Films & Events
Once Upon a Time in the West
When Henry Fonda reported to the set of Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West, the director was furious with him. Fonda had grown a goatee and wore brown contact lenses to give himself a more sinister appearance, all the better, Fonda thought, to play a sadistic gunfighter. Leone, however, had specifically cast Fonda for his good-guy image, feeling his actor’s blue eyes best reflected the icy, cold nature of the gunfighter Frank. Originally reluctant to follow his masterpiece The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly with another western, Paramount offered Leone a generous budget and the services of Henry Fonda to create another horse opera. Leone accepted, primarily for the chance to work with Fonda, and commissioned two Italian film critics (Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento) to conceive a screen story in which two drifters come to protect a beautiful widow from the encroaching railroad company and the gang of hired gunmen instructed to take her land by any means necessary. Presented in its full panoramic glory, Once Upon a Time in the West is every bit the equal of Leone’s previous film.
Cast & Crew
Director: Sergio Leone
Producer: Fulvio Morsella
Editor: Nino Baragli
Screenwriter: Sergio Leone, Sergio Donati
Cinematographer: Tonino Delli Colli
Music: Ennio Morricone
Principal Cast: Jason Robards, Charles Bronson, Claudia Cardinale, Henry Fonda
Filmography: Once Upon a Time in America (1984 ); A Genius Two Friends and an Idiot (1975); Lonesome Gun (1973); Duck You Sucker (1971 ); The Good the Bad and the Ugly (1966 ); For a Few Dollars More (1965 ); A Fistful of Dollars (1964 ); The Colossus of Rhodes (1961 ); The Last Days of Pompeii (1959)
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