Duck, You Sucker!
Like the thrilling genre it identifies, the term "spaghetti western" has steadily gained in esteem and sympathy. Born in the mid-1960s, the Italian Western is a universe in its own right, whose cinematic language, anarchic tone and spectacular iconography have had a considerable impact. Presented in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute of Montreal, this cycle brings together the must-see films of the "three Sergios" (Leone, Corbucci, Sollima) and a diverse selection of films by the main directors of the period. It's an opportunity to grasp the richness of a genre whose stylistic beauty is matched only by the dirtiness of its protagonists, and which has managed to be alternately irreverent and lyrical, funny and violent, bon-vivant and political, dark and luminous. The versions presented have been chosen on the basis of elements such as language (all these films were dubbed, so there is no single "original" version), complete editing and recent restorations.
In the midst of the Mexican Revolution, a bandit meets a fugitive Irish revolutionary and teams up with him to rob a bank. Drawn into the heart of historical events, the bandit gradually develops a political conscience. Leone's "zapata western" is a particularly complex and nuanced work, a tale with an anarchist edge that shifts from humor to horror, from lyricism to disenchantment, from epic splendor to the absurdity of existence. Sometimes unfairly underrated, Leone's final contribution to the Western genre is nothing short of a masterpiece.
Sergio Leone
Born in Rome in 1929, Sergio Leone was the son actress Bice Waleran and filmmaker Roberto Roberti, whose career was cut short by his opposition to fascism. Sergio attended the same school as Ennio Morricone, who was to compose the music for his future films. After the Second World War, he began his career as an assistant to Italian (Vittorio de Sica among others) and American filmmakers (Robert Wise, William Wyler...). Then Leone had the idea of turning to the Western, which he completely revisited, moving away from the American Western in decline at the time. In 1964, A Fistful of Dollars marked the beginning of a style and codes that would come to define the Italian Western, a genre that enjoyed immense success in the decade that followed, with Leone as its figurehead. In 1984, he signed his last masterpiece, Once Upon a Time in America, this time exploring the world of American gangsterism.
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