Once Upon a Time in the West

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⭐7/10

It's western season baby! Opening this summer with what many consider to be the best ever made, Sergio Leone's magnum opus. While I agree it's got plenty of style, and Morricone's score is as good as ever, this movie fell short of their other greats for me. 

First off, this movie is absurdly slow. I would actually say this was like what Pluribus was for the Gilligan. Leone has always been methodical in his directing, but this was simply too much. The opening is 15 silent minutes of cowboys being bored, passing time, and while I respect the boldness of such a move, it should have ended there. This movie is 3 hours and felt like 4. It was a pretty tight story, and the movie structurally was a lot like A Few Dollars more, a movie I loved. But that movie was much shorter and sharper, and while I appreciated the patience of this one, letting us get fully immersed and invested in a sweaty, grimy, hot west, my patience ran thin by the end.

Another issue, I think, was that the finale simply wasn't rewarding enough. If you are going to put us through this movie, you need to have an ending as grand as Good, Bad and Ugly. That one is also wildly slow, but it pays off in an electric showdown. This one cuts to the chase a little quickly once all the pieces have been put together and it felt a little deflating. 

My last negative is that Charles Bronson is no Clint Eastwood. There is a lot of standing and brooding, and Bronson simply isn't sexy enough to pull it off for 3 hours like Eastwood does. Also his outfits are far inferior. It really does make all the difference. 

Still, it's a fantastic movie that looks incredible, features a score that has been emulated for decades, and a story with some nice moments. This movie made the mistake of featuring a woman, and let's just say this one doesn't exactly pass the Bechdel test and has somehow regressed from the older movies which feature none. I made Jess watch this one for my birthday and there were definitely a few awkward sidelong glances 

I was definitely a little disappointed with this one overall. Not my favorite from Leone, but hard to hate a movie with this much craft. 

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