(Jul. 19) – Named for its Italian origins, the “Spaghetti Western” was among the hottest dishes on the movie menu in the 1960s, with a group of brash, ambitious Italian filmmakers reinventing the most quintessentially American of genres. Though Sergio Leone was the genre’s most celebrated chef, such talents as Sergio Corbucci, Gianfranco Parolini, Giulio Petroni and Carlo Lizzani, to name a few, also were drawn to the table, bringing with them a new kind of anti-establishment Western that was right at home in the era of the Black Panthers, student protests and the Vietnam War. Stripping the form of its romantic patriotism and replacing it with bare-bones brutality and satire, the spaghetti Western incorporated widescreen framing, sweaty close-ups and expressive sound design (most often courtesy of composer Ennio Morricone), changing the way Westerns looked, sounded and felt. Small budgets bought plenty of bang for the lira, and relentless action and rootless antiheroes could be counted on to deliver appreciative audiences. The American Cinematheque pays its tribute to Spaghetti Western with a retrospective at the Egyptian and Aero Theatres of Los Angeles from next July 26th to August 12nd.
