Editing Spaghetti Western (section)

==Reception==
In the 1960s, critics recognized that the American genres were rapidly changing. The genre most identifiably American, the Western, seemed to be evolving into a new, rougher form. For many critics, [[Sergio Leone]]'s films were part of the problem. Leone's ''[[Dollars Trilogy]]'' (1964–1966) was not the beginning of the "spaghetti Western" cycle in Italy, but for some Americans, Leone's films represented the true beginning of the Italian invasion of an American genre.

[[Christopher Frayling]], in his noted book on the Italian Western, describes American critical reception of the spaghetti Western cycle as, to "a large extent, confined to a sterile debate about the 'cultural roots' of the American/Hollywood Western".<ref>Frayling (2006), pp. 121–137.</ref> He remarked that few critics dared admit that they were, in fact, "bored with an exhausted Hollywood genre".

Frayling noted that [[Pauline Kael]] was willing to acknowledge this critical ennui, and thus appreciate how a film like Akira Kurosawa's ''Yojimbo'' "could exploit the conventions of the Western genre, while debunking its morality". Frayling and other film scholars, such as Bondanella, argue that this revisionism was the key to Leone's success, and, to some degree, to that of the spaghetti Western genre as a whole.<ref>Frayling (2006), pp. 39–40.</ref>