Once Upon a Time in America, phone ringing after pickup
example · film: Once Upon a Time in America ·
retold in 4 talks
In Leone's film, a phone rings endlessly; a hand picks it up, but the ringing goes on, disintegrating sound from its bodily source and illustrating how cinema can decompose reality into autonomous elements.
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 3
“towards the beginning of the film, we see a phone ringing, ringing endlessly, then finally a hand picks up the phone, the ringing goes on”
“you remember at the beginning the phone is ringing endlessly… the ringing goes on now of course this is not a magic movie”
“the phone ringing ringing ringing then the hand picks up picks it up the ringing goes on... those magic five ten seconds where we think oh my god it's something appears something traumatic.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
Its cast and sources
populated by
Sergio Leone3George Balanchine2Ambrose Bierce1Karl Kraus1Eve Ensler1Éric Rohmer1Joe Ashkenazi1Mark (host)1
alongside works
Every retelling 3
In Leone's film, a phone rings endlessly; a hand picks it up, but the ringing goes on, disintegrating sound from its bodily source and illustrating how cinema can decompose reality into autonomous elements., illustrating spectral voice,Cheshire Cat operation
In Leone's film the phone rings, then there is a three-minute hallucination flashback, then the hand picks up, but the ringing continues, because the pick-up was still within the hallucination. Appearance (the ringing) haunts, persisting without ground., illustrating Lacanian Real,death drive,appearance without substance
In Leone's film, a phone rings and rings and a hand picks it up but the ringing continues, for a few uncanny seconds something traumatic appears before the narrative explains it away, the absolute as pure spectral appearance., illustrating disintegration of fantasy,organ without a body,appearance as appearance