Opening with a sequence as stately and time-stopping as any in cinema — and featuring, incidentally, what may be the most notable performance by a fly in film history — Leone’s essay in epic sprawl succeeds on the strength of its awe-inspiring, panoramic compositions, in bombastic counterpoint wth the deadly, infinitely held gaze of its killer trio of male leads (Charles Bronson, Jason Robards, and Henry Fonda), a blushingly overwrought beaut of a Morricone score, and the ever-astonishing beauty of Claudia Cardinale.

Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) dir. Sergio Leone
165 minutes
12pm, 6pm
Double feature with A Fistful of Dynamite (1972) dir. Sergio Leone
Brattle Theatre
40 Brattle St.
Cambridge, MA
02138