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Jurisdiction stripping
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In the United States, jurisdiction-stripping (also called court-stripping or curtailment-of-jurisdiction), refers to Congress' constitutionally-granted authority to determine the jurisdiction of federal and state courts.
Contents
1 Basis
2 Transfer of authority to state judiciaries
3 Limits
3.1 Story's theory
3.2 Calabresi's theory
3.3 Related issues
4 Other relevant Supreme Court cases
5 Further federal statutes
6 See also
7 References
Basis[edit]
Congress may define the jurisdiction of the judiciary through the simultaneous use of two powers.[1] First, Congress holds the power to create (and, implicitly, to define the jurisdiction of) federal courts inferior to the Supreme Court (i.e. Courts of Appeals, District Courts, and various other Article I and Article III tribunals). This court-creating power is granted both in the congressional powers clause (Art. I, § 8, Cl. 9) and in the judicial vesting clause (Art. III, § 1). Second, Congress has the power to make exceptions to and regulations of the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court. This court-limiting power is granted in the Exceptions Clause (Art. III, § 2). By exercising these powers in concert, Congress may effectively eliminate any judicial review of certain federal legislative or executive actions and of certain state actions, or alternatively transfer the judicial review responsibility to state courts by "knocking [federal courts]...out of the game."[1]
Alexander Hamilton had this to say about the issue in The Federalist:
From this review of the particular powers of the federal judiciary, as marked out in the Constitution, it appears that they are all conformable to the principles which ought to have governed the structure of that department, and which were necessary to the perfection of the system. If some partial inconveniences should appear to be connected with the incorporation of any of them into the plan, it ought to be recollected that the national legislature will have ample authority to make such exceptions, and to prescribe such regulations as will be calculated to obviate or remove these inconveniences.[2]
Transfer of authority to state judiciaries[edit]
Framers of the Constitution, such as Roger Sherman of Connecticut, did not envision jurisdiction stripping as invariably insulating a law from judicial review, and instead foresaw that state judiciaries could determine compatibility of certain types of state statutes with federal laws and the federal Constitution. In 1788, Sherman publicly explained that,
It was thought necessary in order to carry into effect the laws of the Union, to promote justice, and preserve harmony among the states, to extend the judicial powers of the United States to the enumerated cases, under such regulations and with such exceptions as shall be provided by law, which will doubtless reduce them to cases of such magnitude and importance as cannot be safely trusted to the final decisions of the courts of particular states; and the constitution does not make it necessary that any inferior tribunals should be instituted, but it may be done if found necessary; 'tis probable that courts of particular states will be authorized by the laws of the union, as has heretofore been done in cases of piracy, &c....[3]
Thus, there are two kinds of jurisdiction-stripping: one which changes the court that will hear the case (as Sherman envisioned), versus one which essentially insulates statutes from judicial review altogether. Jurisdiction-stripping statutes usually take away no substantive rights but rather change the court that will hear the case.[4]
Congress has sometimes limited federal involvement in state cases, for example by setting a minimum amount in controversy in order to bar the lower federal courts from hearing diversity cases that involve less than that amount (currently $75,000), combined with precluding a right to appeal to the Supreme Court.[5][6] Likewise, Congress has never required that state court cases involving federal questions be removed or appealed to federal court, and so the federal courts are unable to exercise power in many of those cases.[7]
Limits[edit]
Congress may not strip the U.S. Supreme Court of jurisdiction over those cases that fall under the Court's original jurisdiction defined in the U.S. Constitution. Congress can limit only the appellate jurisdiction of the Court.[8] According to the Constitution, the Supreme Court has original jurisdiction in, "all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party...." This last state-shall-be-a-party language does not mean that the U.S. Supreme Court has original jurisdiction merely because a state is a plaintiff or defendant, even if a provision of the U.S. Constitution is at issue. Instead, the controversy must be between two or more states, or between a state and citizens of another state, or between a state and foreigners.[9][10] Additionally, in 1892, the Court decided that it has original jurisdiction in cases between a state and the United States.[11]
Story's theory[edit]
Justice Joseph Story, in his opinion in Martin v. Hunter's Lessee and in his other writings, wrote extensively about how Congress should ensure that the judicial power is properly vested in the federal courts. Professor Akhil Amar credits Story with the theory that Congress may not concurrently remove the jurisdiction of inferior courts and the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court over certain categories of claims, as doing so would violate the Constitution's mandatory grant of jurisdiction over such claims to the judiciary as a whole. [12] Story wrote in Martin v. Hunter's Lessee:
The judicial power shall extend to all the cases enumerated in the constitution. As the mode is not limited, it may extend to all such cases, in any form, in which judicial power may be exercised. It may, therefore, extend to them in the shape of original or appellate jurisdiction, or both; for there is nothing in the nature of the cases which binds to the exercise of the one in preference to the other.
According to Amar, Story's exposition of federal court jurisdiction "has generated considerable confusion" and furthermore, as Amar understands Story's theory, it "simply cannot be right".[12] Professor Henry M. Hart instead argued that Congress may strip the power of the federal judiciary to hear certain classes of cases.[13][14] Hart wrote: "In the scheme of the Constitution [state courts] are the primary guarantors of constitutional rights, and in many cases they may be the ultimate ones."
Calabresi's theory[edit]
In 2007, law professors Steven Calabresi and Gary Lawson opined that Congress can strip the U.S. Supreme Court of appellate jurisdiction only to the extent that Congress expands the Court's original jurisdiction.[15] Calabresi and Lawson acknowledged that their theory contradicts the holding of Marbury v. Madison, according to which the Constitution's description of the Court's original jurisdiction is exhaustive.
According to Calabresi and Lawson, Congress has no ability to alter or make exceptions to the judicial power of the United States, or to do anything less than bring the full judicial power into execution. The Calabresi theory finds support in a 2010 article by Washburn University Law Professor Alex Glashausser.[16] On the other hand, Judge William A. Fletcher wrote an article in 2010 taking the opposite point of view.[17]
Related issues[edit]
Generally speaking, the word "power" is not necessarily synonymous with the word "jurisdiction".[18] For instance, courts will often assert a modest degree of power over a case for purposes of determining whether it has jurisdiction, or for purposes of receiving jurisdiction.[19]
The Constitution vests the judicial power "in one supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time establish" (emphasis added). Scholars have debated whether the word "in" means that the entire judicial power is vested in the Supreme Court and is also vested entirely in the inferior courts; that possibility has implications for what the vesting of such power means.[20][21]
Other relevant Supreme Court cases[edit]
During Reconstruction, Congress withdrew jurisdiction from a case the U.S. Supreme Court was then in the process of adjudicating. In terminating the case Ex Parte McCardle, 74 US 506 (1869), the Justices acknowledged the authority of Congress to intervene.
We are not at liberty to inquire into the motives of the legislature. We can only examine into its power under the Constitution; and the power to make exceptions to the appellate jurisdiction of this court is given by express words.... It is quite clear, therefore, that this court cannot proceed to pronounce judgment in this case, for it has no longer jurisdiction of the appeal; and judicial duty is not less fitly performed by declining ungranted jurisdiction than in exercising firmly that which the Constitution and the laws confer.[22]
In 1882, the Supreme Court again conceded that its own "actual jurisdiction is confined within such limits as Congress sees fit to describe."[23]
In 1948, Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter conceded in a dissenting opinion that "Congress need not give this Court any appellate power; it may withdraw appellate jurisdiction once conferred."[24]
Further federal statutes[edit]
More recent examples of jurisdiction stripping include the following:
Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (inter alia, stripped the federal judiciary of its jurisdiction to review certain Immigration and Naturalization Service decisions),
Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1996 (restricting the remedies available to prison inmates),
Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (limiting the number of habeas corpus petitions available to prison inmates),[25]
Detainee Treatment Act of 2005, ruled an unconstitutional denial of the right of habeas corpus pursuant to the Suspension clause in the case of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld (2006).
Military Commissions Act of 2006 (Strip all Federal Courts of the U.S. jurisdiction to hear appeal or cases from Guantanamo Bay Detainee) Ruled Unconstitutional in the case of Boumediene v. Bush (2008).
There have also been hundreds of unsuccessful bills in Congress to strip federal courts of jurisdiction.[26][27]
See also[edit]
Ouster clause
Privative clause
Separation of powers under the United States Constitution
References[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b Bauman, Richard and Kahana, Tsvi. The Least Examined Branch: the Role of Legislatures in the Constitutional State, p. 442 (2006).
Jump up ^ Federalist 80.
Jump up ^ Sherman, Roger. "Observations on the New Federal Constitution", New Haven Gazette (December 25, 1788), reprinted in Ford, Paul. Essays on the Constitution of the United States, p. 241 (1892).
Jump up ^ Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557 (2007): "a jurisdiction-conferring or jurisdiction-stripping statute usually 'takes away no substantive right but simply changes the tribunal that is to hear the case.'"
Jump up ^ Weiman, Theodore. "Jurisdiction Stripping, Constitutional Supremacy, and the Implications of Ex Parte Young, University of Pennsylvania Law Review, Volume 153, page 1677 (2003): "to this day, the Court still may not hear appeals of state court cases between parties of diverse citizenship, and amount-in-controversy requirements have barred federal court jurisdiction over cases not meeting the requirements since the first Judiciary Act."
Jump up ^ Before the Evarts Act in 1891, the cases that could reach the Supreme Court were heard as a matter of right, meaning that the Court was required to issue a decision in each of those cases. See Russel R. Wheeler & Cynthia Harrison, Fed. Judicial Ctr., Creating the Federal Judicial System 17–18 (3d ed. 2005).
Jump up ^ Rose, John. An elementary treatise on the jurisdiction and procedure of the federal courts, pages 23-24 (King Brothers 1915).
Jump up ^ May, Christopher and Ides, Allan. Constitutional Law National Power and Federalism: Examples and Explanations, p. 62 (2007).
Jump up ^ Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. 264 (1821): "[T]he original jurisdiction of the supreme court, in cases where a state is a party, refers to those cases in which, according to the grant of power made in the preceding clause, jurisdiction might be exercised, in consequence of the character of the party."
Jump up ^ Amar, Akhil. "Marbury, Section 13, and the Original Jurisdiction of the Supreme Court", University of Chicago Law Review, pp. 2, 22 (1989).
Jump up ^ United States v. Texas, 143 U.S. 621 (1892). A factor in United States v. Texas was that there had been an "act of congress requiring the institution of this suit". With a few narrow exceptions, courts have held that Congress controls access to the courts by the United States and its agencies and officials. See, e.g., Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., 514 U.S. 122 ("Agencies do not automatically have standing to sue for actions that frustrate the purposes of their statutes"). Also see United States v. Mattson, 600 F. 2d 1295 (9th Cir. 1979).
^ Jump up to: a b Amar, Akhil. "A Neo-Federalist View of Article III: Separating the Two Tiers of Federal Jurisdiction", Boston University Law Review, Volume 75, page 205 (1985).
Jump up ^ Hart, "The Power of Congress to Limit the Jurisdiction of Federal Courts: An Exercise in Dialectic", 66 Harvard L. Rev. 1362 (1953).
Jump up ^ Brest, Paul; Sanford Levinson; Jack M. Balkin; Akhil Reed Amar; Reva B. Seigel (2006). Processes of Constitutional Decisionmaking: Cases and Materials (6th ed.). Aspen. pp. 887–889.
Jump up ^ Calabresi, Steven and Lawson, Gary. "The Unitary Executive, Jurisdiction Stripping, and the Hamdan Opinions: A Textualist Response to Justice Scalia Archived 2009-03-06 at the Wayback Machine.", Columbia Law Review (2007).
Jump up ^ Glashausser, Alex. "A Return to Form for the Exceptions Clause", Boston College Law Review, Vol. 51, No. 5, 2010.
Jump up ^ Fletcher, William. "The Meaning of the Word 'All' in Article III", Duke Law Journal (2010).
Jump up ^ Velasco, Julian. "Congressional Control Over Federal Court Jurisdiction: A Defense of the Traditional View", Catholic University Law Review, Vol. 46 (Spring 1997), pages 709-713.
Jump up ^ Cover, Robert. Narrative, Violence and the Law (U. Mich. 1995): "Every denial of jurisdiction on the part of a court is an assertion of the power to determine jurisdiction...." See also Hudson Insurance Company v. American Electric Corporation, 957 F.2d 826 (11th Cir. 1992): "Article III of the Constitution provides the judiciary with the constitutional power to receive jurisdiction...."
Jump up ^ Velasco, Julian. "Congressional Control Over Federal Court Jurisdiction: A Defense of the Traditional View", Catholic University Law Review, Vol. 46 (Spring 1997), page 700.
Jump up ^ Amar, Akhil. "A Neo-Federalist View of Article III: Separating the Two Tiers of Federal Jurisdiction" (1985). Faculty Scholarship Series. Paper 1019.
Jump up ^ Ex Parte McCardle, 74 US 506, 514-15 (1869). For discussion see Notre Dame Law School professor, Charles E. Rice, "Congress and the Supreme Court's Jurisdiction," Villanova Law Review 27 (1982): 967-969.
Jump up ^ The Francis Wright, 105 U.S. 381, 386 (1881): "While the appellate power of this Court extends to all cases within the judicial power of the United States, actual jurisdiction is confined within such limits as Congress sees fit to describe. What these powers shall be, and to what extent they shall be exercised, are, and always have been, proper subjects of legislative control."
Jump up ^ Frankfurter in National Insurance Co. v. Tidewater Co., 337 U.S. 582, 655 (1949). See also, the quite useful transcripts of the panel discussion during "Symposium Proceedings" held at Villanova on "Congressional Limits on Federal Court Jurisdiction," Villanova Law Review, May 1982 ed., pp. 1042-1076, where Charles E. Rice quotes former Supreme Court Justice Owen Roberts as follows [at 1043]: '"I do not see any reason why Congress cannot, if it elects to do so, take away entirely the appellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States over state supreme court decisions.'" [A.B.A. Journal 35(1949): 4.]
Jump up ^ "Curtailment of Jurisdiction". American Judicature Society. Archived from the original on 2006-12-06. Retrieved 2006-11-12.
Jump up ^ Keynes, Edward and Miller, Randall. The Court vs. Congress: Prayer, Busing, and Abortion, p. 306 (1989).
Jump up ^ Choate, Alan (2006-06-06). "Cannon tries to ban federal courts from hearing state porn cases". The Daily Herald. p. A1. Archived from the original on August 15, 2006. Retrieved 2006-11-12.
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Once Upon a Time in America
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Once Upon a Time in America
Theatrical release poster by Tom Jung
Directed by
Sergio Leone
Produced by
Arnon Milchan
Screenplay by
Leonardo Benvenuti
Piero De Bernardi
Enrico Medioli
Franco Arcalli
Franco Ferrini
Sergio Leone
Based on
The Hoods
by Harry Grey
Starring
Robert De Niro
James Woods
Elizabeth McGovern
Joe Pesci
Burt Young
Tuesday Weld
Treat Williams
Music by
Ennio Morricone
Cinematography
Tonino Delli Colli
Edited by
Nino Baragli
Production
company
The Ladd Company
Embassy International Pictures
PSO Enterprises
Rafran Cinematografica[1]
Distributed by
The Ladd Company
Warner Bros.
Release date
May 23, 1984 (1984-05-23) (Cannes)
June 1, 1984 (1984-06-01) (United States)
Running time
229 minutes (European release)
139 minutes (US release)
Country
United States[2]
Italy[2]
Language
English
Budget
$30 million
Box office
$5.3 million[3]
Once Upon a Time in America is a 1984 epic crime drama film co-written and directed by Italian filmmaker Sergio Leone and starring Robert De Niro and James Woods. The film is an Italian-American[2] venture produced by The Ladd Company, Embassy International Pictures, PSO Enterprises, and Rafran Cinematografica, and distributed by Warner Bros. Based on Harry Grey's novel The Hoods, it chronicles the lives of best friends David "Noodles" Aaronson and Maximilian "Max" Bercovicz as they lead a group of Jewish ghetto youths who rise to prominence in New York City's world of organized crime. The film explores themes of childhood friendships; love, lust, greed, betrayal, loss, broken relationships, together with the rise of mobsters in American society.
It was the final film directed by Leone before his death five years later and the first feature film he had directed in 13 years. The cinematography was by Tonino Delli Colli, and the film score by Ennio Morricone. Leone originally envisaged two three-hour films, then a single 269-minute (4 hours and 29 minutes) version, but was convinced by distributors to shorten it to 229 minutes (3 hours and 49 minutes). The film premiered on May 23, 1984 at the Cannes Film Festival in France, and was released as a shortened 139 minute (2 hours and 19 minutes) version on June 1, 1984 in the United States. While the original European release received positive reviews, the shortened version was a critical and commercial failure in the United States. The film is now generally acknowledged as a masterpiece and one of the greatest gangster films ever made.
Contents
[hide]
1 Plot
2 Cast
3 Production
3.1 Development
3.2 Casting
3.3 Filming
3.4 Editing
3.5 Music
4 Release
4.1 Versions
4.1.1 US excisions
4.1.2 USSR
4.1.3 TV compilation
4.1.4 Restored original
4.1.5 Home media
5 Critical reception
5.1 Interpretations
5.2 Accolades
6 See also
7 References
8 Bibliography
9 External links
Plot[edit]
This article's plot summary may be too long or excessively detailed. Please help improve it by removing unnecessary details and making it more concise. (March 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
Gangsters enter a Chinese puppet theater, looking for a marked man. The proprietors slip into a hidden opium den and warn a man named "Noodles", but he pays no attention. In a flashback, he watches the police remove three disfigured corpses from a street. He successfully kills one of the three thugs that are after him but learns that the thugs have murdered his girlfriend while looking for him and finds that someone else has stolen his money. He leaves the city.
David "Noodles" Aaronson struggles as a street kid in Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1920. He and his friends Patrick "Patsy" Goldberg, Philip "Cockeye" Stein, and little Dominic commit petty crimes under the supervision of local boss Bugsy. Planning to rob a drunk at the moment a passing truck hides them from a policeman, they're foiled by the older Max Bercovicz, who jumps off the truck to rob the man himself. Noodles confronts Max, but a crooked policeman steals the watch they were fighting over. Later, Max's camera enables them to blackmail the policeman, who was having sex with a teenage girl, and thus start their own gang independent of Bugsy, who had previously enjoyed the policeman's corrupt protection. The boys establish a suitcase money fund, which they hide in a locker at the railway station, giving the key to Fat Moe, a reliable friend who's not part of the operation. Noodles is in love with Fat Moe's sister Deborah, who aspires to be a dancer and actress. One day, Bugsy ambushes the boys and shoots little Dominic, who dies in Noodles' arms, Noodles then stabs Bugsy to death and injures a police officer who tried to intervene. Noodles is arrested and sentenced to 12 years in prison.
Adult Noodles is released from jail in 1932 and is reacquainted with his old gang: Max, Patsy, and Cockeye, who are now major players in the bootlegging industry during Prohibition. Noodles reunites with Deborah and tries to rekindle their relationship. Meanwhile, during a robbery, the gang meets Carol, who soon becomes Max's girlfriend. The gang prospers from bootlegging under Prohibition, providing muscle for union boss Jimmy Conway O'Donnell. Noodles tries to impress Deborah on an extravagant date, then rapes her on their way home in a limousine, after which he becomes remorseful.
The gang's financial success ends with the repeal of Prohibition, when Max considers a suggestion to set up what was to become the Teamsters' union, which Noodles refuses and leaves. Max runs after him and they go to Florida together. While there, Max suggests robbing the New York Federal Reserve Bank, but Noodles sees it as suicidal. Carol, who also fears for Max's life, convinces Noodles to call the police on his friend for a minor offence, just to keep him in jail for a short time. Noodles does this at an end-of-Prohibition party. Shortly after, Max, who has followed him to the office, knocks him unconscious for calling him crazy. Regaining consciousness, Noodles finds out that Max, Patsy, and Cockeye have been killed by the police, and is consumed with guilt over making the phone call that led to the beginning scenes of the film. Noodles is then seen boarding the first bus to leave New York, going to Buffalo, where he will live in hiding under a fake identity for the next 35 years.
In 1968, Noodles receives a letter informing him that the cemetery where his friends are buried has been sold and asking him to make arrangements for their reburial. Realising that someone has deduced his identity, Noodles returns to Manhattan and stays with Fat Moe above his still-open restaurant. While visiting the new cemetery, Noodles finds there, visibly hung for him to take it, a key to the railway locker once kept by the gang, and further notes the license plate of a car that is following him there. Opening the locker, he discovers a suitcase full of cash, like the one kept there and taken away, now with a note saying the money is a down payment on his next job. Noodles hears about the lavish estate of Secretary Bailey, an embattled political figure whose name has been mentioned in news reports of the car explosion that killed the District Attorney.
Noodles visits Carol, who lives at a retirement home run by the Bailey Foundation. She tells him that Max planted the idea of Carol and Noodles tipping off the police because he wanted to die rather than go insane like his father, who died in an asylum. He opened fire on the police to ensure his own death. While at the home, Noodles sees a photo of Deborah at the institution's dedication. Noodles tracks down Deborah, now a successful actress. He questions her about Secretary Bailey, telling her that he has received an invitation to a party at Bailey's house. Deborah claims not to know much about Bailey, but Noodles already knows they have lived together for years. In the end, Deborah tells him Bailey was a starving immigrant who married a very wealthy woman who died in childbirth. She begs him to not go to the party but leave via the back exit and not the main door of her dressing room, where a young man named David is waiting for her. Noodles leaves via the main door and Deborah explains that the young man is Secretary Bailey's son, named David (which is also Noodles' given name). David bears an obvious resemblance to Max as a young man (and is played by the same actor), implying that Secretary Bailey is Max.
Secretary Bailey is revealed to be Max. Noodles meets with Max in his private room at the party. Max explains that corrupt policemen helped him fake his own death so that he could steal the gang's money and steal Noodles' love interest, Deborah, in order to begin a new life as Mr. Bailey, a man with contacts to the Teamsters' union. Now faced with ruin and the spectre of a Teamster assassination, Max asks Noodles to kill him. Noodles refuses despite Max's permission and goading, because, in his eyes, Max died with the gang. As Noodles leaves Bailey's estate, he hears a garbage truck start up and looks back to see a man standing at the driveway's gated entrance. As he begins to walk towards Noodles, the truck passes between them. As the truck passes, Noodles sees its auger grinding down rubbish, the man nowhere to be seen.
In a flashback, a young adult Noodles enters the opium den after his gang's murder, taking the drug and broadly grinning.
Cast[edit]
Robert De Niro as Noodles
Scott Tiler as Young Noodles
James Woods as Max
Rusty Jacobs as Young Max/David
Elizabeth McGovern as Deborah
Jennifer Connelly as Young Deborah
Treat Williams as Jimmy O'Donnell
Tuesday Weld as Carol
Burt Young as Joe
Joe Pesci as Frankie
Danny Aiello as Police Chief Aiello
William Forsythe as Cockeye
Adrian Curran as Young Cockeye
James Hayden as Patsy
Brian Bloom as Young Patsy
Darlanne Fluegel as Eve
Larry Rapp as Fat Moe
Mike Monetti as Young Fat Moe
Richard Bright as Chicken Joe
Amy Ryder as Peggy
Julie Cohen as Young Peggy
Olga Karlatos as Woman in the Puppet Theatre
Noah Moazezi as Dominic
James Russo as Bugsy
The cast also includes Robert Harper as Sharkey, Mario Brega as Mandy, Paul Herman as Monkey, Marcia Jean Kurtz as Max's Mother, Estelle Harris as Peggy's Mother, and Richard Foronji as Whitey. Louise Fletcher can also be seen in the 2012 restoration as the director of the cemetery Noodles visits in 1968.[4]
Production[edit]
Development[edit]
During the mid-1960s, Sergio Leone read the novel The Hoods by Harry Grey, a pseudonym for the former gangster-turned-informant whose real name was Harry Goldberg.[5] In 1968, after shooting Once Upon a Time in the West, Leone made many efforts to talk to Grey. Having enjoyed Leone's Dollars Trilogy, Grey finally responded and agreed to meet with Leone at a Manhattan bar.[6] Following that initial meeting, Leone met with Grey several times throughout the remainder of the 1960s and 1970s to understand America through Grey's point of view. Intent on making another trilogy about America,[5] Leone turned down an offer from Paramount Pictures to direct The Godfather in order to pursue his pet project.[7][8]
Casting[edit]
Leone considered many actors for the film during the long development process. Originally, in 1975, Gérard Depardieu, who was determined to learn English with a Brooklyn accent for the role, was cast as Max, with Jean Gabin playing the older Max. Richard Dreyfuss was cast as Noodles, with James Cagney playing the older Noodles. In 1980, Leone spoke of casting Tom Berenger as Noodles, with Paul Newman playing the older Noodles. Among actors considered for the role of Max were Dustin Hoffman, Jon Voight, Harvey Keitel, John Malkovich, and John Belushi.
Early in 1981, Brooke Shields was offered the role of Deborah Gelly, after Leone had seen The Blue Lagoon, claiming that "she had the potential to play a mature character." A writers' strike delayed the project, and Shields withdrew before auditions began. Elizabeth McGovern was cast as Deborah and Jennifer Connelly as her younger self.
Joe Pesci was among many to audition for Max. He got the smaller role of Frankie, partly as a favor to his friend De Niro. Danny Aiello auditioned for several roles and was ultimately cast as the police chief who (coincidentally) shares his surname. Claudia Cardinale (who appeared in Once Upon a Time in the West) wanted to play Carol, but Leone was afraid she would not be convincing as a New Yorker and turned her down.
Filming[edit]
The film was shot between June 14, 1982, and April 22, 1983. Leone tried, as he had with A Fistful of Dynamite, to produce the film with a young director under him. In the early days of the project he courted John Milius, a fan of his who was enthusiastic about the idea; but Milius was working on The Wind and the Lion and the script for Apocalypse Now and could not commit to the project. For the film's visual style, Leone used as references the paintings of such artists as Reginald Marsh, Edward Hopper, and Norman Rockwell, as well as (for the 1922 sequences) the photographs of Jacob Riis. F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby influenced Noodles' relationship with Deborah.
Most exteriors were shot in New York City (such as in Williamsburg along South 6th Street, where Fat Moe's restaurant was based, and South 8th Street), but several key scenes were shot elsewhere. Most interiors were shot in Cinecittà in Rome. The beach scene, where Max unveils his plan to rob the Federal Reserve, was shot at the Don CeSar in St. Petersburg, Florida.[9] The New York's railway "Grand Central Station" scene in the thirties flashbacks was filmed in the Gare du Nord in Paris.[10] The interiors of the lavish restaurant where Noodles takes Deborah on their date were shot in the Hotel Excelsior in Venice, Italy.[10] The gang's hit on Joe was filmed in Quebec. The view of the Manhattan Bridge shown in the film's poster can be seen from Washington Street in Brooklyn.[11]
The shooting script, completed in October 1981 after many delays and a writers' strike between April and July of that year, was 317 pages in length.
Editing[edit]
By the end of filming, Leone had eight to ten hours worth of footage. With his editor, Nino Baragli, Leone trimmed this to almost six hours, and he originally wanted to release the film in two parts, each three hours.[12] The producers refused, partly because of the commercial and critical failure of Bertolucci's two-part 1900, and Leone was forced to further shorten it.[12] The film was originally 269 minutes (4 hours and 29 minutes), but when the film premiered out of competition at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival,[13] Leone had cut it to 229 minutes (3 hours and 49 minutes) to appease the distributors, which was the version shown in European cinemas. However, the American wide release was edited further to 139 minutes (2 hours and 19 minutes) by the studio, against the director's wishes.
Music[edit]
The musical score was composed by Leone's longtime collaborator Ennio Morricone. The film's long production resulted in Morricone's finishing the composition of most of the soundtrack before many scenes had been filmed. Some of Morricone's pieces were played on set as filming took place, a technique that Leone had used for Once Upon a Time in the West. "Deborah's Theme" was written for another film in the 1970s but was rejected; Morricone presented the piece to Leone, who was initially reluctant to include it, considering it too similar to Morricone's main title music for Once Upon a Time in the West. The score is also notable for Morricone’s incorporation of the music of Gheorghe Zamfir, who plays a pan flute. At times this music is used to convey remembrance, at other times terror. Zamfir’s flute music was used to similarly haunting effect in Peter Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975).[14] Morricone also collaborated with vocalist Edda Dell'Orso on the score.
Once Upon a Time in America
Soundtrack album by Ennio Morricone
Released
June 1, 1984
October 17, 1995 (Special Edition)
Recorded
December 1983
Studio
Forum Studios, Rome
Genre
Contemporary classical
Label
Mercury Records
Producer
Ennio Morricone
Special Edition cover
1995 Special Edition
A soundtrack album was released in 1984 by Mercury Records.[15] This was followed by a special-edition release in 1995, featuring four additional tracks.[16]
Side one
No.
Title
Length
1. "Once Upon a Time in America" 2:11
2. "Poverty" 3:37
3. "Deborah's Theme" 4:24
4. "Childhood Memories" 3:22
5. "Amapola" 5:21
6. "Friends" 1:34
7. "Prohibition Dirge" 4:20
Side two
No.
Title
Length
8. "Cockeye's Song" 4:20
9. "Amapola, Part II" 3:07
10. "Childhood Poverty" 1:41
11. "Photographic Memories" 1:00
12. "Friends" 1:23
13. "Friendship & Love" 4:14
14. "Speakeasy" 2:21
15. "Deborah's Theme – Amapola" 6:13
Bonus tracks (1995 Special Edition)
No.
Title
Length
16. "Suite from Once Upon a Time in America (Includes Amapola)" 13:32
17. "Poverty (Temp. Version)" 3:26
18. "Unused Theme" 4:46
19. "Unused Theme (Version 2)" 3:38
Besides the original music, the film used source music, including:
"God Bless America" (written by Irving Berlin, performed by Kate Smith – 1943) – Plays over the opening credits from a radio in Eve's bedroom and briefly at the film's ending.
"Yesterday" (written by Lennon–McCartney – 1965) – A Muzak version of this piece plays when Noodles first returns to New York in 1968, examining himself in a train station mirror. An instrumental version of the song also plays briefly during the dialogue scene between Noodles and "Bailey" towards the end of the film.
"Summertime" (written by George Gershwin – 1935) An instrumental version of the aria from the opera Porgy and Bess is playing softly in the background as Noodles, just before leaving, explains to "Secretary Bailey" why he could never kill his friend.
"Amapola" (written by Joseph LaCalle, American lyrics by Albert Gamse – 1923) – Originally an opera piece, several instrumental versions of this song were played during the film; a jazzy version, which was played on the gramophone danced to by young Deborah in 1922; a similar version played by Fat Moe's jazz band in the speakeasy in 1932; and a string version, during Noodles' date with Deborah. It has been suggested that Leone used this piece after hearing a version of it in the film Carnal Knowledge, though this has not been confirmed. Both versions are available on the soundtrack.
"La gazza ladra" overture (Gioachino Rossini – 1817) – Used during the famous baby-switching scene in the hospital.
"Night and Day" (written and sung by Cole Porter – 1932) – Played by a jazz band during the beach scene before the beachgoers receive word of Prohibition's repeal, and during the party at the house of "Secretary Bailey" in 1968.
"St. James Infirmary Blues" is used during the Prohibition "funeral" at the gang's speakeasy.
Release[edit]
Once Upon a Time in America premiered at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival on 23 May and received a "15-minute standing ovation".[12][13] In the United States, the film received a wide release in 894 theaters on June 1, 1984 and grossed $2.4 million during its opening weekend.[17] It ended its box office run with a gross of just over $5.3 million on a $30 million budget,[18] and became labeled as a box office flop.[19] The financial and critical disaster of the American release almost bankrupted The Ladd Company.[citation needed] Eventually, the film premiered in Leone's native Italy out of competition at the 41st Venice International Film Festival in September 1984.[20] That same month, the film was released wide in Italy on September 28, 1984 in its 229-minute version.
Versions[edit]
Several different versions of Once Upon a Time in America have been shown. The original European release version (1984, 229 minutes) was shown internationally.
US excisions[edit]
The film was shown in limited release and for film critics in America, where it was slightly trimmed to secure an "R" rating. Cuts were made to two rape scenes and some of the more graphic violence at the beginning. Noodles' meeting with Bailey in 1968 was also excised. The film gained a mediocre reception at several sneak premieres in North America. Because of this early audience reaction, the fear of its length, its graphic violence, and the inability of theaters to have multiple showings in one day, the decision was made by The Ladd Company to make many edits and cut entire scenes without the supervision of Sergio Leone.[12] This American wide release (1984, 139 minutes) was drastically different from the European release, as the non-chronological story was rearranged into chronological order. Other major cuts involved many of the childhood sequences, making the adult 1933 sections more prominent. Noodles' 1968 meeting with Deborah was excised, and the scene with Bailey ends with him shooting himself (with the sound of a gunshot off screen) rather than the garbage truck conclusion of the 229-minute version.
USSR[edit]
In the Soviet Union, the film was shown theatrically in the late 1980s, with other Hollywood blockbusters such as the two King Kong films. The story was rearranged in chronological order and the film was split in two, with the two parts shown as separate movies,[21] one containing the childhood scenes and the other comprising the adulthood scenes. Despite the rearranging, no major scene deletions were made. It was rated "16+" by the Goskino.
TV compilation[edit]
A network television version was shown in the early to mid-1990s with a running time of almost three hours (excluding commercials). While it retained the film's original non-chronological order, many key scenes involving violence and graphic content were left out. This version was a one-off showing, and no copies are known to exist.
Restored original[edit]
Robert De Niro and Elizabeth McGovern at the screening of the film's restored version, during the 2012 Cannes Film Festival.
In March 2011, it was announced that Leone's original 269-minute version was to be re-created by a film lab in Italy under the supervision of Leone's children, who had acquired the Italian distribution rights, and the film's original sound editor, Fausto Ancillai, for a premiere in 2012 at either the Cannes Film Festival or Venice Film Festival.[22][23]
The restored film premiered at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, but because of unforeseen rights issues for the deleted scenes, the restoration had a runtime of only 251 minutes.[24][25][26] However, Martin Scorsese (whose Film Foundation helped with the restoration) stated that he is helping Leone's children gain the rights to the final 24 minutes of deleted scenes to create a complete restoration of Leone's envisaged 269-minute version. On August 3, 2012, it was reported that after the premiere at Cannes, the restored film was pulled from circulation, pending further restoration work.[27]
Home media[edit]
In North America, the heavily edited 139-minute version was made available on DVD in the late 1990s. This was followed by a two-disc special edition release on June 10, 2003, featuring the 229-minute version of the film.[28] This special edition was rereleased on January 11, 2011, on both DVD and Blu-ray.[29] On September 30, 2014, Warner Bros. released a two-disc Blu-ray and DVD set of the 2012 251-minute restoration shown at the Cannes Film Festival, dubbed the Extended Director's Cut.[30] This version was previously released in Italy, on September 4, 2012.[31]
Critical reception[edit]
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The initial critical response to Once Upon a Time in America was mixed, because of the different versions released worldwide. While internationally the film was well received in its original form, American critics were much more dissatisfied with the 139-minute version released in North America. This condensed version was a critical and financial disaster, and many American critics who knew of Leone's original cut attacked the short version. Some critics compared shortening the film to shortening Richard Wagner's operas, saying that works of art that are meant to be long should be given the respect they deserve. Roger Ebert wrote in his 1984 review that the uncut version was "an epic poem of violence and greed" but described the American theatrical version as a "travesty".[32] Ebert's television film critic partner Gene Siskel considered the uncut version to be the best film of 1984.[33]
It was only after Leone's death and the subsequent restoration of the original version that critics began to give it the kind of praise displayed at its original Cannes showing. The uncut original film is considered to be far superior to the edited version released in the US in 1984.[34] Ebert, in his review of Brian De Palma's The Untouchables, called the original uncut version of Once Upon a Time in America the best film depicting the Prohibition era.[35] James Woods, who considers it to be Leone's finest film, mentioned in the DVD documentary that one critic dubbed the film the worst of 1984, only to see the original cut years later and call it the best of the 1980s.[21] The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reports an 86% approval rating with an average rating of 8.6/10 based on 50 reviews. The website's consensus reads, "Sergio Leone's epic crime drama is visually stunning, stylistically bold, and emotionally haunting, and filled with great performances from the likes of Robert De Niro and James Woods."[36]
The film has since been ranked as one of the best films of the gangster genre. When Sight & Sound asked several UK critics in 2002 what their favorite films of the last 25 years were, Once Upon a Time in America placed at number 10.[37] In 2015, the film was ranked at number nine on Time Out's list of the 50 best gangster films of all time.[38]
Interpretations[edit]
As the film begins and ends in 1933, with Noodles hiding in an opium den from syndicate hitmen, and the last shot of the film is of Noodles in a smiling, opium-soaked high, the film can be interpreted as having been a drug-induced dream, with Noodles remembering his past and envisioning the future. In an interview by Noël Simsolo published in 1987, Leone confirms the validity of this interpretation, saying that the scenes set in the 1960s could be seen as an opium dream of Noodles'.[39] In the DVD commentary for the film, film historian and critic Richard Schickel states that opium users often report vivid dreams, and that these visions have a tendency to explore the user's past and future.[40]
Many people (including Schickel) assume that the 1968 Frisbee scene, which has an immediate cut and gives no further resolution, was part of a longer sequence.[41] Ebert stated that the purpose of the flying disc scene was to establish the 1960s time frame and nothing more.[32]
Accolades[edit]
Despite its modern critical success, the initial American release did not fare well with critics and received no Academy Award nominations.[42] The film's music was disqualified from Oscar consideration for a technicality,[43] as the studio accidentally omitted the composer's name from the opening credits when trimming its running time for the American release.[21]
Award
Category
Nominee
Result
38th British Academy Film Awards[44] Best Costume Design Gabriella Pescucci Won
Best Film Music Ennio Morricone Won
Best Direction Sergio Leone Nominated
Best Actress in a Supporting Role Tuesday Weld Nominated
Best Cinematography Tonino Delli Colli Nominated
42nd Golden Globe Awards[45] Best Director Sergio Leone Nominated
Best Original Score Ennio Morricone Nominated
8th Japan Academy Prize[46] Outstanding Foreign Language Film – Won
10th Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards[47] Best Film – Nominated
Best Director Sergio Leone Nominated
Best Music Score Ennio Morricone Won
See also[edit]
List of films cut over the director's opposition
References[edit]
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^ Jump up to: a b Hughes Crime Wave: The Filmgoers' guide to the great crime movies pp.156–157.
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Jump up ^ Variety (10 March 2011): "'Once Upon a Time' to be restored" Retrieved April 21, 2011
Jump up ^ The Film Forum (13 Mar 2011): "Once Upon a Time in America – 269 minute version in 2012" Retrieved April 21, 2011
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Jump up ^ Gallman, Brett (April 21, 2012). "'Once Upon a Time in America,' Other Director's Cuts Worth Watching – Yahoo! Movies". Movies.yahoo.com. Retrieved May 19, 2012.
Jump up ^ Cannes Classics 2012 - Festival de Cannes 2014 (International Film Festival). Festival-cannes.fr. Retrieved on June 5, 2014.
Jump up ^ Paley, Tony (August 3, 2012). "Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America is withdrawn from circulation". The Guardian. London.
Jump up ^ Erickson, Glenn (June 2003). "DVD Savant Review: Once Upon a Time in America". DVD Talk. Retrieved March 26, 2015.
Jump up ^ "Once Upon a Time in America Preview". IGN. Ziff Davis. January 11, 2011. Retrieved March 26, 2015.
Jump up ^ "Once Upon a Time in America: Extended Director's Cut Blu-ray". Blu-ray.com. June 5, 2014.
Jump up ^ "Once Upon a Time in America (Comparison)". Movie-Censorship.com. December 11, 2012. Retrieved March 26, 2015.
^ Jump up to: a b Ebert, Roger (January 1, 1984). "Once Upon A Time in America". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved June 8, 2008.
Jump up ^ Siskel, Gene. ""Siskel and Ebert" Top Ten Films (1980-1998)". Estate of Gene Siskel. Archived from the original on February 23, 2010. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ Turan, Kenneth (July 10, 1999). "A Cinematic Rarity: Showing of Leone's Uncut 'America'". The Los Angeles Times.
Jump up ^ Ebert, Roger (June 3, 1987). "The Untouchables (1987)". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ "Once Upon a Time in America". Rotten Tomatoes. Flixster. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ "Modern Times". Sight & Sound. British Film Institute. December 2002. Archived from the original on March 7, 2012. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ "The 50 best gangster movies of all time". Time Out. Time Out Limited. March 12, 2015. p. 5. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ Simsolo, Noël (1987). Conversations avec Sergio Leone. Paris: Stock. ISBN 2-234-02049-2.
Jump up ^ Once Upon a Time in America commentary with film historian Richard Schickel
Jump up ^ Once Upon a Time in America DVD audio commentary
Jump up ^ "Snubbed by Oscar: Mistakes & Omissions". AMC Networks. American Movie Classics Company. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ Ibid
Jump up ^ "Film in 1985". British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Retrieved March 25, 2015.
Jump up ^ Thomas, Bob (January 8, 1985). "Amadeus," The Killing Fields," Top Nominees". Associated Press Archive. Associated Press. Archived from the original on March 27, 2015. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ "8th Japan Academy Prize". Japan Academy Prize Association (in Japanese). Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Jump up ^ "10th Annual Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards". Los Angeles Film Critics Association. 2007. Retrieved March 27, 2015.
Bibliography[edit]
Hughes, Howard (2002). Crime Wave: The Filmgoers' guide to the great crime movies.
External links[edit]
Once Upon a Time in America on IMDb
Once Upon a Time in America at Rotten Tomatoes
Once Upon a Time in America at Box Office Mojo
Once Upon a Time in America at AllMovie
Unofficial movie site
[hide]
v
t
e
Films directed by Sergio Leone
They Stole a Tram (1954)
The Last Days of Pompeii (1959)
The Colossus of Rhodes (1961)
A Fistful of Dollars (1964)
For a Few Dollars More (1965)
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966)
Once Upon a Time in the West (1968)
Duck, You Sucker! (1971)
Once Upon a Time in America (1984)
Authority control
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VIAF: 316751724
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Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Once_Upon_a_Time_in_America&oldid=827698763"
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