Once Upon A Time In Hollywood

Quentin Tarantino's latest film, Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019), is essentially a love letter to late 60s film and Hollywood. This is basically achieved by following a fading movie star Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his stunt double/valet Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) on typical day along with that of Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie)-an actor and wife of director Roman Polanski. The fictionalized actor Dalton allows Tarantino to create fictional films, advertisements, and TV series to fill in Dalton's backstory. There are references to the films of the day seen in the background on marquees as the characters navigate Los Angeles and Hollywood in particular in their daily routines. There's a controversial set piece where Booth gets in a fight with Bruce Lee (Mike Moh) on the set of The Green Hornet, that doesn't portray Lee in a positive light. Tate is based on the infamous victim of the Manson family and provides a look into the real going events of the era like the scene where Tate goes to see herself in the 1968 film with Dean Martin, The Wrecking Crew. The Manson family enters the story when Booth picks up a young, outgoing hitch hiker, Pussycat (Margaret Qualley) and drops her off on the Spahn Ranch. It's something of a shaggy dog movie with a meandering plot until the end of the film. There's plenty of the stylized Tarantino dialogue and some impressive cinematography. Overall, I enjoyed the late 60s love letter but felt it was also somewhat indulgent and overlong.