A funeral to the golden age of the western

‘Hey, Harmonica, when they do you in, pray it’s somebody who knows where to shoot.’

Sergio Leone’s depiction of the west became increasingly more romantic and sentimental with each passing western. Elements of Once Upon a Time in the West can be traced back to For A Few Dollars More, with the plot of Mortimer seeking revenge on Indio, and the little hints of past trauma planted over the course of the film, which you see here with Harmonica’s blurred and ambiguous flashbacks of Frank. I believe Once Upon a Time in the West has more in common with For A Few Dollars More more than The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, which is the more fast-paced and action-packed film. Once Upon a Time in the West is the complete antithesis. That’s not to say it doesn’t have its moments of action, but its much more minimal, restrained, and really takes its time in setting the scene of the gunfight, but when it plays out finally, boy, is it earned! The first fifteen minutes alone proves this. Hearing the ‘you brought two too many’, line never fails to send shivers.

While I think The Good, The Bad and The Ugly is the more entertaining and accessible film, Once Upon a Time in the West is the one I find myself constantly revisiting the most, which serves as my favourite western from Leone, and I think that very much has to do with the way he romanticized the west here. A big part of this is of course attributed to the majesty of Ennio Morricone’s score and the emotional resonance of the film’s revenge plot. But it is also much more than just a story of revenge. Its my belief that Once Upon a Time in the West and The Wild Bunch were the two westerns from the end of the 1960s which served as the end of the standardized western film period beginning all the way from Stagecoach in 1939 to here, in 1968 and 1969. In other words, they are funerals. Funerals to the golden age of the western. That’s not to say we didn’t get great westerns after these two films, McCabe and Mrs Miller, Heaven’s Gate, and Unforgiven are up there as some of the greats, but they were westerns which aimed to deconstruct Hollywood’s mythos of the west. Once Upon a Time in the West is the last, great nostalgic western, and its ending, which serves as a reminder of this fact, never fails to move me to tears.