Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), directed by Sergio Leone and starring Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson, Claudia Cardinale, and Jason Robards, is an operatic Western about the arrival of the railroad, land rights, and the end of the frontier, played out over nearly three hours with almost no wasted frames.

Why It Matters

• Casting Henry Fonda — America's most beloved actor — as the film's cold-blooded villain was a calculated act of myth deconstruction
• Ennio Morricone's score is the greatest in Western film history, composed before shooting began and played on set during filming
• The 12-minute opening sequence — three men waiting for a train in near silence — is a masterwork of tension and economy

Leone intended the film as both a love letter to American Westerns and their funeral. He succeeded completely. It is simultaneously the most beautiful Western ever made and an elegy for the form itself.

Reference:

Wikipedia: Once Upon a Time in the West

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Once_Upon_a_Time_in_the_West