26/01/2011

Once Upon A Time In The West/C'era una Volta il west - 1968 USA/Italy d: Sergio Leone



I must make clear my colours. I have seen this film many, many times - well into double figures.  I have travelled across the UK to see this film at cinema screenings.  Sometimes the sheer majesty of this film actually makes me shed tears of awe.  I have considered this film to be the greatest film ever made since I was about 15.  This will not be an objective review, this will be me selling it to you.

In many ways Sergio Leone was a most post-modern film-maker.  His was a cinema of looking back and reworking - most famously Fistful Of Dollars was a revisioning of Kurosawa's Yojimbo - and from the very start Once Upon A Time In The West was intended as a "greatest hits" package ode to the classic Western. Leone sat down with two leading Italian film critics (Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento) and the three of them watched classic Westerns and moulded them together to create the ultimate elegy to the Wild West - the über-Western.  The main body of ...West is practically a remake of Nicholas Ray's eccentric masterpiece Johnny Guitar but amplified to epic proportions. Added to this were healthy dollops of High Noon, The Iron Horse, The Searchers and others and much from epic European opera tradition. However, despite this, the end product is its own film. And what a film.

The basic elements of cinema are visual and sound. Leone realised this and thrust these elements to the fore. There may be a story, there may be characters, but these are secondary to the sensory experience. The film is awe-inspiring in its visual construction.  Shot choice, camerawork, light, shade, sets, costumes - all honed to perfection.



And the sound!  The music by Ennio Morricone is one of his greatest achievements.  Furthering the Wagnerian opera comparisons, Morricone and Leone use leitmotif, giving every main character a theme. Camera moves are synchronised to the music, at times the senses are almost overwhelmed.  Added to this, natural and background sounds are heightened almost to act as music themselves - especially in the legendary opening sequence.

The characters are really ciphers. This is opera, not soap opera. Each character represents something mythic and folkloric - the avenging angel/demon, the completely evil villain, the romantic bandit, the corrupt business man and the whore with the heart of gold who becomes the mother of a nation. This is heady stuff and Leone knew exactly what he was doing. He was tired of Westerns and desperately wanted to make Once Upon A Time In America (he would have to wait nearly two decades to achieve this) but the studio and the audience wanted more Westerns, so he decided to make the Western to top them all.  Which he did, and all at a stately, measured pace a far cry from the hurried action films to which people were accustomed.



Perfect is a dangerous word to use, but I cannot find flaw in this film. With each viewing my regard for it has risen, and seeing it as beautifully rendered as one can now in these days of DVD upsampling confimed everything I have felt for 25 years.  This is the greatest film ever made.  A perfect piece of cinema and a colossal artictic achievement.

There is nothing better.  I feel I actually owe Leone for what he gave me and the world. See this film. Experience this film.  Feel the awe.

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