★★★★★★ (6/7)
"Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood" is about a faded television actor and his stunt double striving to achieve fame and success in the final years of Hollywood's Golden Age in 1969 Los Angeles. It is the newest film released from director Quentin Tarantino.
Tarantino's newest film is an ode to Hollywood and the entertainment industry as a whole. The film follows Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio), a once big shot actor now falling out of the spotlight, and his stunt double, Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt). This movie feels different than other Tarantino movies I have seen. It gives an interesting look into the mentality of actors and how they try to perfect their craft. It also gives a new look into the death of Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie), which is shown in total Tarantino style.
When comparing "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood"with Tarantino's other films, I found this film to have more substance and message, whereas his other films focus on having an actual human dialogue. That being said, this film does not suffer from bad dialogue, but some lines from the Manson family are so corny that they are unintentionally funny.
The celebrity losing his spotlight is not a new story, but it is interesting to see it from Tarantino's point of view. When watching the film, I thought the best written scenes were those that showed the internal crisis of DiCaprio's character. We are shown an actor who berates himself for making mistakes, as he feels he must be perfect to find his way back to the glory he once new. A bleak character study like this is not often found in a Tarantino film.
Brad Pitt does phenomenal as the stunt double who is loyal through all the struggles. Cliff is much more laidback than Rick. I thought Brad Pitt played his character to perfection. He was always calm and the perfect amount of cocky. However, the scene that Tarantino put in that was a conflict between Cliff and Bruce Lee left a very bad taste in my mouth. Choosing to portray a dead martial arts icon who was known as extremely kind and humble as a cocky, self-indulgent person who brags about his strength felt disrespectful to the late Lee. Also, having him lose in a fight to a Hollywood stunt double was just as outrageous.
Tarantino's signature style shines through in the portion of the movie dedicated to the Manson family. I enjoyed how he showed them as human, but also made their horrible crimes and motives easily recognizable. To top all of that off, their climax is done in the usual over the top violent style that Tarantino fans are all now used to.
The deep look into Hollywood and the character studies given from Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood" were very pleasing to me. It was a different approach from him in relation to most of his past films. It was a good watch and the length is easily overlooked once one actually watches the film.
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