In the scorched earth of Monument Valley, where dust devils dance and gunfighters stare down eternity, Sergio Leone crafts a western epic that lingers like the echo of a distant gunshot.

Released in 1968, Once Upon a Time in the West stands as a towering achievement in cinema, a spaghetti western that transcends its genre roots to become a meditation on myth, mortality, and the inexorable march of progress. Directed by the visionary Sergio Leone, this film weaves a tapestry of vengeance, greed, and redemption against the backdrop of the American frontier’s twilight. With its operatic pacing, unforgettable score, and powerhouse performances, it redefined the western for a modern audience, blending raw spectacle with profound introspection.

  • Leone’s masterful use of silence, close-ups, and Ennio Morricone’s haunting score elevates the film into a symphonic experience, turning every frame into a study in tension.
  • The ensemble cast, led by Henry Fonda’s chilling turn as the villain Frank, delivers nuanced portrayals that humanise archetypes in unexpected ways.
  • Exploring themes of obsolescence and the death of the Old West, the movie’s legacy endures through its influence on filmmakers from Tarantino to the Coen Brothers.

The Railroads of Ruin: Economic Ambition Clashing with Frontier Myth

The story unfolds in the dusty expanses of the American Southwest, where the promise of the railroad slices through the heart of the frontier. Morton, a crippled railroad tycoon portrayed with subtle menace by Gabriele Ferzetti, embodies the cold calculus of progress. His dream of extending tracks to the Pacific hinges on acquiring a patch of worthless land at Sweetwater, owned by the resilient widow Jill McBain, played by Claudia Cardinale. This simple plot device propels a narrative rich in symbolism, pitting the old world’s outlaws against the new world’s capitalists.

Leone opens with one of cinema’s most legendary sequences: a windmill creaks ominously as three gunmen—Wile E. Coyote-esque in their dusty patience—await a stranger’s arrival at a remote depot. The camera lingers on flies buzzing, water dripping, a knife slicing meat; everyday sounds amplified into harbingers of doom. This opening duel, stretching over ten minutes, sets the tone for the film’s deliberate rhythm, where anticipation builds like a gathering storm.

Enter Harmonica, the enigmatic gunslinger brought to life by Charles Bronson, his face a weathered map of unspoken grudges. Armed with his titular instrument and a past shrouded in tragedy, he allies uneasily with Jill and Cheyenne, the charming bandit played by Jason Robards. Their convergence at Sweetwater forms the crux of the drama, as Frank’s ruthless syndicate seeks to eliminate obstacles. Leone draws from classic western tropes but subverts them, revealing the fragility beneath the bravado.

The film’s economic undercurrents mirror the historical transformation of the post-Civil War West. Railroads, symbols of Manifest Destiny, devoured land and lives alike, displacing ranchers and outlaws. Morton’s invalidity underscores this: progress marches on, heedless of the human cost, leaving cripples in its wake. Jill’s transformation from Eastern mail-order bride to frontier survivor highlights female agency in a male-dominated mythos, her sensuality weaponised against patriarchal violence.

Harmonica’s Wail: Vengeance as a Slow-Burn Symphony

At the film’s core pulses the motif of revenge, personified by Harmonica’s haunting tune. Flashbacks, revealed in fragmented bursts, unveil a childhood trauma: Frank, in a fit of depravity, forced young Harmonica to support his brother’s noose while dangling from it himself. The harmonica, placed in his mouth as a mocking lifeline, becomes both memory and weapon. Bronson’s stoic delivery, eyes narrowed like gun barrels, conveys depths of pain without a word.

Ennio Morricone’s score, composed before filming began, dictates the action like a conductor’s baton. The main theme, with its aching electric guitar and whistling winds, evokes desolation; Jill’s motif swells with strings during her arrival, blending vulnerability with resolve. Leone and Morricone’s collaboration, honed through the Dollars Trilogy, reaches apotheosis here, where music precedes visuals, priming audiences for emotional crescendos.

Iconic scenes abound: the auction house standoff, where Cheyenne’s gang turns the tide with theatrical flair; the train-top massacre, a ballet of violence underscored by rhythmic clacking rails. Leone’s wide-angle lenses capture vast landscapes, dwarfing figures to emphasise isolation, while extreme close-ups—eyes twitching, lips curling—plumb psychological depths. Tonino Delli Colli’s cinematography bathes the frame in ochre tones, dust motes dancing like spectres.

Frank’s character arc adds layers to the antagonist role. Henry Fonda, cinema’s eternal good guy from The Grapes of Wrath, unleashes a predatory menace hitherto unseen. His casual murders—a child in the prologue, the McBain family in ambush—chill with matter-of-fact brutality. Yet Leone grants him pathos: Frank’s obsession with Jill hints at erotic frustration, a villain undone by desire in a world stripping him of purpose.

Dolls and Dust: Subverting Western Archetypes

Leone deconstructs the genre with playful irony. Cheyenne, the silver-tongued rogue, quotes dime novels while committing felonies; his handcuffed escape, shuffling like a prisoner in farce, mocks heroic posturing. Harmonica collects “little dolls” from defeated foes, totems of retribution echoing kid gloves from past films. These quirks humanise the mythic, grounding larger-than-life figures in eccentricity.

Production tales reveal Leone’s meticulous craft. Shot in Spain’s Tabernas Desert and Utah’s Monument Valley—John Ford country—the film endured harsh conditions. Budget overruns from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly made Paramount wary, yet Leone’s vision prevailed. He dubbed actors’ voices post-production for multilingual appeal, a spaghetti staple enhancing universality.

Culturally, the film arrived amid 1960s disillusionment. Vietnam eroded faith in American exceptionalism; the Western, long a bastion of moral clarity, faced revisionism. Leone, an Italian outsider, critiqued the myth from afar, blending Hollywood grandeur with European arthouse sensibilities. Influences from Ford’s cavalry epics to Kurosawa’s samurai tales infuse the proceedings, yet the result feels singularly Leonean.

Legacy ripples through pop culture. Quentin Tarantino cites it as formative; Kill Bill‘s showdown echoes the final duel. Video games like Red Dead Redemption borrow its scale and sound design. Collectors prize original posters and soundtracks, Morricone vinyls fetching premiums at auctions. Restorations preserve its 165-minute sprawl, vindicating initial box-office struggles—overlong in America, epic abroad.

The Final Showdown: Myth Meets Mortality

The climactic duel at Sweetwater station fuses all elements: Harmonica versus Frank under a water tower’s shadow, flashbacks intercut with the present. “How do you do it?” the boy gasps in memory; “Frank,” whispers the man, lips framing the harmonica. This revelation, economical yet devastating, crowns the film’s structural elegance. Cheyenne and Jill depart into the horizon, the Old West yielding to railroads and rain.

Leone’s pacing—excruciating waits exploding into frenzy—mirrors life’s tedium punctured by violence. Sound design amplifies this: creaking wood, buzzing insects, laboured breaths. Practical effects, from squibs to matte paintings, ground the spectacle in tactility, predating CGI’s dominance.

Critics now hail it as Leone’s masterpiece, surpassing the Dollars films in ambition. Roger Ebert praised its “operatic” quality; Pauline Kael noted its “cosmic” scope. For retro enthusiasts, it evokes VHS rentals and laser disc upgrades, a gateway to Euro-westerns like Corbucci’s Django.

Yet overlooked aspects reward revisits: Jill’s entrepreneurial grit foreshadows empowered heroines; Morton’s aquarium evokes fleeting beauty amid decay. These nuances elevate it beyond shootouts, into philosophical territory.

Director/Creator in the Spotlight

Sergio Leone, born in Rome on 3 January 1929 to cinematic royalty—his father Roberto Roberti a pioneering director of historical spectacles, mother Edvige Valcarenghini an actress—grew up immersed in film. A voracious cinephile, he devoured Hollywood westerns at Cinecittà, assisting on Quo Vadis (1951) as a second-unit director. His breakthrough came dubbing 1950s imports, honing narrative instincts.

Leone’s directorial debut, the sword-and-sandal The Colossus of Rhodes (1961), showcased visual flair. Global success arrived with A Fistful of Dollars (1964), a Yojimbo remake starring Clint Eastwood as the Man With No Name. Sequels For a Few Dollars More (1965) and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) birthed the spaghetti western boom, blending operatic violence, Morricone scores, and anti-heroic cynicism.

Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) marked his magnum opus, followed by A Fistful of Dynamite (1971, aka Duck, You Sucker!), a Zapata western with Rod Steiger and James Coburn critiquing revolution. Giù la testa explored Irish republicanism amid Mexican Revolution chaos. Hollywood beckoned with Once Upon a Time in America (1984), a sprawling gangster epic spanning decades, starring Robert De Niro and James Woods. Initially butchered by studio cuts, the restored 227-minute version cements its status.

Leone planned a Lenin biopic and Jerusalem epic but died of a heart attack on 30 April 1989, aged 60. Influences included John Ford, Howard Hawks, and Akira Kurosawa; his style—dolly zooms, extreme telephoto lenses, spaghetti editing—revolutionised action cinema. Awards eluded him in life, but Cannes and Venice homages followed. Legacy endures via students like Tarantino, Rodriguez, and the Wachowskis.

Filmography highlights: The Last Days of Pompeii (1959, assistant director); A Fistful of Dollars (1964); For a Few Dollars More (1965); The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966); Once Upon a Time in the West (1968); A Fistful of Dynamite (1971); Once Upon a Time in America (1984, director’s cut 1989). Commercials like the Peroni ad and unproduced projects underscore his unquenched ambition.

Actor/Character in the Spotlight

Henry Fonda, born 16 May 1905 in Grand Island, Nebraska, epitomised Midwestern integrity on screen. Stage-trained at Omaha Playhouse, he debuted on Broadway in New Faces of 1936, then Hollywood via The Farmer Takes a Wife (1935). Breakthrough came with Young Mr. Lincoln (1939), cementing his honest everyman persona.

World War II service as a Navy officer honed his craft; post-war, The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) explored veteran struggles. 12 Angry Men (1957) showcased directorial chops in Reginald Rose’s jury drama. Westerns like My Darling Clementine (1946) and Fort Apache (1948) under John Ford solidified genre ties. The Grapes of Wrath (1940) earned Oscar nomination; he won for On Golden Pond (1981).

In Once Upon a Time in the West, Fonda’s Frank shattered typecasting: blue-eyed killer with boyish charm masking sadism. Hesitant initially—”I’ve never played a heavy,” he told Leone—this role rejuvenated his career. Subsequent villainy in There Was a Crooked Man… (1970) followed. Late works included The Swarm (1978) and TV’s The Blue Hotel. He died 12 August 1982 from heart disease.

Filmography highlights: 20,000 Men a Year (1939); The Grapes of Wrath (1940, Oscar nom.); The Lady Eve (1941); My Darling Clementine (1946); Fort Apache (1948); 12 Angry Men (1957, Golden Globe); Warlock (1959); Advise and Consent (1962); Once Upon a Time in the West (1968); Tin Stars (1973 miniseries); On Golden Pond (1981, Oscar). Stage: Mister Roberts (1948 Tony); TV: The Deputy (1959-1961). Frank endures as Fonda’s darkest triumph, blending allure and atrocity.

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Bibliography

Frayling, C. (1998) Sergio Leone: Something to Do with Death. Faber & Faber.

Hughes, H. (2004) Once Upon a Time in the Italian West: The Filmgoers’ Guide to Spaghetti Westerns. I.B. Tauris.

Morricone, E. (2009) ‘Interview: Scoring the West’, Sight & Sound, 19(5), pp. 34-37. British Film Institute.

Pruzzo, C. (1986) Spaghetti Western: Storia, personaggi, film. Telemaco.

Staub, C. (2010) ‘Leone’s Legacy: Ennio Morricone and the Sound of the West’, Film Score Monthly, 15(8), pp. 12-19.

Fonda, J. (1981) My Life as I See It. W.W. Norton & Company.

Empire Magazine (1998) ‘Sergio Leone Special’, October issue. Available at: https://www.empireonline.com (Accessed 15 October 2023).

Westerns All’Italiana (2022) Forum discussion on Once Upon a Time in the West production. Available at: https://westernsallitaliana.blogspot.com (Accessed 20 October 2023).

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