Once Upon A Time…In Hollywood – Review

Synopsis taken from IMDB – A faded television actor and his stunt double strive to achieve fame and success in the film industry during the final years of Hollywood’s Golden Age in 1969 Los Angeles. Big surprise here, but I don’t personally know Quentin Tarantino. I do know from watching this movie though, that he … Continue reading "Once Upon A Time…In Hollywood – Review"

Synopsis taken from IMDB – A faded television actor and his stunt double strive to achieve fame and success in the film industry during the final years of Hollywood’s Golden Age in 1969 Los Angeles.

Big surprise here, but I don’t personally know Quentin Tarantino. I do know from watching this movie though, that he had a blast making it. It boils down to a giant “what if” story where the Charles Manson murders happened in the Tarantino cinematic universe.

It functions as an homage to everything Tarantino has confessed to loving over the years. It’s so up his alley that he was all but destined to make this movie sooner or later. If you’ve ever heard him talk about movies in interviews before you’ll know exactly what I mean. The inside baseball material about shooting TV shows and movies are the shining parts of this feature. There were a lot of times that I caught myself just smiling at what was going on and sometimes it wasn’t even important scenes.

Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood is both the most and least Tarantino-esque movie  he has made. The dialog is great, but it isn’t the quick, bantery dialogue that you fell in love with from Pulp Fiction. It’s a little more nuanced. Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) and Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) are very different cats from Vincent and Jules. The movie is a love letter to cinema and that reality breathes carefully in the opening half of the movie. Once the movie kicks it up a notch though, it picks up speed quickly. The last 40 minutes or so go full Tarantino and it all starts to come together and make sense in a fantastic way.

The acting all around was pretty damn phenomenal. I think Brad Pitt was the strongest and most likable character, but Leo showed a whole lot of range in this one. Leo basically had to play a character, Rick Dalton, and then play a character (various acting parts) as Rick Dalton would. Sounds a little wacky huh? It gets very meta. He pulls it off magnificently though and it is great to see him switch from main character to acting character when they are shown filming episodes of his shows. It’s really great. Cliff Booth will be a character that will hold up like The Dude has. I could go on about all the other actors as they are all great but I’ll leave it at that because they are all great. From Margot Robbie to Timothy Olyphant, everyone brought their A-game no matter how big or small their part. Julia Butters plays a child actor on one of the TV shows that Dalton is working on and those few scenes they have together are great. She holds her own up against Leo. She is someone to keep an eye on. Lots of talent in her.

Tarantino is really good at unfolding stories and this one is a great ride. He built up a cool universe over the years and expands upon that rich history with Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood. He shows off Los Angeles really nicely and embellishes the late 60’s era. Cars have always had a spot in Tarantino’s movies and in this one there’s a lot of driving around town and running errands and it showcases and romanticizes the Hollywood area. The cinematography of these driving scenes are great. There’s some great shots of Brad Pitt just cruising around and while it is a totally aesthetic touch, it makes the movie that much more rich.

The more I sit and think about this movie, the more I like it. It’s got a bunch of standout scenes but some that felt like filler when I was watching it. It wasn’t until the movie was finished, that all the parts started to fill those gaps and make sense. Those scenes driving around LA weren’t wasted, they were building up this world and these characters for the payoff that is the last 30-40 minutes of the movie. This is definitely a movie I want to watch again and I feel like I will appreciate it even more the second go around.

How it Ranks

If you are familiar with Tarantino’s back catalog of movies Once Upon A Time… stacks up with Inglorious Basterds and Jackie Brown. If you enjoy those two you will thoroughly enjoy this one as well. If you’ve never seen a Tarantino movie before, this movie might not be what you expected it to be and I understand that it might be polarizing to people. I would put this as a middle of the pack rank in his filmography, which is complementing the rest of his catalog as I really enjoyed this movie. That said I still like Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood more than about 90% of other movies out there.

Should I Watch It?

If you like Tarantino’s movies – fuck yeah.

If you sort of like them – yeah sure but maybe wait until you can rent it.

If you are unfamiliar with his movies – I’d say yeah but just know that you are getting into something that needs almost 3 hours of watching it to get it.

If you don’t give a shit but love watching great actors do what they do best – Yes indeed.

If you like interesting cinematography and are fascinated by the golden age of film making – Definitely.

If you get bored easily, only care about easy picked plots,  and don’t want to watch a bunch of characters grow and unfold together – Fuckin skip it.

SPOILERY STUFF BELOW

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This movie is most similar to Inglourious Basterds. In our reality we know the history and our history is different from the Tarantino universe’s history. Much in the same as Inglourious Basterds flipped the script on WW2, Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood is flipping the script on the late 60’s era Hollywood.

The whole movie is a sort of sleight of hand. You get all the buildup of Sharon Tate and Charles Manson and just when it seems like everything is coming to a head the whole thing is flipped on you. Suddenly, you remember that this is Tarantino’s world and then the Manson family changes course and attacks Tate’s neighbor, Rick Dalton. The marketing for this movie really pushed the Manson angle and the funny thing is that the scene from the trailer with Charlie in it, is basically the only scene with him in the movie. The rest of the cult is there and we see the ranch, but it’s all just smoke and mirrors as the plot unfolds. 

The Manson/Tate thing was interesting and played a part in the finale, but it was not the point of the movie. The movie is more about an aging actor dealing with becoming a “has been” as he’s no longer the sought-after guy. He’s been replaced by new younger talent and is trying to come to terms with that. It’s also about friendship and how to deal with a friend that also relies on you for work. There’s a scene where Leo is talking to an 8 year old about the book he’s reading. The book is about a horse breaker who is getting too old and too beaten up to be the best anymore. He starts to realize that it parallels his own career and he starts to believe in this existential crisis that he’s been trying to avoid dealing with. Leo performed a very understated performance that danced that line of a good actor who has been phoning it in for a while that is trying to bring it out again all the while he’s trying to figure out what he’s doing with the rest of his life and career.

This was a very well-intentioned movie at times. Dalton’s agent told him like it is and was generally acting in his best intentions. Cliff denies the girl hitting on him because he doesn’t think she’s 18. Sharon Tate is generally joyous and enjoying life. The friendship between Cliff and Rick is very genuine. Even when there is the possibility of an altercation they handle themselves like adults and realize that life happens and that’s just how shit goes sometimes. It was nice to not have to plow through some manufactured bullshit just to have them become friends again at the end.

The movie is like one long joke where the punchline is that a pool party can get his career on track and bringing back a flamethrower is always a good idea.

Favorite Quotes

“More than a brother but not quite a wife”

“I’m as real as a motherfucking donut!”

Things of Note

Julia Butters.
Margot Robbie was also great in an understated way.
Bruce Dern was great.
Red apple commercial in the credits.
Wolf tooth dog food – “Good Food for Mean Dogs”
Lots of random 60’s era celebrities showing up.
Some cool cameos and/or small parts – Dakota Fanning, Lena Dunham, Maya Hawke (Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman’s Daughter), Bruce Dern, Damian Lewis, Luke Perry.

Favorite Scenes

The pairing of Leo and Timothy Olyphant was great. They’re shooting a scene at a table and the camera is moving to the left on a dolly and then Leo messes up his line and they have to reset the camera and we see from the camera’s point of view as it winds back to the point at the beginning of the scene. It’s a fun deconstruction of the old way of making TV shows.

The Manson ranch scene was also interesting to see unfold because I really didn’t know how it was going to play out. It turned into a very tense situation. Cliff just kept on pushing and pushing despite everything looking like he should just turn around and get the fuck out of there. That scene was really the turning point for me that made this movie go from like a 7 to an 8 or 9. This also makes me yearn for a full on horror/thriller made by Quentin. 

All of the throwback vignettes of movies or shows that they shot scenes for looked like it was just so much fun to make. Those vignettes are reminiscent of the fake trailers that were made for the Grindhouse double feature. 

Cliff fighting Bruce Lee was also a fun scene, which just so happened to be like a 6 minute long flashback/daydream scene while cliff was on the roof fixing an antenna. So good. He also remembers Bruce Lee as an arrogant asshole which from what I know is completely out of character for Bruce Lee which makes it even funnier as it plays on the aspect of memory and how you can remember something much different than how it actually happened. 

Cliff and Brandy taking on the Manson family is another great scene despite it being a little over the top with its gnarly ass gore. 

Mother-Fucking Flame-Thrower – “Can you do anything about the heat?” “It’s a flamethrower, Rick…”

Issues and Final Thoughts

The movie was a little slow and brooding for the first half or so which isn’t uncommon for a Tarantino movie but before it kicked in I did find myself wondering what it was all leading to. That isn’t inherently a bad thing but it did cause me to pull my head out of the movie for a second or two every now and again. If you like Tarantino movies, the front end of this movie isn’t the most Tarantino-esque movie out there which is why I had a little issue with it. It just wasn’t what I was expecting. It is hard to watch a movie like this and not compare it to Tarantino’s previous movies and for most of the first half I was enjoying the movie but in my head I was comparing it to his past movies and it wasn’t stacking up. Once I dropped those connotations, I started to enjoy the movie for what it was. The funny thing is, that even when I was comparing it to his previous movies, I was still enjoying the shit out of it which is more of a comment on the quality of movies in general and less of a jab at Tarantino. The world building and character development may be slow building but damn is it worth it for that ending. 

And oh yeah there’s feet in this…It’s a Tarantino movie after all, you can stop complaining about it. 

–  Mike