Comprehensive information and links about Sergio Leone

Sergio Leone (January 3, 1929 – April 30, 1989) was an Italian film director. Born in Rome, he was the son of the cinema pioneer Vincenzo Leone (known as director Roberto Roberti), and the actress Edvige Valcarenghi (Bice Waleran), and started working in the film industry himself at the age of eighteen.

Biography

He began writing screenplays in the 1950s, primarily for the so-called "sword and sandal" or "peplum" historical epics which were popular at the time. He also worked as an assistant director on several large-scale, high-profile Hollywood productions, a.k.a. runaway productions, filmed at Cinecittà Studios in Rome, notably ) starring Steve Reeves, Sergio Leone was asked to step in and complete the film. As a result, when the time came to make his solo directoral debut with ) 1961, he was well equipped to produce low-budget films which looked and felt like Hollywood spectaculars.

In the early 1960s, demand for historical epics collapsed, and Leone was fortunate enough to be at the forefront of the genre which replaced it in the public's affections – the Western. His ) (1964) was an early trend-setter in a genre which came to be known as the "spaghetti western". Based closely enough on Akira Kurosawa's Meiji-era samurai adventure (1961) to elicit a legal challenge from the Japanese director, the film is notable for its establishment of Clint Eastwood as a star. Until that time, he had been an American television actor with few roles to his name.

The look of the film was established partly by its budget, partly by its Spanish locations, and it presented a gritty, violent, morally complex vision of the American West which paid tribute to traditional American Westerns, but significantly departed from them in storyline, plot, characterization, and mood. Leone deservedly gets credit for one great breakthrough in the Western genre that is still followed today: in traditional Western films, heroes and villains alike looked like they had just stepped out of the fashion magazine and the moral opposites were clearly drawn, even down to the hero wearing a white hat and the villain wearing a black hat. Leone's characters were, in contrast, more "realistic" and complex: usually "lone wolves" in their behaviour, they rarely shaved, looked dirty, and there was a strong suggestion of odour and a history of criminal behaviour; they were morally ambiguous and often either generously compassionate or nakedly and brutally self-serving as the situation demanded. This sense of realism continues to affect Western movies today, and has also been influential outside this genre. Many have said it ironic that an Italian director who could not speak English and had never even seen the American west could have almost single handedly redefined the typical vision of the American cowboy.

His next two films – trilogy, with each film being more financially successful and more technically proficient than its predecessor. All three films featured scores by the prolific composer Ennio Morricone: Leone had a personal way of shooting scenes with Morricone's music ongoing. Critics have often said that was the finest of the trilogy. The opening soundtrack has often been called the most recognized music in a Western film.

Based on these successes, in 1967 he was invited to America to direct what he hoped would be his masterwork, ) for Paramount. Filmed in Monument Valley, Utah as well as in Spain and Italy, and starring Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson, and Claudia Cardinale it emerged as a long, violent, dreamlike meditation upon the mythology of the American West. It was ed by Leone's longtime friend and collaborator Sergio Donati. The story was written by Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento, both of whom went on to have significant careers as directors. Before its release, however, the film was ruthlessly edited by Paramount, which perhaps contributed to its poor box-office results in America. Nevertheless, it was a huge hit in Europe and highly praised amongst North American film students, and it has come to be regarded by many as Leone's best film.

After ) (1971), a film which he was producing, due to artistic differences with its stars, Leone was asked to step in and replace Gian Carlo Santi, his longtime assistant director turned director. "A Fistful Of Dynamite" is a Mexican Revolution action drama which starred James Coburn as an Irish revolutionary and Rod Steiger as a Mexican bandit who is conned into becoming a revolutionist. Leone continued to produce, and on occasion step in to re-shoot scenes. One of these films was (1973) by Tonino Valerii (though true participation of Leone in shooting is disputed), a comedy western film which poked fun at the spaghetti western genre. It starred Henry Fonda as an old gunslinger who watched 'his' old west fade away before his very eyes and Terence Hill as the young stranger who helps Fonda leave the dying west with , 1986). During this period he also directed various award winning TV commerials for European television.

Leone had turned down the opportunity to direct , but spent the ten years developing a new epic project, this time focusing on a quartet of New York City Jewish gangsters of the 1920s and 1930s who had been friends since childhood. This work, was a meditation on another aspect of popular American mythology, the role of greed and violence and their uneasy coexistence with the meaning of ethnicity and friendship, and like the earlier film, it was too long and stately for the studio to stomach. The studio cut its four-hour running time drastically, losing much of the sense of the complex narrative. The recut version flopped and received much criticism. In his original version, the film is considered a masterpiece and perhaps Leone's finest.

At the time of his 1989 death, Leone was part way through planning yet another epic, this time on the siege of Leningrad during the Second World War. In his later years, Leone had a falling out of sorts with Clint Eastwood, his most famous actor. When he directed , he commented that Robert De Niro was a real actor unlike Eastwood. However, the two made amends before Leone's death. In 1992, Clint Eastwood directed , a Western in which he won the Oscar for best director. Leone was one of the people he dedicated it to.

Critical opinion on Leone's contributions remain mixed to this day. Despite influencing several directors and re-inventing an entire genre, his status as a 'great' director and an auteur is highly debated. However, several critics regard his contribution to cinema fondly.

(1959) (Mario Bonnard is the credited director; Leone served as assistant director and reportedly took over completion of the film when Bonnard became severely ill during production)