After talking about Once Upon A Time in America with DC, I started to think why it did not win any Academy Awards. Now, I haven't seen any other films released in 1984 but surley this film deserved Oscars. Does anybody know why it wasn't even nominated? Thanks.

The film did not do well in theaters due to the fact that it was released as a 2 hour version, cutting out a lot of scenes that were important to the plot of the movie. Many people walked away very confused after watching the edited version in the theaters which resulted in poor box office sales. So the film wound up being shut out of the Oscars and therefore did not receive any nominations.

Plus a U.S. distributor did NOT file the proper paperwork so that the movie score could be put up for nomination for an Academy Award.

ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA was fucked by the infamous American theatrical edit, which tried to cut the movie in chronological order...and those that have seen the movie in its correct edit, know it can't be edited chronological....so you have an edit that made no sense, and was trashed hard in America.

Meanwhile, the 220+ minute edit was a huge money/critical hit in Europe, and it was at Cannes film festival when the American critics finally saw the movie in its "correct" version(go read Roger Ebert's review sometime on his website.)

Leone's edit(or close enough to it) was released on VHS in America, and its reputation was restored in the states by the end of the decade when it came up for consideration by a magazine for Best Movie of the 1980s(which RAGING BULL won).

I have heard that there is a "12 hour" version of this movie floating around somewhere. Does anyone have any information about this? Sorry if this a repeat question or one already answered elsewhere on the board.

It's actually never struck me as commercial or marketable enough to be Oscar-worthy. It's decidedly arthouse cinema; a non-linear narrative, an obtrusive, expressionist and individualist directorial approach, and its length and pace are enduring to say the least. It's certainly not consumerable to the masses.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say (and I think it's a fair comment) that were it not for the subject matter, or perhaps De Niro, a lot of people wouldn't have even seen it on these boards.

Great, great film.

I have never seen Once Upon a Time in America before and have always wanted to. So I finally got around to ordering it through my online Blockbuster rental and one of the two discs they sent me was wrong! It was a freakin' anime dvd instead!

Thank god I have Netflix