Welcome to The Best Movies I’ve Never Seen! This is the part of the blog where I work my way through 100 films I’ve never seen that are generally considered to be great. You’re invited to watch along with me if you can find a copy or find it streaming. So grab some popcorn and let’s get started!

Once Upon a Time in the West

1968

Directed by Sergio Leone

In what he claimed would be his last Western, Italian director Sergio Leone has crafted an epic love letter to the American Old West with Once Upon a Time in the West. While abandoning the quirky humor and brisk pacing of his iconic Dollars Trilogy, Leone retains his distinctive style and flair for visual storytelling on a grand scale.

Fans expecting another “good, bad, and ugly” adventure may be surprised by the patient, deliberate pace Leone sets here. Scenes often run long with little dialogue, instead building tension through slow zooms, meaningful glances, and small gestures. It’s less showy gunplay and more balletic ritual that precedes the brief bursts of violence.

The plot, co-written by Leone along with Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento, draws heavy inspiration from classic American Westerns (my fellow cinema nerds could spend hours ticking off direct visual quotes). The somewhat convoluted story follows the intersecting fates of a widow (Claudia Cardinale), a bandit (Jason Robards), a harmonica-playing gunman (Charles Bronson), and a cruel hired killer (Henry Fonda, chillingly cast against type) over a parcel of valuable land.

While it takes some time for all the narrative threads to weave together, the film rewards patience with an emotional payoff in the deliberately-paced second half. Here we see characters changing and growing in ways rarely depicted in Leone’s previous work. And the expected climatic shootout does not disappoint.

The international cast delivers across the board, with Cardinale and Bronson as impressive standouts (though one wonders if a more fiery performance from Cardinale may have served the film better). And of course, the iconic score from Leone’s longtime collaborator Ennio Morricone ties it all together, becoming as integral to the drama as the actors themselves.

Though its lengthy running time and methodical pacing may test some viewers’ endurance, “Once Upon a Time in the West” ultimately offers a richly drawn elegy for the Western genre that inspired it. Leone has crafted an undeniably slow burn, but one that sparks and smolders to a resonant finish. If this is truly his last word on Westerns, he chooses to go out in self-indulgent style rather than with a bang. Not a breezy watch by any means, but a must-see for diehard Leone fans and devotees of ambitious cinema.