Once Upon A Time In

America Case Study

Directed by Sergio Leone

May 1984

Reece Thompson

The use of locations in the opening of Once Upon A Time In America helps to establish the cliche aspects of a thriller

film. The first location I am going to use as an example, is the apartment in which the femme fatale, Eve, enters, to find

her bed-ridden with bullet holes.

The setting of an apartment is generic, as there are lots of objects that can obscure a viewer’s sight. The idea of this is

to lead the viewer into thinking that there is something hidden within the mise-en-scene. The use of this locations also

allows an increased number of shadows to be formed. In doing so, the three cop characters can be distilled in the

shadows leading to a dramatic entrance. When Eve turns the light on, the shadows dissipate and reveal the three

characters leading to strong composition. The use of an apartment can be seen as ironic for this scene, as you would

expect the character to be most comfortable at their own home. However, Eve is far from that when the three cops are

revealed.

Another location used is the elevator shaft. The use of this location is generic to the genre as it is a confined and

claustrophobic space. Another aspect of the elevator shaft is that is ascends slowly. In doing so, this creates a

suspenseful mood, which is the whole idea of a thriller film. Sergio Leone uses this successfully by having the main

character ‘Noodles’ use this to his advantage to distract the cop.

Locations

Generic Archetypes

Another key aspect of a noir film is the use of the generic archetypal characters within them. For example, Leone’s

character of Eve represents the idea of the ‘femme fatale’. A femme fatale, is a female character, in a noir, whose fate

is usually death. A femme fatale can be identified by their apparel and their mannerisms. In the opening of the film, we

see that Eve is a femme fatale due to her swift fatal exit from the film. We can also see she is a femme fatale from what

she wears. In the opening, we see that the lighting is focused on the pearl necklace. Pearls are used to represent tears,

signifying that something bad is about to happen. The name ‘Eve’ also has a lot of biblical connotations, therefore

leading the audience to believe that there is a slight holiness about her. However, it could also signify her vulnerability

as well.

The second archetype that Leone uses is that of the anti-hero. The character of Noodles fulfills this anti-hero stereotype

because of the things he does. For instance, we see that he is in an opium den, considered negative, but we later

discover his intentions. Noodles shares his anti-hero qualities with that much like Walter White from Breaking Bad.

Within the role, Walter cooks and sells meth, but only to help support his family. The general archetype of the anti-hero

can be seen through their positive intentions that sometimes lead them to do negative things within the story.

Example of Walter White: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weznTLanFzY

Film Noir

The idea of film noir is to set a scene in which their is a sense of ambiguity and suspense. Sergio Leone successfully

captures this by using the aforementioned techniques. The genre of film noir is usually very cliche in it’s approach, but

can be composed in very different ways, leading to very different films labelled as noir.

A scene that represents the idea of film noir, is the flashback of the fire. The composition of the scene is done in such a

way as to create dim lighting and focused lighting. The scene uses the generic convention of the wet streets. This can

also be seen in the other case study we are focusing on which is ‘Essex Boys’. The use of this effect creates a

reflection on the ground. This is combined with the lighting to create an ambiguous mood. It also can be seen as

making the characters reflect upon their actions, especially the main character of Noodles who is considered an anti

hero The scene also has it’s lighting set up so all you see is the bare minimum required to actually see what is going on

within the scene.