Grade: A
Through a stroke of serendipity, this summer has seen a neat symmetry with Bruce Springsteen and Quentin Tarantino. Each has new pieces of work that were not created with the other in mind, but occupy the same world. Last month, Springsteen released Western Stars – an album with lush, cinematic strings and orchestrations, hearkening back to the California pop sound of the 1970s and late 60s. Two of the characters sung about include a Hollywood actor and a Hollywood stuntman. Yesterday, QT’s 9th movie* as a director was released. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. It is a snapshot of a few months in the life of many in the film industry in Hollywood in 1969, particularly an actor and his stuntman. Western Stars and Once Upon a Time in Hollywood are both excellent new efforts that see both established artists at the top of their craft, and if you enjoy one, I think you will enjoy the other.
Tarantino has said that he never went to film school. He went to films. Most of his movies are more about characters and atmosphere than plot. And he is still a master at evoking an atmosphere. I wasn’t in California in 1969, but thanks to OUATIH, I was there in those hills, on those streets, and on those sets. Every last squeal of tires, chuck of boots in the dirt, dusty whistling wind, and whoosh of spinning guns is felt and hits home. We can almost taste his love of movies, as he relishes and hangs every last shot and sound effect out to dry. Our two main players here are Rick, a famous TV actor, and Cliff, his long-time friend, go-fer, designated driver, and stuntman. As Rick and Cliff, Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt have the best on-screen chemistry I can think of since Morgan Freeman and Chris Rock in Nurse Betty, and about Nurse Betty, I’d said that Freeman and Rock have the best chemistry since John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction. Other faces from the supporting cast that I recognized include Al Pacino, Michael Madsen, Dakota Fanning, Timothy Olyphant, Kurt Russell, Bruce Dern, Luke Perry, and one other I’m about to get to.
Tarantino likes to linger on what he finds fascinating, and I am always happy to linger with him. He seems to have a fixation on strong female characters: Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction and the Kill Bills, Pam Grier in Jackie Brown, Melanie Laurent in Inglourious Basterds, Kerry Washington in Django Unchained, Jennifer Jason Leigh in The Hateful Eight, etc. Though Margot Robbie doesn’t have many lines, the camera loves her as Sharon Tate in OUATIH. This could most closely be compared to Pulp Fiction in that it doesn’t have a definitive beginning-to-end throughline, but is rather a series of often-intersecting chapters or vignettes starring various individual characters. I most enjoyed the sequence where Brad Pitt drives the hitchhiker home to the ranch, and what he finds there, and how he deals with it. And in typical Tarantinian fashion, he can simultaneously turn up the laughs as he turns up the gore.
The movie lost me a little bit at the end, but that was my fault. I didn’t know a thing about the history behind Roman Polanski, Sharon Tate, and Charles Manson and his minions. I am not spoiling as much as it sounds, as we know that QT likes to re-write history. Something goes down in a bloody way, but not the way you would expect. The movie ends on a curious quiet beat – not with the upbeat flourish of his most successful past endings. I understand it better now that I did my homework. Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood is up there with the best of his other master strokes. I already want to see it again.
Grade: A
- – It’s his 9th feature film as a director if you don’t count Death Proof, which was part of the Grindhouse double-feature. Or is he counting Death Proof and only counting the Kill Bills as one movie (since they were filmed together and originally intended to be one long film)? I’ve just assumed he doesn’t count Death Proof, but there could be convincing arguments either way.
Film Reviews by Mark 
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