annoying british snob who thought he was James Bond and totally arrogant as hell. Showing how he's deadly with a pistol but when the harsh brutality of reality comes in, he gets his head tucked between his legs. His was one of the most brutal bitch slappings I've seen in movies.
Eastwood does this a lot in his later films. He runs away from the hollywood flawless looks good on film trope and shows how stuff happens in the real world.