reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP (11/30/84)
I just got back from seeing Sergio Leone's American cut of "Once Upon a
Time in America". I'd seen the Ladd Studio's cut before, and had liked it.
I liked Leone's version a lot more. It's more than an hour longer, so, with
intermission and a few coming attractions, you can expect to spend four hours
in the theater. The major change is that it has been restored to Leone's
original conception of presentation in flashbacks. The footage was shot to
work this way, and, not surprisingly, it is much more impressive. The
additional scenes (mostly, though far from entirely, from the childhood
sequences) provide much better character development, though not much new
story. De Niro's character, Noodles, is a particular beneficiary.
The film is far from perfect. Leone seems to be striken with mild cases of
maladies common to epic filmmakers, particularly Lean's Disease (a tendency
to abandon story, action, and character for ravishing visuals and camera moves)
and Coppolaitis, which manifests itself in outrageous cost overruns and an
inability to come up with a satisfactory ending. The first twenty minutes of
the film will be either fascinating or infuriating, depending on how much
effort you are willing to put into a movie and whether you've seen the more
linear short version. Overall, "Once Upon a Time in America" is best described
as a film buff's movie. It's easy to see why the studio didn't want to release
it in its current form.
--
Peter Reiher
reiher@ucla-cs.arpa
{...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher