masterclass filmmaking

Rating: Null/10 (4 August 2002)

Of all of Sergio Leone's films this one has to be the best plot, you couldn't class the film as another gangster movie but a triumph for all involved would be more appropriate. The structure of the film at times makes it hard to watch as it flashes back and forth from the 1920's to the 1960's, but the plot remains compelling throughout. The direction of the film is slow, deliberate and intense. Leone's cinematic flair is clearly in view and visually the film is quite amazing, but he also doesn't hold back in his depiction of violence, some of which would have to go down among the most shocking scenes ever filmed. DeNiro is as ever excellent and Woods plays his psychotic friend in his own familiar reliable way. This has to be one of the few movies of the 1980's that kept the classic hallmarks of maverick filmmaking; we have everything and more needed for a cinema masterpiece, in my opinion only equalled by Raging Bull or The Godfather trilogy. Once Upon A time In America is certainly a movie that every film student would need to study, in fact most modern day `directors' would need to study an artist like Leone, and try to determine were they went wrong.