Review of Once Upon a Time in America (1984) by Grant L — 03 Jul 2010

I heard nothing but great things about this film and was really lokking forward to watching it. And I have to say that everything I heard about it was true and it lived up to its word. First I have to credit the cast all the way from De Niro and James Woods to the actors who barley even spoke a word.

In the first 30 minutes of the film there is barley any words spoken but the facial expressions and reactions kept my attention all the way through. The rest of the 3 hours of the film there was a lot of things going on which made the story so great and kept the flow of the film going.

But I think the actors had a lot to da with the flow of the film. De Niro gave one of his best performaces and was his character likeable? I woulden't say so but he was a cold hearted gangster but he still looked out for his friends and he proved that at the end of the film.

Now James Woods has never gave a performance as good as this, he was amazing and even held his own with De Niro throughout which is saying a lot. I also loved the young actors and the bond they shared as friends and let us know that nothing was going to come between them(the scene where Dominic died was powerful and it made their bond even stronger).

The direction from Sergio Leone was strong and the scenes he made were sometimes hard too watch especially the rape scenes so probably some people will just look away. Still his direction sometimes jumped around a bit but it didn't take you long to know exactly what was going on.

I woulden't compare this film to The Godfather or Goodfellas because all 3 are different films with different stories but all are great. So if you can look past its long length you should definltley see it for yourself.

Amazing film. 100%.