Once Upon A Time in the West

My favorite western film by far. Everything about it is great.

"You brought two too many"

Greatest Western of All Time.

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I've re-watched the opening scene 4 times.

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The guys meeting Bronson at the train station were supposed to be Eastwood, Van Cleef, and Wallach - they couldn't make it happen, but it would have been the best spaghetti western "easter egg" of all time.

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Holy.shite.

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Yeah, they just don't/won't/can't make them like that anymore.

This is my desert island western. It edges out "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly" for me.

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I thought Eastwood was offered Bronson's role and turned it down?

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True as well - in fact, Leone envisioned it as another "Man with no name" film, but Eastwood was trying to break that stereotype and politely declined. THEN Leone got the idea to cast, essentially as cameos, his 3 leads from TG, TB and TU, which was a brilliant idea, but they couldn't make it happen.

Its been a while since I've watched it. I grew up on these movies cause my grandfather loved them. Shane, the Eastwood Moves, Liberty Valence, High Noon, all because of him. Oddly enough, his least favorite were John Wayne's films.

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"The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly"

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I need to see this one too. Once Upon a Time in the West was awesome too.

I once dated a girl who said she liked westerns, so we watched Once Upon a Time. She didn't like it. I broke up with her.

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I'm not sure if he had ever played a "bad guy" before.

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He had not played a high profile antagonist before, for sure.

He was concerned about doing the film with Leone - Eli Wallach, ultimately convinced him.

Short interview where Hank talks about his casting

If you get the chance, it's well worth the time to watch the added features on the DVD disk. One is interviews referencing the actors and Leone, another is about the music, and another is about the few pages of script. Each actor had their own signature music which played on the set for emotional value whenever they were in the camera's eye.
Notice the lack of dialogue in this film. It only had a few, compared to other movies, pages of script. Facial closeups and body language were used extensively and pure acting was the key. Leone was a master. Go back and rewatch Fonda's acting in the scenes where he left the saloon for the street and his own men were waiting to get him.