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They were "ersatz Westerns" to American critics. Umberto Eco compared them to the "godless nostalgia" of Renaissance writing, and the director himself described them as about "picaresque people placed in epic situations". The films of Sergio Leone have inspired generations of directors, from Steven Spielberg, George Lucas (whose film Star Wars was effectively a Western in space) and John Carpenter to Quentin Tarantino. Christopher Frayling certainly needs no convincing of the man's talent. Already the author of Spaghetti Westerns, his first full-length biography is a cinéaste's delight, a detailed and rewarding survey of the career of the man of whom Bernardo Bertolucci said, "I like the way he filmed horses' arses".
Leone was born into film: his father directed the first Italian Western in 1913 and his mother was an actress. Beset by a formative tangle of influences, such as Neapolitan marionette shows and a love of John Ford and Charlie Chaplin, he moved from "toga flicks" to the landscape of his dreams, the American mid-West (actually Almeria in Spain). The 1960s Dollars trilogy, with their fledgling star Clint Eastwood as The Man With No Name (actually Joe in the first, then Blondie) and their lingering camerawork allied to Ennio Morricone's haunting scores, defined a genre from which he fought to escape. Once Upon the Time in the West followed, with its dizzying stillness but there would be a decade of relative inertia before the epic Once Upon a Time in America, the gangster film he reputedly turned down The Godfather to direct. The film is a mosaic of reference to film noir and America, the genre and country that continued to inform and delight him. Frayling's cultured prose focuses less on the man than the movie-maker, yet his study, which also doubles as a general history of Italian cinema, splendidly feeds off the numerous legends and bitching that sprung up around the history of Leone's productions. Drawing on conversations with the director himself before his death in 1989, as well as dialogues with old acquaintances--and, most essentially, a first-class knowledge of the films themselves--Frayling has written a comprehensive homage to one of the trademark directors of 20th-century cinema. --David Vincent
The Sunday Telegraph
"Luxuriously illustrated...Sir Christopher Frayling is an expert in the genre"
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The American cinema as it was then was composed of a gallery of actors' faces unparalleled either before or after (at least as I see it), and the plots were simple devices (amorous, character-based, generic) for bringing these faces together in ever changing combinations. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
The American cinema as it was then was composed of a gallery of actors' faces unparalleled either before or after (at least as I see it), and the plots were simple devices (amorous, character-based, generic) for bringing these faces together in ever changing combinations. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The enormous strength of this book for me is Frayling's succinct and detailed analysis of Leones films. He takes key scenes from all of Leones films backing them up with excellent anecdotes, to point out either a technical point to Leones directing, or as an excuse to show Leone's emotional sometimes bullying and overbearing manner when directing. The biography does get a little too bogged down in minor detail sometimes. This can be distracting but its better to be slightly over detailed than under detailed in a biography. The only other minor quibble I would have with the book is the start of it, which confusingly starts with Leone as a young teenager or so, before going back to when he was born. Although this shift in time was a common gimmick in Leone's films, Frayling's idea although nice in theory, disjoints the start of the book to no great purpose and does become a minor irritation. On the otherhand the anecdotes Frayling uses are of a superb quality, and are very well used to reflect different aspects of Leones character. This book will I suspect be a key work for those interested in spaghetti westerns and the making of them. It will also be a marvellous insight into the background of the film 'once upon a time in America'. A film that is a far deeper and more powerful experience than the Godfather or 'Goodfellas', rightly acknowledged classics of the 'gangster' genre.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Prof. Frayling has written the first - and most likely definitive - account of Leone's life. It is everything that a fan could want, casting light on the conception and gestation of his films and offering generous insight into them.
This is no hagiography; Frayling (very gently) deflates the myth that Leone created about himself to produce a book which informs, enlightens and entertains.
It goes without saying that this is an essential purchase for anyone who loves Spaghetti Westerns and the work of Il Maestro.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is the definitive Leone biography. Meticulously researched with access to the key players either directly or through secondary sources. Particularly worthy of mention is the way the author brings the subject back to life by weaving quotes from Leone skilfully into the narrative. This book has the goods on the movies, how they were made and the source material that inspired them. However, and this is the only serious quibble with this book, one wonders if it is necessary to go into such detail regarding the plot outline particularly of Once Upon A Time In America which is repeated a couple of times through the book. Perhaps the author wishes to convey the agonizing lengths to which Leone had to go to bring this epic project into being but this over-detailing tends to interrupt the flow of an otherwise well paced narrative and leave one with a lingering suspicion that this is so much padding. However, this quibble aside this book is the definitive Sergio Leone biography hardly likely to be surpassed. Would love to see a second edition minus the redundant information.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
A short term treat
I bought this for myself and all the interviews and articles as well as the great images were fascinating for a fan of italian westerns and sergio leone. Read more
Published 10 months ago by jackreed
Feet of Clay, Who Cares.
One working associate of Sergio Leone describes him as "a brilliant film maker, but as a human being a complete turd". Read more
Published 16 months ago by Bob Salter
Leone's western legacy
For all of us fans of the western movies of Sergio Leone,this book is a treat and pretty much essential. Read more
Published on 29 April 2009 by Mr. A. Whiteside
brilliant but missing the essential ingredient
This book is an excellent introduction to the Sergio Leone westerns of the 1960s, however, I felt it could have included a little bit more relating to Once Upon A Time In America. Read more
Published on 21 Feb 2009 by Stewart Fryer
The first in depth analysis of Leone's life in film.
This book, the first biography of Leone, features at its core the connection between Leone's life and career with that of the Italian film industry and Italian society. Read more
Published on 2 April 2000
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