(aka "C'era una volta in America (Italy)" )
directed
by Sergio Leone
Italy/USA 1984
Sergio Leone’s final film as a director and one he spent 17
years developing. Like the spaghetti westerns he was famous for, Once Upon A
Time In America concerns itself with a mythic America as seen from the
perspective of a foreigner who grew up experiencing the United States through
its movies.
The movie follows the rise and fall of a band of Jewish gangsters from New
York’s Lower East Side. The two older members of the gang, Noodles and Max,
have a complex relationship as both best friends and rivals. The story takes
place over five decades and unfolds nonlinearly though the use of jump cuts.,
flashback sequences and just enough unsolved mystery to suggest that much of
it may be an opium dream. As much an operatic tale of lost love, betrayal and
longing as a crime caper there is something about the way Leone put this one
together that supersedes the limitations of the genre. One of Sergio Leone's
best and a true masterpiece of cinema.
Considered too long and confusing by its US distributor when the movie was
released in 1984, it was shortened to around two and a half hours and edited
into chronological order. The results were disastrous. Fortunately, the
original cut of Once Upon A Time In America played well in Europe and was
released on VHS in a longer version closer to the director's intention where
it found its audience. On DVD for the first time, this is a cut preferred by
Sergio Leone.
Note: In addition to this and the short version there is an Italian television
version that runs four hours, twenty five minutes and a rumored eight hour cut
that was never released.
Posters
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Theatrical Release: February 17, 1984 (USA)
Reviews More Reviews DVD Reviews
DVD Review: Warner Home Video (Two-Disc Special Edition) - Region 1 - NTSC
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| Distribution |
Warner Home Video Region 1 - NTSC |
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| Runtime | 229' | |
| Video |
1.78:1 Aspect Ratio
16X9 enhanced |
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NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes. |
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| Audio | English/French (Dolby Digital 5.1) | |
| Subtitles | English/French/Spanish/None | |
| Features |
Release Information: Studio: Warner Home Video Aspect Ratio:
Edition Details: Chapters 59 |
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| Comments | While not
unpleasant to watch, the DVD suffers from inconsistency. The film print
has scratches and nicks along with visible grain. The video transfer,
while near superbit quality as far as compression goes, suffers from
intermittent shimmering on horizontal camera moves. Flesh tones often
appear reddish. In addition, in places the image is very sharp and
elsewhere it appears too soft. The original 1:85:1 image has been cropped
to a 1.78:1 aspect ratio. The original mono soundtrack has been remixed for 5.1 Dolby surround. Perhaps, due to the way it was originally recorded there doesn't seem to be much benefit from this upgrade. The audio is clear enough but the center channel gets the biggest workout and the surround speakers and subwoofer only kick in during the music. The nearly four hour movie is split over two dual-layer discs. The break occurs toward the end of a scene and picks up on the second disc. Presumably, this was done to split the time evenly between the discs and maintain a consistent compression level but it comes off as sloppy. There is an intermission but it occurs later in the film. The odd thing is that the DVD case lists the intermission as the disc break. Perhaps the choice of where to put the disc break was a last minute decision. While this is the best version of Once Upon A Time In America I have seen (Region 1) on video a movie this fine deserves better treatment.  out of
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