Rating: 
Summary: Outstanding DVD of a Terrific Film ******!!!
Review: Do two things when you watch this: After watching the best of Sergio Leone's westerns, watch it again with the commentaries of Claudia Cardenale, John Milius, & John Carpenter, all of whom have remarkable insight to this splendid film.The additiional segments are wonderful, & although I've had someone ask, "Why the bit on the railroad?", when you think about it, that's really what the film is all about. The best additions the on any DVD, & fitting to Leone's film.
Rating:
Summary: Great Movie, Great DVD
Review: This movie is perhaps one of the most unappreciated westerns of all times. It still amazes me at the number of people I speak to who claim to be fans of the western genre, and yet have never even heard of this movie. While not as well known (or as fast pased) as any of Leone's "Fistful of Dollars" movies, this movie is technically superior to all of them. Leone is on top of his craft here, using the camera to highlight the actors's faces in gigantic close-ups, the shear size of them grant the actors an immediate epic status. This movie is admittedly very short on dialogue and on action, but the movie is an extreme study in mood. The style of the movie is almost operatic in its conception. I'd like to say a few words about the dvd. The transfer is bright, and with a few minor exceptions there is no noticible grit from the transfer. The commentary is a rather mixed dish, with so many actors, directors and critics contributing to it that you end up with portions of it that are very good and others that you wish would just be quiet. The Documentary on the second disc is very well done and while it employs the same people as the commentary, a much more consistent experience. If only all dvd releases could be this good! Considering the price and the quality and number of the special features, it is perhaps one of the best priced dvds on the market
Rating:
Summary: Jaw dropping
Review: Casting Fonda as the one of the meanest of all Western villians
is a masterstroke. The final duel is excellent. And the first time I watched it as a teenager, and saw how the "harmonica" came to be, my jaw was on the floor! Also, soundtrack by Morricone....what more needs to be said! Danny
Rating:
Summary: Operatic. Mythic. Epic.
Review: Operatic. Mythic. Epic. Leone's "Once Upon A Time In The West" is the ultimate Eurowestern: pastiche-pervaded and postmodern. Fonda, in his best role, plays the cold-blooded killer. Bronson, never once registering a flicker of fear across his iconic features, plays the Man With No Name. Jason Robards is the bandit. And Claudia Cardinale (the Italian hottie from Fellini's "8 1/2") plays the lady. Part revenge tale, part commentary on how technology and business tamed the lawless west, "Once Upon A Time..." is a genre film that looks like an art film: the endless deep focus foreground/background juxtapositionings make DePalma's compositions in "Blowout" look amateurish. The film contains very little dialogue. Most of the film is told via the slow unfolding of deliberate and ritualized visuals--which also helps lend a pronounced art film vibe to the proceedings. As the commentary points out, the film references approximately 100 different westerns (including most of the best work by John Ford): "High Noon", "Shane", "The Iron Horse", "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance", "The Searchers", "Johnny Guitar", "The Violent Men", "Duel in the Sun", "Stagecoach", "My Darling Clementine", "The Last Sunset", and so on. Interestingly, the shot in "Barton Fink" where Barton looks at the painting of the beach as the sound of sea surf mixes up seems to have been lifted from a scene in this film. The disc's commentary is of interest, and features Leone's biographer, John Carpenter, John Militus, Alex Cox, Bernardo Bertolucci, and others. Bertolucci--along with Dario Argento--helped assemble the original treatment of the film. Bertolucci talks about how he was heavily influenced by the French New Wave's passion for referencing genre cinema, and how he, Leone, and Argento sat down and screened every Western classic they could, and then--like Godard in "Breathless" and Tarantino in "Kill Bill"--littered the tale with as many genre homages and allusions as possible. The three short documentaries on the second disc are noteworthy and feature talking heads with the same people from the commentary--as well as others--and point out the many merits and facets of the film. Definitely one of the best DVD releases of 2003, and absolutely essential viewing, as you will be dumbstruck by scene after scene of brilliantly framed vistas and visages--and the plethora of rich and revisionist American western characters and situations. Buy or rent it today!
Rating:
Summary: Once and forever
Review: Leone took the conventions of the Western and petrified them into something of grandeur and beauty. This is western as opera, museum piece, rock symphony. The archetpyes of the Western have been transformed into myths. This is larger-than-larger-than-life. Yet, at the same time sly Leone subverted the genre by casting Henry Fonda as the heavy, Woody Strode as a cold-blooded killer, and casting a shadow over the optimistic notion of Manifest Destiny.
Leone composed and framed his images with an awesomely architectural sense. Gunmen stand like huge pillars, extreme close-ups reveal crags and valleys through people's complexions, eyes become mini oceans.
The score by Morricone ranges from sublimely beautiful to hauntingly sadistic. It reverberates and shakes every bone in your body. Bone-thrilling experience.
Rating:
Summary: Once upon a time....
Review: It seems that today there are two kinds of films being made. Those that have huge budgets, big names, release dates that are planned to exploit box office, awards and expected weekend earnings. Then there are those that are made for a "certain audience". These films wear their pretensions on there sleeves and in doing so attempt to be branded as something "daring" or
"special" because they don't have "studio" support. I don't mean to imply that some of these films (large or small budgets) don't have merit and are not good or even great films, as there are many that most certainly are. 30 years ago, Paramount wanted to capitalize on the "dollars" being generated by the Leone/Eastwood/Morricone trilogy. With a blank check and Henry Fonda, Sergio Leone succeeded in making a western that would fail to ignite at america's box office, garner mostly negative reviews and end up being hacked up by its
parent, Paramount. What Leone and Parmount could not have known at the time was that Leone's 3 hour homage to cinema would take its place in the company of films like Welles's "Touch of Evil", Laughton's "Night of the Hunter", Capra's "It's a wonderful Life"
and Scott's "BladeRunner", etc. These films and others rejected,
disowned, chopped and forgotten, would join that small group of masterpieces from all mediums of artistic expression with the magic to reach into time and find audiences decade after decade. Today, Leones beautiful and sad meditation on the end of an america that never existed, takes its place in the pantheon of greatest films ever made. See the accolades on the "IMDB" top 250 films, reviews from critics coast to coast on "Rotten Tomatoes", film makers from Tarantino to Scorsese and most of all,
those of us who have seen and been touched by this great film through the years since its creation. Today we have a beautiful
representation of a great directors gift to the myth of an america that never was. It seems that Paramount has at last done right by Leone, wherever Leone's spirit rests, he must be pleased.
Rating:
Summary: My No. 1 favorite movie
Review: Back in the dark ages, before I saw Sergio Leone's "Once Upon a Time in the West" in its wonderful new DVD incarnation, I believed that "The Godfather" was the greatest movie of all time. But "Once Upon a Time in the West" reigns supreme. That it is the greatest Western ever made goes without saying. Leone takes every shot from every famous (and maybe not so famous) Western, everything we ever thought true about the genre, and turns it on its head -- redefines it, makes it better, makes it feel original and new all over again. This movie does for the Western what "Pulp Fiction" did for crime pictures. But to mention another movie in the same breath as this one is to bestow undue recognition on a lesser film. "Once Upon a Time in the West" is without peer. It represents the zenith of acting, writing, directing, cinematography, film editing, sound. I could never imagine suffering through this beautiful movie on pan-and-scan VHS or on any other medium besides DVD. Indeed, DVD was seemingly invented for movies like this. It is almost impossible to believe "Once Upon a Time" is more than 30 years old! It has been scrubbed clean and digitally restored to a level that rivals even "Finding Nemo" or "The Two Towers." This DVD is nothing short of miraculous. But so is the movie itself. Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson and Jason Robards are greatness personified. And Leone's direction is just magnificent. No other film can touch the style, the grace, the visual excitement of this one. And the music! Each character has his or her own personal score that reminded me of John Williams' work on "Star Wars" and the "Indiana Jones" films -- indeed, Cheyenne's theme sounds most reminiscent of the "Imperial March" from "The Empire Strikes Back." This movie tops a long list of very good and important Westerns including "Rio Bravo," "Unforgiven," "The Outlaw Josey Wales," "Dances With Wolves," "Open Range," "The Searchers," and others. It's the "2001," the "Citizen Kane" of Westerns. It is a masterpiece.
Rating:
Summary: Operatic - Epic - Fantastic!
Review: I first saw this classic on the big screen at the age of 13 when it was released in the U.S. My most vivid memory of the film is the scene where Cheyenne terrorizes Frank's henchmen from atop a moving train, making good use of his boot! I also studied the film in a college film class and discovered how Leone created so many of the unique looks in the film. All in all, I've probably seen this movie 30 times, and now that I own the DVD, I'll probably watch it another 30 times. I would rate it the #2 best Western of all time, right behind Unforgiven. And remember... people scare better when they're dying.
Rating:
Summary: Once Upon A Time In The West
Review: Marvelous, Simply Marvelous. Watching Henry Fonda in this movie blew me away when I saw it years ago. I realized then what a great actor can do with a role that go against any type casting from previous film roles. Viewing it again in the DVD format is stunning. Sergio Leone is in my Hall of Fame as a movie director.
You can easily see Sergio Leone influence in all of Clint Eastwood work. This is a must see movie for all us old cowboy movie fans.
Rating:
Summary: A great movie
Review: there are three great westerns...Once Upon a Time in the West, The Wild Bunch and Shane (only because Jack Palance was great as the hired gun)...Leone was a true story teller and even though a lot of people find his movies overlong or confusing..Leone still delivers a masterpiece...Fonda as the villian was an inspired casting decision and Robards is great as the likable outlaw with a sense of morals..as for Bronson..what can you say..always underrated he is the linchpin that keeps the movie going
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