In short: Once Upon a Time …in Hollywood (2019)

Despite my general enthusiasm for the works of Quentin Tarantino, I went into this expecting to hate it, for I have developed a bit of a distaste for films in which Hollywood people glorify Hollywood, usually leading to a level of intellectual and philosophical dishonesty even worse than what you’ll encounter in your typical Hollywood biopic, if you can imagine that.

However, that distaste was blown away rather quickly by the way Tarantino focuses on the has-beens and the never-quite-weres of that supposedly magical place, the dreams that never quite came true and the egos not only too big for their talents (because you can still go far without much talent but with a humongous ego in Hollywood, as certain careers alas prove all too well) but also too weird for a normal life. Not surprisingly, it’s the weirdoes Tarantino’s heart beats for here, though not the truly nasty ones; those get bloodily murdered.

Quentin’s kind of weirdoes are wonderfully embodied by Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt here. DiCaprio manages to turn his aging cowboy actor Rick Dalton at once pathetic, loveable, annoying, and very very funny; he also demonstrates a fine understanding of a very specific kind of brilliant acting only found in low budget movies, programmers and other despised corners of the land of movies, places I tend to call home. Whereas Pitt embodies an over-aged kind of cool that only barely hides a deep goofiness and a certain emotional helplessness (a contemporary term of description would probably be “manchild”, but to me, that’s always been the kind of phrase only a judgemental asshole should use) in such a lovely way, I’m even willing to forgive him his Prozac turn in Ad Astra.

This is of course not a film interested in tight plotting or other new-fangled nonsense of this kind, but rather about its two main characters ambling through their lives, having encounters and small adventures, and from time to time crossing ways with the Manson “Family” so Quentin can at least get a little of the old ultra violence in, and critics who like this sort of thing can nod sagely and talk about “the dark side of the Hollywood dream”.

Me, I would have been perfectly happy without the whole Manson business, and without the obligatory explosion of violence. That would also have helped to rid the film of its other problem: the scenes when it pops in with Margot Robbie’s Sharon Tate, who is rich, and beautiful, and so very very boring, doing nothing of interest whatsoever except breaking up our fun time with Leo and Brad while Tarantino’s camera leers so male-gazey on every single bit of her body, even I felt a little uncomfortable. I was also wishing for a female character with a personality in her stead.


Despite being structurally rather important for the movie as a whole (some might argue also for the point of it as a whole, but eh, points…), these pretty large flaws never feel too terrible while actually watching Once Upon a Time, never hindering me from being really damn charmed by most of the proceedings on screen.