1968 ‘C'era una volta il West’ Directed by Sergio Leone
This classic western masterpiece is an epic film about a widow whose land and life are in danger as the railroad is getting closer and closer to taking them over. A mysterious harmonica player joins forces with a desperado to protect the woman and her land.
Claudia Cardinale Henry Fonda Jason Robards Charles Bronson Gabriele Ferzetti Paolo Stoppa Woody Strode Jack Elam Keenan Wynn Frank Wolff Lionel Stander Enzo Santaniello Simonetta Santaniello Marco Zuanelli Al Mulock John Frederick Michael Harvey Benito Stefanelli Antonio Molino Rojo Fabio Testi Frank Braña Paolo Figlia Saturno Cerra Spartaco Conversi Aldo Berti Aldo Sambrell Lorenzo Robledo Bruno Corazzari Antonio Palombi Show All…
Although Sergio Leone never really made anything better or more entertaining than The Good, the Bad & the Ugly in my opinion, he did come incredibly close to repeating that cinematic feat with this spaghetti western epic. A stunning work of blazing originality & featuring precision craftsmanship in nearly all departments of filmmaking, Once Upon a Time in the West is western in its purest form that fuses breathtaking art into the legacy of Wild West unlike any other example before or after it.
The story revolves around a small chunk of land which is the region's only water source. The family that owns the land is slaughtered by Frank & his gang, after which the ownership transfers to Jill, the widow of…
A true masterpiece in every sense of the word! The opening scene takes the mundane (sweaty gunslingers with weathered faces, dripping water, pesky fly and a rusty old windmill) and literally turns it into a work of art!
A western that's so real you can almost see the beard stubble grow by the minute and the sweat trickling from your screen!
Gorgeous cinematography with soundtracks ranging from glorious, to thrilling, to haunting! An all star cast as magnificent as the film itself! (Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson, Jason Robards, Claudia Cardinale)
As lusty as it is gutsy! A place and time when guns and grimaces did all of the talking!
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Beautifully composed, shot, and told, Sergio Leone's "Once Upon a Time in the West" is well deserving of its reputation as one of the best Westerns ever made. An epic story of lawlessness, vengeance, and the women and men conquering the untamed American west, Leone's film is meditative and gritty, sweeping and violent. It compels with its carefully composed aesthetic, archetypal-yet-specifically drawn characters, and grand themes.
Steeped in dirt, sweat, and stubble, Leone's film is made up of narrative threads well-known to genre fans. Murder, westward expansion, and frontier justice dominate the plot. The story focuses on a widow whose husband owned precious water rights near the town of Flagstone. With parties trying to forcibly rid the widow of her…
"Do you know anything about a guy going around playing the harmonica? He's someone you'd remember. Instead of talking, he plays. And when he better play, he talks."
What a pleasure it was for me to finally get to watch this masterpiece which I kept on putting off because of its nearly three hour runtime. I was blown away by Sergio Leone’s direction in The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly, and that was the only film of his that I’d seen up to this point, but now I honestly can’t say which of the two films I prefer. This is perhaps a better film because it is set on a grander and epic scale, but perhaps not as entertaining…
"There were no dollars in them days."
All of Sergio Leone's westerns have been about the arrival of capitalism (both to the historical American West and to then-contemporary 1960's Italy), but Once Upon a Time in the West takes a slightly more specific perspective. Instead of looking at the (monetary) value of life, it uses the symbol of the cowboy to chart how the arrival of capital and industry parallels the decline of traditional male heroism. Industrialization causes heroic masculinity to defensively over-inflate and begin to collapse in on itself. The film takes this macho war hero whose glory days are behind him and shows how society is moving forward without him. Removed from the spotlight, this symbolic centerpiece is…
Masterpiece
Beyond the fact that this is one of the greatest movies ever made, this movie teaches you one very important lesson. DON'T F*CK WITH CHARLES BRONSON.
Vi esta película de pequeño y se me quedó grabada a fuego.
No me gustaría ser el forajido y escuchar el sonido de esa armónica cuya melodía habla por el propio hombre susurrando en el oeste la hora de una muerte que se hace esperar.
Películas como esta es lo que se llama de culto, al igual que muchos otros westerns de los 60s.
Perfection. I had almost forgotten how beautiful this is. Every shot is art. And Morricone's music is of course perfect. He's always great, but working with Leone he managed to come up with something extra special. Leone's way of letting characters act with their eyes is perfected here as well. Everything here is perfect basically.
Acho inacreditável como Leone, em tão pouco tempo, consegue criar um filme mais impecável que o outro, e depois de ver “The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly”, não achava que poderia manter seu nível ou ultrapassa-lo. Coisa de mestre mesmo.
A beautiful cinematic experience; the definitive Western. The plot unfolds with a naturalness and confidence, in cinematic language more often than dialog. It's stunning. The contrast between the opening scene and the closing segment is elegant and simple. Civilization approaches and here is the swansong of the gunfighter.
Once Upon a Time in The West is the 13th entry on my own Western History Marathon, following The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.
This made me totally speechless from the first watch, it's just too much to take in
Is this Leone's apex? I would not be that surprised if it actually was to be considered as such. His vision is just perfectly pulled off in here and its without questioning still capable to be the most emotional of all his westerns until now.
Considerably comparable with The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, it's as if this film worked as the other side on the same of the coin in relation to the Dollar Trilogy's climax, similar…
The story of Once Upon A Time In The West is not quite as captivating or entertaining as that of The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly (in my opinion), but both films confirm Sergio Leone as one of the great genre stylists in film.
Happy 80th Birthday to Claudia Cardinale! Who is great here as Jill McBain. Who arrives in town, only to find out that her entire family has been murdered thanks to some shady land dealings. I’ve actually seen this film in the theater before and EPIC just doesn’t seem like the right word to describe it, as it runs 2 hours 44 min! It literally took me all evening to watch this, while we had Sunday Night tacos! Like, I said, I saw this in the theater a few years ago and it’s ALWAYS a 4.5 for me! There are some pretty powerful themes that run throughout and I would consider this to be one of the very best westerns from…
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