Schofield Kid
The persistence of imagery throughout the film is based on the mythology of the West versus the reality. A tapestry of imagery serves to create an intricately designed web of those things which are and which are not at the same time. For instance, young man who first informs Munny of the bounty and reward calls himself the Schofield Kid…or rather suggests that people call him by that name. But since he has yet to actually kill anyone, there is very little likelihood of anyone but himself ever referring to him as the Schofield Kid. Thus he is the Schofield Kid, but he is also not Schofield Kid.
English Bob
English Bob is one of the killers coming to town to seek the bounty. He and Little Bill go way back, but the on the train trip into town, English Bob’s reputation is one of a proper British gent gone horribly bad. Later, his biographer learns that the exciting and almost noble history of English Bob as a gunslinger is not what he thought it was. English Bob isn’t even a proper British gent; as he leaves town a broken and battered victim, his Queen’s English slowly devolves into a lower class Cockney accent. English Bob, therefore, is both a proper British gent with a perverse sense nobility and a common Cockney low-life lacking nobility in all its forms.
Beauty on the Perimeter
The literal imagery surrounding the town where all this corruption and demythologizing is taking place is also an example of something that that is and is not. Little Bill’s domain is muddy, broken down, brown, ugly and filthy. Off in the distance, however, are beautiful snow-capped mountains and brilliant blue skies. This holds true for the backgrounds of nearly every outdoor scene. The action is taking place where things are ugly; off in the distance is the promise of the beautiful. So the West is presented as an ugly and filthy place and a beautiful place at the same time. Once again the imagery underlines the thematic framework of both beautiful myth and uglier truth co-existing.
Hawk
Ned challenges the Kid to a shooting contest with the target being a hawk in the sky. The Kid looks up and says he could hit it with one shot as well if he minded wasting a shot. Ned then informs him there is no hawk in the sky and this is how he and Munny learn the Kid has bad eyesight. The hawk is there but it is not there. It is both invented myth and the absence of reality.
