Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)

 “How can you trust a man who wears both a belt and suspenders? The man can’t even trust his own pants. ” – Frank

Number of Times Seen – 1 (18 Jun 2014)

Brief Synopsis – A stranger comes to town and in order to protect a homestead widow from a railroad tyrant, he joins forces with a wanted outlaw.

My Take on it – Sergio Leone created some great spaghetti westerns in the 1960’s and this one is no exception.

He created some great characters and found the perfect actors to be typecast in those roles and in this movie it works extremely well.

Charles Bronson, Jason Robards and Henry Fonda are all excellent here and you never know who to root for because they all have their good and bad qualities.

Many people have problems with Leone’s way of making movies because he shot scenes deliberately slowly in order to give us a full picture as to everything happening at the time of a certain scene. This movie’s opening scene lasts close to 15 minutes with practically no dialogue at all.

In contrast he uses intricate storylines that take a while to connect but when they do, you know you are watching a great story (and movie) unfold before your very eyes.

This movie makes me want to check out even more some of his other gems.

Bottom Line – Great movie that was done exceptionally well. Deliberately slow at certain points, but if you stay patient, it’s completely worthwhile.  Three lead actors are all superb! Highly Recommended!

Rating – Oscar Worthy

_______________________________________

Check out my *updated* movie stats here

To see my reviews of Oscar Winning Performances check out this link

To see my reviews of all Oscar Best Picture Winners click here (now complete)

Here is a link to my movie index A-Z