The Big Picture - ‘Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood’ Is Quentin Tarantino’s Most Sentimental Film Yet (SPOILERS) | Exit Survey

Episode Date: July 26, 2019

We gather to discuss Quentin Tarantino’s ninth—and allegedly penultimate—film, ‘Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood.’ We break down everything from Leonardo DiCaprio grappling with the end of his career in the leading role, to Brad Pitt’s quiet charisma, to the way historical accuracy competes with fantasy. Hosts: Sean Fennessey, Amanda Dobbins, Chris Ryan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of The Big Picture is brought to you by M&M's. Watching a movie is nothing without a bag of your favorite treats. Take those treats to the next level with the new M&M's Hazelnut Spread Chocolate Candies. They are a delicious combo of hazelnut spread and milk chocolate in every bite-sized piece, delivering a side of indulgence that's all its own. I hate to walk into a movie theater late, but if I'm waiting on a special delivery of M&M's Hazelnut, I will wait. I will miss a couple of minutes of that movie just to get those M&M's.

So go Hazelnutty and try new M&M's Hazelnut spread chocolate candies today. Bring a little water. Bring a little wine. Bring a little lard. And I'll be fine. Know that you want to. And I know that you do. Come in here and love with me. I'm Sean Fennessey, editor-in-chief of The Ringer, and this is The Big Picture, a podcast about a movie called Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,

perhaps the most eagerly awaited movie in years, at least for myself. I am joined, of course, by Amanda Dobbins and Chris Ryan. Hello, guys. Thank you for joining me. What's up, man? Hi, Sean. Guys, I know that you were looking forward to this as much as I was. You just got a chance to see this movie last night. Maybe not as much as I was. Amanda just shrugged.

No, I was very much looking forward to it, but I just don't want to credit myself for caring as much as you do. This is a big day for you. Also, by the way, this will be running on your birthday. On my birthday. Happy birthday, Sean Fantasy. Thank you, Amanda. Thank you.

There we go. That's very embarrassing. The movie is premiering on my birthday, which is super exciting. This is the ninth movie from Quentin Tarantino. It is a movie about Hollywood. It is the first movie he's made that is specifically about Hollywood. Now, I'm going to say right up front, we're going to spoil this movie. Not yet. We're going to talk a little bit about some of the ideas and the performances and what this movie means for Quentin. About 20 to 25

minutes into the conversation, there will be a demarcating point, and we're going to start to spoil because you have to spoil to understand and unlock fully what's at play here. Now, I will admit I am a week removed from seeing the movie and you guys just saw it. So I think some of these things are going to be more fresh in your mind than in mine. So I'm eager to know what that immediate frisson of reaction was for you guys. How did you feel coming out of the movie? Chris, why don't you start? Well, I will say this. As we walked out of the movie, Amanda and I, who are neither of us are particularly bashful about sharing opinions. We were in silence for a solid few minutes and we made Bobby Wagner go first, which was pretty funny. Trying to include and share and let everyone have a turn at the table.

Bobby, are you mic'd right now? I am mic'd right now. Bobby, what was your immediate reaction since you spoke first? I said, are you seriously going to make me go first? My ultimate reaction, though, is that I adored this movie, which is not something that I often say about Tarantino movies. I love them. I'm enthralled by them.

I'm blown away by them. I think they're amazing. But it's not often that I adore them. And it's been a very, very long time since I've had a movie that I basically wanted to live inside of like I did with this. Amanda, in the description of this movie, it hits a lot of boxes for you. Yes. Super beautiful movie stars, cool period piece, interesting people interacting,

very dialogue forward. What'd you think? I like Chris. I was pretty moved by it. And we're not going to spoil it too much, but this is a movie about nostalgia. It's in the title. And I really had that Don Draper, like the nostalgia is the Greek word for pain from an old wound type feeling. It made me feel a little old, which was really tough. And again, I think we'll talk about this and how it fits into Tarantino's body of work but it is definitely a man looks at 50 or 55 and his life and his work and I had the

same experience because as you said it's a lot of things that I'm interested in I mean we all like moved to Los Angeles not to be in the movies, but to talk about the movies. And we do it a lot. There are things that are very dear to us. And I felt that that was reflected on the screen in a powerful way. Yeah. And this is a movie that is ineffably a Tarantino movie. It features Charles Manson and a blowtorch and a lot of reimagined old Hollywood props and ideas, but it is by far the softest thing he's ever made and the most sentimental thing he's ever made. And I use that word as a compliment.

It's kind of amazing just how sincere it is. Yeah, I mean, I like to think about his movies a lot in pairs. You know, you think about the way in which his filmography is kind of a conversation with itself, and you can think about Django and Inglourious together. You can think about Hateful Eight and Reservoir Dogs together. But this is really a partner conversation with itself. And you can think about Django and Inglorious together. You can think about hateful eight and reservoir dogs together, but this is really a partner film with Jackie Brown to me in terms of just how affectionate it is towards the,

almost every single person in this movie has something where you're just like, God, that just feels like a, if not a real person, at least it feels like a kind of person that I would like to have in my life in some way, maybe not Charles Manson, but you know, for the most part, like you just kind of, I think a lot of that is an extension of this being his home turf. And I think it's our home turf too, you know, now.

And I think that's probably why we're having such an incredibly kind of sensory reaction to it. But you can really understand the distances people drive, what the material their shoes are made of. There's so many shots of Brad Pitt's moccasins. You can see what they eat, what it must smell like. They're constantly telling you how hot it is. You can instantly imagine what the weather is like there. There's so much time spent in cars as you would in Los Angeles. So there's just like this lived in feeling to it that makes it really familiar. Amanda, let me ask you, you're connected to Los Angeles now. You've been living here for a few

years. Do you feel connected to some of the notions that Tarantino is exploring here? The idea of out of work actors, struggling stuntmen, movie stars, Charles Manson mythology. Are those things that you care about? Well, certainly not specifically the Manson mythology, but the old Hollywood of it all. And the Musso and Frank is where Leonardo DiCaprio and Al Pacino meet at the beginning of the movie. It's in the trailer. And, you know, that's a place that we've all been and a place you can still go and experience that Hollywood heyday vibe.

And Los Angeles still, in a lot of ways, is trying to get back to that golden era always. I mean, I think that golden era was maybe always a myth or something that was constantly being created, which we'll talk more about. And you certainly feel that way now. But yes, I feel connected to that. And to the idea of the actors and the out of work stuntmen.

I mean, not maybe I don't connect to that literally, but I mentioned this is a movie about age, about looking at your career, looking at what you've done with your life and taking stock of it. What's worked? What hasn't? Are you on the way up or are you on the way down? I don't we all relate to that? I don't know. Maybe that's just me. No, I think that's a major theme of the movie. It's interesting though, because if you've heard Tarantino talk about the movie at all thus far, he's not really putting that level of sentiment at the forefront. He's saying things more like what I wanted to do is pay tribute to people like Tab Hunter, a certain kind of actor who existed in the 60s and is now sort of forgotten. And this movie, it's not a spoiler at all to say that it is about a transitional

moment in American history and in the history of the city that we live in. And to show us essentially a breaking point and what could be inside that breaking point. And I was blown away, I think, by the way that he saw the city. And I think it's hard to know what's real and what's illusory to your point, Amanda, about the myth. But there are some things in the movie, like El Coyote, the restaurant that is across the street from the new Beverly Cinema, which is the cinema that he owns, playing such a significant role in the story in an oblique way and putting us in place and making it feel very real.

And then doing other things that feel completely unreal and and sometimes imagined chris what did you think about the kind of relationship between the actual and the invented yeah so i think it it kind of goes hand in hand if we're talking about pairing his movies together there is a he has made a few films that are basically referred to as like realer than real, which is his version of history. And it's incredibly precise in some ways, and then it takes liberties in some ways, but it felt like, and from what I understand, everything that was a detail is exactly right. So that's what Sharon Tate wore. This is what was on the radio on these specific days at this time. That's what

the weather was. This is like what would have been playing on these specific days at this time that's what the weather was this is like what would have been playing on these movie marquees so all that stuff even if it only registers with Tarantino and like three dozen people who are cultural historians of Los Angeles and understand that stuff it feels like those choices accumulate to create a sense of aversibility or whatever reality that you're just like everything else is believable then no matter how fantastical it becomes yeah and there's something interesting about how this movie is happening because it's the first time he's making a movie without the Weinstein company and it's funded by Sony and Sony is an old school long

time Columbia in particular is an old school, long time Hollywood corporation. It feels fitting. Who can forget Bobby Sony back in the golden days of Hollywood? Just make the great, the great, the great Bob Sony. And he'd say, kid, your picture's a go. I hope you keep Bob Sony in your back pocket for future bits. More specifically Columbia, of course, is the old school Hollywood studio. And it's nice that he's able to make this movie. And he's making it mostly with the team that he's made a lot of these movies with. He's making it with Robert Richardson. He's making it with Fred Raskin, who is the editor who took over when Sally Menke passed away. It's a lot of the same kind of craftspeople. It's his team. It's the Quentin team.

And Leo and Brad are on the Quentin team now. And I'll just say before we get into any details, just lights out maybe a top two Leo performance for me. Like I was just... Is the other one Django? Gosh, I don't know.

It's my number one. He's got it. He is dialed in. And I feel like he really brought it. He heard me, Chris and I were standing in line before the screening last night and I was like, you know what? I've been thinking a lot about it. I just like... Leo hasn he really brought it. He heard me. Chris and I were standing in line before the screening last night, and I was like, you know what?

I've been thinking a lot about it. I just like Leo hasn't really brought it for me in a while. And then he brought it. Holy shit. Just an absolutely amazing, committed. I feel like there are words that we get like fearless or unafraid to be vulnerable or these obvious things that acting is all about that we throw at actors. But to meet somebody at this stage of their career who is a huge star

with nothing to lose, to do something as weird and sensitive and specific as he's doing with this character, with Rick Dalton, and seeing him through various stages

of his own life, I was just fucking floored. I thought it was truly awesome. Conversely, I thought Brad Pitt was also great. And I thought it was an interesting choice to just let Brad Pitt kind of just do Rusty again a little bit from Oceans, just kind of hang and be cool and rely on his cool. What did you think about kind of contrasting these two figures together in the movie? Well, it's Rusty with real hints of Aldo. It even breaks into Aldo voice at one point. Yeah, you can hear it like the southern, the western becomes a southern, becomes a, especially on the, well, we won't spoil it,

there's a climactic scene where it really comes out. I thought, what was so interesting to this movie for me, for Tarantino, for DiCaprio, for Pitt on Down, is it is really self-referential. They are playing on public ideas about themselves and our understanding of what a Tarantino movie is, our understanding of who a little bit about that character's backstory when we talk about Brad Pitt, because they are really engaging both with their on-screen personas and their off-screen histories, how we understand them as movie stars. This is a movie that's really interested in movie stars. It's explicit. Yeah. I mean, like there's a scene early in the movie where they essentially talk about Leonardo DiCaprio is playing this TV Western star who made a failed attempt at going

big in movies and is kind of now trying to put his career back together and is increasingly cast as the villain in guest appearances in Western shows. And Al Pacino plays a producer who's trying to sort of explain where he's at in his career. And he's just like, this is what they do. They get themselves a new star and then they cast a guy like you who's had a show canceled as the villain so that america starts to think of the new guy as the guy who kicks your ass and it's this like it is a tarantino speech it is exactly like that's what tarantino must think when he watches stuff is he's like oh i see what they're doing with the rock or with jason statham now or whatever he's watching and And it was one of those just like

nobody. I don't know that there are many directors who understand how the audience interacts with these movie stars as much as how filmmakers interact with them and getting good stuff out of them. Yeah, I think that that's exactly right. And there's something very measured about giving those guys room to make choices and then also staying on the Tarantino wavelength. You know, his movies operate in a very specific tonality. And if you move out of them, it feels obvious. DiCaprio's character is fully committed and deeply insecure in a way that I don't know if I've ever seen him. Maybe not since This Boy's life has he ever been this insecure

and kind of like able to be self-destructed. Like departed or something, yeah. Yeah, maybe that's a good comparison. I just couldn't believe his willingness to go there with that. And I was impressed by Pitt's willingness to play along with some of the things, Amanda, that you alluded to about maybe his personal life that are, I don't know, that it feels like Tarantino's pushing his thumb

down on. We'll get to that in a little bit. What about the rest of the cast? There was obviously, after the film screened at Cannes, the big controversy surrounding the movie was Margot Robbie's portrayal of Sharon Tate and the utter lack of dialogue that her character has. Now, I think we will get specifically into that when we get into the back half of this conversation because I think there's a lot of intentionality there and I'm curious to hear what you guys think about it.

But just her performance and then the performance of the other folks in the movie. Emile Hirsch, Margaret Qualley, Timothy Olyphant, you mentioned Pacino. Really an all-star cast of performers who are coming in

to do like two days work. Yeah, like Clifton Collins comes on to not talk and sit on a horse. Yeah, he barely does anything. The late Luke Perry. Yeah. What did you guys think about the supporting cast? Dynamite almost, not quite, I wouldn't say distracting at all,

but like sometimes I would just be like, so wait, is Scoot McNary going to have like a role now? And he was just, no, he's an extra in this. I spent a minute of that scene being like that is scud mcnerry no it isn't is it it's just someone who looks like scud mcnerry i also we won't spoil what dakota fanning does in this movie but i didn't realize it was her till after oh i was just like oh yeah yeah yeah because i was too freaked out about some other things that were going on so they you know the the only person who really stood out to me

as themselves and not a character actor was Lena Dunham. But, you know, but even there, I thought the way that he used Lena Dunham was pretty funny

and commenting on aspects of her persona. Totally. It seemed like he got Lena Dunham through and through. That is the conversation Lena Dunham would have, the conversation she has

with Cliff Booth. I think that my main observation was just, you know, there's a couple of people in this movie, Perry, Rebecca Gayhart. There's a couple of other people we mostly know from TV. And this is a movie that's largely about like people who maybe didn't make the most of their shot or never got their shot or did stuff that is looked down upon by most audiences as like, you know, disposable. And it was really fascinating to me to see him put those actors in a Quentin Tarantino film almost to pay tribute, like know what you did, like was actually valuable in the

same way that the kinds of shows that Rick Dalton does, you know, like the Westerns that were just on every Thursday and people would watch them and forget them, was valuable to him. Yeah. And I think similarly, if you think about legacy and remembering people, a lot of the young actors and actresses, particularly the actresses who are living on Spahn Ranch, are played by the children of famous people through and through. You know, Maya Hawke is in this movie. I believe... Margaret Qualley. Margaret Hawke is in this movie. I believe...

Margaret Qualley. Margaret Qualley is in this movie, obviously. I believe... Who's the star? Pamela Adlin's daughter is also... She's the better thing.

She's on better things. Right, right. But she's also in this film. That seems like a very intentional choice to kind of show us the through lines that Hollywood is kind of

always etching. These circles that are all interconnected to each other. I was pretty impressed by his ability also to get good performances out of sometimes people that go over the top. Now, Al Pacino is maybe one of the three

greatest living screen actors of all time. He hasn't really been very good in a movie in a long time. And I really enjoyed his bit here. He seemed like a very recognizable figure in the history of Hollywood. Likewise, Bruce Dern, who those guys feel like they fit in Tarantino movies more than they fit in modern movies to me. Because they're allowed to spread their eagle wings a little bit and do the ridiculous, which I really admired.

Anybody else you want to underline as something you enjoyed? I liked Margot Robbie's performance. And I think it's hard to talk about it without specifics so we'll save it but you know I think that you mentioned that press conference at at con and what she said there is right which was like I knew the role that I was taking and I understood what you know what this role what role this role was playing in this movie and I get it now and you know I wouldn't say this is a movie about women necessarily, but that's okay. I, you know, I think that it is possibly more thoughtful than people gave it credit for. I just also, you know, I didn't go, I didn't go to the movie for feminist politics.

Right. So it's okay. Yeah. I will just say also, I would like to shout out Mike Moe as Bruce Lee in this movie. Quite, quite a flex. I want to talk about that too. Should we just transition? Should we say, I think three of us universally love this movie, would highly recommend it to anybody who is curious about whether they should go see it or not. It's a fascinating,

theoretical, penultimate Quentin Tarantino movie. This is his ninth movie. He says he's only making ten. We'll see about that, I suppose. I sure to God hope that's not true if you don't want anything spoiled for you going forward turn the podcast off if you do want to get it spoiled for you stick around if you've already seen the movie definitely stick around because we're going to

talk about it now three and two and one we're talking about once upon a time in hollywood and what really happens in the movie chris you used the phrase inglorious bastards and there's a reason for that because it is also a cousin to that movie because this is a true blue alternate history movie. And I can see why the movie in all the commercials has been positioned this way. I had a conversation with Cameron Crowe, not to name drop, but I interviewed him on this podcast and he was asking me about this movie. And he said, why are the commercials like that?

And I was like, well, I feel like if you do anything to indicate what's really happening in this movie, you kind of give away the whole thing. And the fact that Tarantino is focusing so clearly on these two ancillary figures orbiting this quintessential moment in Los Angeles and in many ways American history, which is to say that the Manson murders and everything that happened there, and it also is largely representative of all the tumult in 1969. If you give away the fact that what Quentin shows us at the end of the movie is not what actually happened in the world, and in fact is either a wish or a dream or... Chris, how did you interpret it? Well, I wasn't surprised because I think pretty early on in the original development of the when it first was announced that tarantino was going to make a manson movie or something that was set around the time of the manson murders there had been some pushback from the tate family

tarantino met with i believe sharon tate's sister and when that meeting was over she was like you have my blessing to make this movie and i couldn't imagine that it was because he had come up with something like highly delicate way to handle what actually happened i just assumed that we would get something like we got in inglorious bastards uh i've been trying to unpack how i felt about the ending for a while i mean i obviously as like a tarantino fan was just kind of dazzled by it but uh i was trying to figure out like what just this and then much the same way i was trying to figure out inglorious bastards i was trying to figure out like what just the same and then much the same way I was trying to figure out Inglorious Basterds

I was trying to figure out like what it means and what it meant some of it I was trying to chalk up to an actual longing on his part to have saved those people which I think

as a person who loves Hollywood and was really invested in that culture and that time period and was a child when it happened I think he legitimately does did want that and then I also was wondering whether child when it happened I think he legitimately does did want that and then I also was wondering whether or not it had something to do with

especially with the very ending just how much of life is just a matter of who's home and who's not one night or like whether or not a guy with a pitcher of frozen margaritas tells a car to back down the drive or not and what how history can be changed

by the smallest of instances. And then, you know, because the film ends with J.C. Brink and Sharon Tate being like, Rick Dalton. Oh my God. Like they treat him like he's the star. And you kind of basically assume

that Rick Dalton will go on to star in Roman Polanski movies. I mean, I don't... Ten play. That was what he imagined for himself, at least. Yeah. And it kind of ties back into this idea that you come out here to make your dreams come true.

So I'm still trying to decide how I feel about what happens in the last 20 minutes of the movie. In no way am I like, you're not allowed to do that or that that was too grotesque or anything like that. But I'm trying to figure out like what he... Why did he want to do this? And why did he want this to be the ending? Amanda, let me ask you,

you are the prognosticator about potential media reaction to fictional events. Yeah. How do you think this is going to be received, this decision to save Sharon Tate, save Jay Sebring? Right.

And imagine a different future for these people who obviously were tragically murdered. that Quentin Tarantino is doing a movie that involves the Manson murders and Sharon Tate. And it's like basically being released on the 50th anniversary of that event. And you're like, I don't know whether I feel good about this. And I think the expectation was for something so gruesome, not that it wasn't, but something so like tacky and inappropriate in terms of how it portrayed. I mean, I think we all thought that we were going to see the actual Sharon Tate murder. I think that's what we thought. Up until the last 10 minutes of the film. When we see Tex and the two young women in the car, we're like, it's on. They've got their knives. It's happening.

So I thought that, I was like, oh, okay, not so bad. And it does feel like the general media vibe is like expectations are such that it it was not as bad as expectations. So I think it'll be OK. I agree with Chris's interpretation that it's just kind of a protect the myth choice by Tarantino and that it's, you know, that his whole thing is about the power of movies. And that's at least how I relate to him in this entire, this is kind of like the most obvious statement about that belief that has been in every single one of his movies thus far. I confess I interpreted the last shot differently. And I don't actually think that this is literally what happens. I think the way that Chris described it, which is that Rick Dalton goes to their house and they become friends. And, you know, the three so, you know, almost murderers who are based ish on they don't use the same names, but I think it's like a pretty close comparison to what happened in real life. They're dispatched with and everyone kind of lives on happily.

I think that's what you're supposed to think. But there was something about the overhead shot that I didn't interpret as like pure revisionist. There was something threatening about it. And it's, you know, I don't know whether you're supposed to think that it's just like a close call. It wasn't like one-to-one bastards for me. It's like, this is just an alternate history and this is how it goes there. And I,

it is maybe just the tone of the movie that is slightly more melancholy. I think. Yeah. I mean, that's the thing is that there were more murders, you know what I mean? Like he's still out there. Like,

yeah, that's kind of what I think. So I, I guess I interpreted it. It's like we saved this, this one moment, but it does also feel like the end of something this movie is like in a lot of ways that Joan Didion line that like the 60s ended

in on August 9th 1969 with with these murders yeah and I walked away with that feeling at the end and they're over anyway I mean like they're over when he's at when when uh Cliff is at Spahn Ranch and he sees this what used to be this monument to like the industry and to film and television and cowboys and the west and and high production values and everything that he kind of was like a part of and it's just turned into this hippie dump you know yeah I just also think Inglourious Basterds ends on such a weirdly jubilant note. And I didn't get the same energy from this ending. I think that there's a more of a wistfulness than I think this may be my masterpiece. You know, that there was something very winking about the end of Inglourious Basterds.

I think tonally they're different. I think just the idea of retconning significant events in world history is a bold choice. Now, he also does that in some ways in Django and in Hateful Eight, and in some ways those events are maybe not as iconic in our minds. It's an interesting choice. The movie's shape and structure actually reminds me a lot of The Hateful Eight and Inglourious Basterds because it similarly has this, essentially a day in the life of execution for the first

I would just say two thirds of the film where we're spending a day with Cliff a day with Rick and inside of those experiences we're getting some flashbacks we're getting Cliff

going back to the murder slash accidental death of his wife we're getting his showdown with Bruce Lee we're getting Rick imagining

several experiences that he's had as an actor in his career over the years during those times. And then we're also getting this very sweet, largely dialogue-free fantasia of Sharon Tate and Westwood that I think is probably the most unusual thing that Tarantino has ever done in a movie. And I can see why some of the reaction to that was negative, because it makes her seem simple, you know? And we don't really see her get to have the same sort of emotional crisis that Rick has. Or we don't get to see her be a hero the way that Cliff is when he goes to Spahn Ranch. And I feel, I'm sure there are going to be people who say, well, they've removed some agency from her. Yeah, I think so.

Sure, of course. Yeah, my read on the Westwood thing was like, this person mattered. And watching her sit in the audience and watching what was probably, I've never seen The Wrecking Crew, which is the Dean Martin movie she's in. But I was like,

her listening to people laugh at the laugh lines and clap when she karate kicks Nancy Kwan and and and flashbacks to her training with Bruce Lee and her doing the little moves in the chair while like in the seat while she's watching I a lot of this is about the I thought like maybe like the role that this stuff movies and tv and these actors can play in people's lives which is like you're just giving people a little bit of joy and you're giving them a break. And it doesn't have to be like I made Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You know, it can be like I made a stupid B movie that people laughed at for two hours and took their mind off of the Vietnam War. And that was

kind of like how I took that whole sequence. And she doesn't get to chat that much, you know, and I think that that will obviously be an issue. But I loved that scene. I loved it when she was watching herself on screen. I thought that was so great. I also just see it as a comment on movie stars and how we relate to the people on the screen and the difference between the performance and again, the myth, this golden god idea of these and the people who want to be a part of it, which is definitely a theme throughout this movie. And in that sense, she is a projection, which is often something that we say,

especially about female characters in movies, as a negative, as someone who didn't do their work. But I think that that is actually the point of including Sharon Tate in this movie. And that scene that you talked about when she's in the movie theater is actually the character responding to and engaging with that idea of what it means. The person you know on the screen versus the person that you know,

the person in real life. I agree with you guys. I am merely presenting what I think will be a devil's advocate case against that presentation where the other two male characters are deeply shaded. What did you think when they ended?

What did you think about the last 20 minutes? Well, I think it's kind of hard to get your bearings when things start to unfurl. And then, you know, we haven't really said, but the moments when Cliff, who is extremely high and is battling Tex and the two women, and then when Rick emerges with the flamethrower is just deeply pitched up Tarantino craziness.

It is the, the only time in the movie where you're like, Oh, the guy who made Pulp Fiction, the guy who made Django. Yeah. I honestly forgot that I was in a, well,

I just forgot that the violence was coming because that's not why I watched Tarantino movies. I watched Tarantino movies because I too believe in the power of cinema, you know, and, and like references and showing people how smart I am by knowing stuff. But I had forgotten. And then I was like, oh wait, there was going to be something really violent. And I had to steal myself for it. And then I was sitting next to Chris. I was so upset. I was not watching by the end of it. Number one, I don't need to see Brad Pitt do those things in my life ever. That's, I will carry that with me now, and that's pretty complicated, given my other feelings about Brad Pitt, but it was really extra.

Yeah, even in the pantheon of ear-cutting and blowing Hitler's head off, that sequence is really violent, and it's going to be shocking. It's closer to Jennifer Jason Leigh's Hateful Eight stuff. Completely, yes. It's almost comic horror in a way. And so it's a little hard to get your bearings with this. Otherwise, I think, like I said, very sentimental, emotional response to a vision of stardom and a vision of movie making and a

vision of like living in the Hills friendship that he has a lot of adulation, admiration and excitement about, you know, that he obviously he loves movies like the wrecking crew, even though they're kind of trashy and he loves actresses like Sharon Tate even though Sharon Tate

never really made a quote-unquote great film. She was tabbed to. I think there was a lot of expectation, yes? Please respect Valley of the Dolls.

Valley of the Dolls is a very fun movie. I don't know if I would say it was a great film. I mean, she likely would have been the star of Tess and we see her buy

the copy of Tess of Duberville in a bookstore for her husband, Roman Polanski, who we're not even the copy of Tess of Duberville in a bookstore for her husband, Roman Polanski, who we're not even talking about here, which is another complicated little wrinkle in this movie. But I honestly felt a lot of empathy for him. That was my takeaway. Because I often feel like Quentin, I know that I'm being manipulated in a fun way.

I like to be kind of pushed around by him a little bit with his movies. This was different. This felt very open. And to be kind of pushed around by him a little bit with his movies. This was different. This felt much, it felt very open. And I was kind of shocked. It felt confessional. It also doesn't have, it's not particularly Tarantino-esque in its dialogue. Like a lot of the exchanges are not very showy.

They're pretty reserved. There's a lot of mistakes like Leo stutters. And then they have, you know, like there's a lot of redoing of things and the interaction between um Rick and uh what's her name Trudy Frazier the kid actress on on uh Lancer is the most tender thing that Tarantino's ever written you know it's just like this old like basically fading star with a with a precocious child actress and you see the kid and you're almost like in your mind you're like this is a Tarantino movie so this kid's either

going to start talking about the French New Wave or start cursing Rick out I mean she does she does but she's just like first she just does like a pitch perfect send up of actors talking about their craft for like five minutes I just my job is to not have impediments. Directly to Leonardo DiCaprio, which is incredible in-joke meta movie making. I really loved it. But it was sweet. It felt very, very, very sweet. This actress's name is Julia Butters

and she is an extremely important person. This is a really, really good performance by an eight-year-old. This is tremendous. Really good. And I think obviously in some ways, the emotional crux of the movie is that moment from the trailer when Leo's character is told by this eight year old girl that that's the best acting

she's ever seen in her life. And that also is such a straightforward evocation of real emotion. And maybe he had to put that in the voice of a young child, but you also don't see that stuff from Tarantino so much. You never hear a character in a Tarantino movie say, I love you. That's not the way that he writes. That's not the way that he writes. That's not the way that he sees the world.

And there is something so specifically open, like I said. As far as the rest of the movie, though, I didn't always have that feeling. I think that there were times when we were at Spawn Ranch, for example, or there were times when we were, when we see Cliff and Bruce Lee have a showdown. It's a very fun little pocket scene. I don even know if how real we're meant to believe that is in some ways

because it feels hyper real when it's happening that did feel very tarantino but that is super tarantino that is what i was going to say there's a couple of moments where you're like oh right like two cool guys having a showdown and saying quippy shit to each other i mean there is an hour of this movie that is just reconstructing TV westerns from the 60s. So are you going to participate in that part of the conversation? Because I think Chris and I have been eager to talk about this. No, I will. I will say I sat next to Chris during it.

So I liked it because of that, because he was so happy. And again, it is all of the Tarantino shit all in once of this movie. It feels so personal. And that includes just being like, let me tell you about another TV show that I loved

and just let some men on horses say weird shit to each other for like 30 minutes. I can see you getting into Operation Dynamite. Show of hands, how many people

at this table have seen one episode of the show Lancer? Chris has because he watched it on YouTube this morning. Okay. So why don't you tell us

a little bit about what you saw in Lancer and then we'll talk about what we saw in Once Upon a morning. Okay. So why don't you tell us a little bit about what you saw in Lancer and then we'll talk about what we saw in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. So I was, one of the things that was tough was I was like, when you watch the scene between Oliphant and DiCaprio, that DiCaprio breaks, obviously.

And then the next scene between DiCaprio's character, Caleb Dacotu, what is it? I think that's correct. And Luke Perry's Boston. I was like, how close is this to the way Lancer was played? And Lancer's not like quite like Gunsmoke or

the 50s Westerns, which were a little bit stiffer. It kind of seems to be a little looser, but it is not good. I just needed you to say that because i did the same thing you did lancer is not good so i wouldn't go there's no land i was kind of thinking as i was driving home last night maybe my new thing will just to be like watch 60s tv your new thing well i don't i don't watch like friggin bonanza like i've watched them before but like there's a lot

of tv to watch i'd much rather watch euphoria. Yeah, but in this movie, it's shot and performed, this TV series, like it's Peckinpah. It's so stylized. The dialogue is so intense. The mode of performance is much more Brando than it is James Garner on a Western in the mid-60s. And it's really funny because you can see that Tarantino has so much admiration for this kind of culture. And I think one of our favorite things, all of us, about his movies is this collision of high and low and saying that there's some things that are considered low that are just as worthy as the things that are considered high. And he's always infusing that concept into his films. And he's doing it with this by saying, you know, the people who worked on Lancer worked

really hard and they tried to make it good every time. And sometimes it was really good. But... Angry Hamlet. Yes. Yes. But... Angry Hamlet. Yes. Yes. But I love that director. Sam Wanamaker. That's great stuff too.

But Lancer wasn't good. You know what I mean? Or at least it was what it was in its time. Yeah. And it had utility and of course TV was evolving. It would be like a CBS procedural now.

It would be like in 30 years it would be like somebody taking like NCIS or something and just being like, man, the guys who worked on NCIS just really had it locked in. And then you shot it and you made it look like a Robert Altman movie or something. And it's like, that was not what that was. I mean, it was the procedural of its day.

It just happened to be with cowboy hats. Amanda, did you find yourself getting weirdly pulled out of the centrifugal force of the movie during this long extended Western television sequence because it does kind of happen dead in the middle. I did it only because it is commenting on it at the same time. And that is why it didn't lose me because as you said, Leonardo DiCaprio breaks and it's very funny. And then he is recreating all this Western stuff

that's really important to him, but he's also showing you behind the scenes of how a TV show gets made. And, you know, the interaction with the eight-year-old is both really funny. And like I said, I will use against every pretentious actor that we talk about going forward. He's building in the commentary. And, like, I loved that. That's why I go to the movies. Again, I do wonder if there are people who don't love super meta, self-referential movie movies and or westerns, whether they will be into it. I was wondering if they would just be confused.

Yeah. I mean, am I wrong to think that the silver medal for takes on this, think pieces on this movie is going to be about the great escape scene? Well, how so? What will those takes be like? You're made Forrest Gump like that's your this isn't cool like this is like takes me out of it i mean look let me tell you something when that happens and leonardo caprio is acting in great escape i definitely felt like i had smoked an acid dipped cigarette did you i was like this is fucking amazing so you had no idea that that was coming?

None. Because you just referenced The Great Escape with me on a podcast about Quentin Tarantino. Yeah, I said, that is what Inglourious Bastards in his 30s and knowing that The Great Escape is very important, it similarly is this sentimental sliding doors presentation of like what this guy's life could have been. The same way that him going up the driveway up to Sharon Tate's house is what this guy's life could have been. And it's all could have been shit. And the whole movie is this design of of potential that is unfulfilled and it's like oliphant's not that much there's not that much of an age

difference between oliphant and dicaprio and i'm sure like it's like oliphant has the role that dicaprio's character is going for even though oliphant's role is essentially the role he just got done playing on justified a couple years ago and he's acting, asking, Leonardo DiCaprio is the biggest star of Oliphant's lifetime, but is pretending to be a failed star. What it was like to not get the Steve McQueen part in The Great Escape. And he's like, well, I was never really up for it. And the other Georges were up for it, like George Pappard and these other guys and then just like they give us what it would be like if Leonardo DiCaprio

was Steve McQueen who by the way is also in the movie played by Damian Lewis. What do you think of that? What do you think of the Playboy sequence? Why do directors like Damian Lewis so much? And I say that as someone who really likes Damian Lewis but he's in everything. He stuck out to me a little.

I was not a fan of this sequence. This felt the most like Austin Powers to me. Yeah, it's the boots a lot. Yeah, it was because Polanski was dressed as Austin Powers. He was. If you Google Roman Polanski, Sharon Tate, the first Google image result is him wearing that outfit. I believe it is all period accurate. I just mean the way that it's shot.

It's mostly pulled back at the party. There's a lot of shots of people dancing wildly in the 1960s. I have no doubt that at Hugh Hefner's home in 1969, people were wearing those clothes, dancing to that music. They were all arm and arm with Cass Elliott and they were arm and arm with Steve McQueen. But it felt the most like we're recreating something that really happened as opposed to a movie

that is so invested in thinking about the potential of what could have been or the unknowability of certain things. Yeah. It's like when you read certain historical fiction and like the guy goes into the restroom and it's like, Teddy Roosevelt was there. And it's like, oh, okay. Could have been anybody in this bathroom, but I'm glad I've been told, you know, like. Yeah. And as for Steve McQueen and Damian Lewis, I saw someone recently say that he looks exactly like Steve McQueen. That is not the case. Who said that? I'm not going to name names.

Okay. I'll spare thee. But that is... Damian Lewis is a lovely actor. And that was the one time I was just like, why are you here? And a handsome guy. But I was like, why is Axe dressed like Steve McQueen? I also didn't think his hair looked that much like Steve McQueen.

Well, his hair is red. Steve McQueen's hair is not red. It's sandy. It's, I mean, because Sebring's in it and I did not know that Sebring was responsible for like Jim Morrison's hair

and Warren Beatty's hair. But, you know, that didn't ring true as Steve McQueen. The character in Shampoo is essentially based on Jay Sebring. Yeah. Where else do we need to go here?

Should we talk about Cliff? Just the whole cliff story? Let's do it. Sure. I think that cliff is one of the more unique Quentin tarantino creations Now the story is that when tarantino brought the part to brad pitt He had an archetype in mind And then pitt visited tarantino with an archetype in mind of his own. And they both had the same archetype in mind. Now, maybe this is Hollywood bullshit, maybe it's not.

But they were both thinking of Billy Jack. Have you guys seen any of the Billy Jack movies? I have. Yeah, I want to talk about it. Okay, so Tom McLaughlin, who's an actor and a star and a director and a producer, had this action film series called Billy Jack. That's pretty obscure at this point. I would not say that it has a huge legacy.

Is he like Russell Gators and stuff? Yeah, he's a real like a man's man, an outdoorsman. You know, these are movies that you're not going to check out, Amanda. But they both were going for not necessarily the life details of this man or this character, but just the grit, the intensity, the presentation, the look. What'd you make of Cliff? Well, I really enjoyed the roof scene i you know i think we just we have to say it brad pitt's 55 years old congratulations to him there's a reason

he's brad pitt he throughout his career does like play with his appearance and play with the idea of what it means to be that handsome male beautiful yeah and look the way he does and have and also the charisma that he has and the effect that it has on other people. And this is a pretty, it's not charisma-less. He has a ton of charisma, but it's different. He's not doing like full ocean's charm in this. He has it turned off.

What do you think his reaction was when he was reading Tarantino's script and he got to the part where it says, what you're going to do is climb on top of a roof in the Hollywood Hills and then have a memory of kicking Bruce Lee's ass you think he's going to be like I'm in sign me up it seems fucking ridiculous it is ridiculous but it also just seems like that's where Brad Pitt is I think like that's the moment when he's like yeah sure why not does anybody have it better than him in the whole entire world I think he probably carries around a lot of baggage

Yeah? Yeah, sure. Like I said, it's Like a complicated relationship with his ex-wife? Yes, exactly. Who may or may not have the lips of Rebecca Gayhart in this movie? I definitely did not know that that was Rebecca Gayhart when I saw her on screen. I might have been honestly might have been just a little more focused on her ass There's quite a leering shot of Rebecca Gayhart's

ass in this movie. Can I also shout out I don't know that this might have just been a happy accident but Brad Pitt on that roof nails late 60s early 70s guy bod where it's like Burt Reynolds like it

looks like a tree trunk covered in leather but it's not like cut it's just like I'm strong. I lift things all the time. Right. And I have a manual transmission. It's not bulky. And not power steering.

So everything takes strength. And I make things and I turn wheels. And that is like a body that dudes don't have anymore. Shout out to Bobby and Craig who are going through their own physical body shaping processes. There's nothing you can do with kombucha or calories or anything to get that kind of tone. And I can't get it. It's not as if Brad Pitt transported himself back to 69 to get it, though. He just naturally is that.

Is he? Yes. That's what he has looked like for years. Yeah, that's true. Because Chris and I were talking about Moneyball before this movie started, which I rewatched recently. And I was just like, oh, I forgot that this is just a movie about Brad Pitt making out. Incredible cinematic achievement that it's just two hours of Brad Pitt working out. And he's way more cut in that than in this movie.

So I think it is a little bit natural. What do you think about the the for lack of a better word arc of his character kind of what what role he plays in this movie as the you know the shadow the the the flip side the sort of the content with failure as opposed to successful and aspiring to more which is what Rick Dalton is it's a little bit of a joke which I like you know it is funny to put Brad Pitt in the never had a career role and having him say that out loud while looking as handsome as he looks driving a car with the Los Angeles sunlight just show just so I again it is they're all playing with their identities and

I liked it though it is interesting to have Brad Pitt in your movie and not give him as much of an arc is it an arc? It's more just a presence he's in the sidecar I thought the arc was going to be that the that the Manson family was going to kill him and that his sort of like being this chum

that gets thrown into the city as like a literal like body double as somebody who takes the abuse and you know like leo says to kurt russell at one point he's just like throw him hit him with a lincoln throw him off a roof like he can handle it like all that stuff i thought he was going to absorb it somehow i'm very happy that he lived it was just a great send-off where he's just like you're a good friend i was like fuck yeah um but would you do that for me, Chris? Which part?

Would you eat back the Manson family? If I had dog food available, yeah. If I had dog food cans and stuff, I would definitely take a run at it. If I was on acid, I definitely would. Where do we go? This is such a sprawling movie. I can't wait to see it again.

I feel like there's so much more to unpack, and yet we've already said a lot. I thought that the decision and the reason that I was making the comparison to the hateful eight and glorious bastard earlier is because the movie does sort of have a break. Once we finish that day, we haven't even really talked about the spawn ranch sequences, but once we get through that day and Leonardo DiCaprio decides to take Al Pacino's character's money and go to Italy and make these spaghetti Westerns, then we hear Quentin to Italy and make these spaghetti Westerns. Then we hear Quentin's voice and narrator Quentin is back. And then we're kind of walked very quickly through, I guess, a nine month period.

I don't know how long that was. Well, Amanda left the theater mentally because she was imagining Once Upon a Time in Rome, where it's just Leonardo DiCaprio. Why didn't I get to see any of this? You want to make me care about Westerns? Show me that. That's true. I think it's February to August. So it's six months. February to August. I thought that was an interesting and weird tonal choice that most filmmakers couldn't get away with to just say, now we're going to go six months into the future. And now everything is not going to happen in this sort of linear, leisurely pacing.

And you kind of have to get on board with even more of his minutiae about how a life goes, where he's talking deeply about what happens to an actor who decides to make spaghetti Westerns, which is like definitely something that I care about. But I don't know if most people are going to get on the level of recognizing that like Burt Reynolds did Nebraska Gym in 1967 in order to get his career going forward.

And that's also something that Rick Dalton is doing and that we're kind of, I guess you don't have to get that reference. No, I mean, it's interesting. My wife also saw this movie with you and she was like, I'm so glad I read a bunch about the murders and about the time period

and about the music going into it because it made the experience of seeing the movie so much richer. I think you can do it so much richer. I think you can do it either way though. I think you can know who Sergio Corbucci is and, or you can just be like, I got it. They, they, they kind of explains spaghetti Westerns pretty efficiently in this, in this movie. It's not like you need to have spent a lot of time, um, you know, watching bad YouTube streams of, of, you know, my name is Ringo or whatever.

Will you go back and watch the original Django now that you've seen this movie? No, probably not. That's too bad. But that's okay. I will see this again. Yeah, no, I will. To your point, I will see that transition

and the voiceover and what he did. They do explain it very well. But that is the moment when I was like, okay, this is moving a little fast I could see the machinery in place and I knew enough about the real life Manson murders to know what must be coming as soon as they said August I mean you know that from the beginning you know that when you see Cielo Drive and Sharon Tate is living next door but I wonder if you don't have knowledge of either, whether it feels a little, whether you can follow everything. Yeah.

Because you're supposed to, they're doing all of the Spaghetti Western Rome plot in order to get you back to Los Angeles in the night of the Sharon Tate murder. And if you know that's coming, then you understand why the film is kind of is moving at the pace that it is. The one thing I really am looking forward to seeing it again for is the suggestions of, and I think we all feel this is for a variety of different reasons now, is that feeling like there's something just kind of uneasy on the horizon and there's something something dark out there. And I think that, you know, in the early scene in Musso, they're getting in the car and the radio is talking about Sirhan Sirhan and the Robert Kennedy assassination. And when he goes to Spahn Ranch, you can just feel the music actually changes.

I think it's just a Bernard Herrmann score, but it's playing over like as he's going up to George Spahn's house. That scene is very stressful. And it feels like, oh, there's something lurking out there. You know what I mean? There's something really bad over the other hill that's coming. And the way he captures that, I don't know necessarily that you need to understand the history to understand times in American history when that felt very palpable. Maybe it does now. So you think he's actually trying to literalize

the horrors of Vietnam, Nixon, everything that is sort of to come in a much more elevated way with that sequence? I don't think he's ignorant of it. I mean, she definitely, like, Kweli's character

is definitely like, you know, fucking pig and Cliff's just like, whatever. You know, like, they definitely have these attitudes towards hippies that are not, I think that it's talked about for sure. What did you make of that scene in general?

I agree that it was very tense and kind of funny with the introduction of all of the characters, but then- The spawn ranch scene. The spawn ranch scene. But then once, I think once Squeaky really kind of takes over,

it gets like pretty scary. And it's a little bit and i that was the first time when it occurred to me that this would be an alternate history that this would be we would see something that would reveal something that hadn't actually happened now it's possible that someone who was like cliff booth went to the spawn ranch and tried to make sure that you know george spawn was okay and that he was being looked after despite the fact that he had gone blind and was being i guess was manipulated into a sexual relationship by Squeaky in order to allow all of Manson's family to stay on the ranch. That's essentially what happened, right?

Yeah, and I think that's true. It's pretty much what they said. That's my understanding, yeah. Did he have sex and like to watch TV and let them use the ranch for free? And I agree with you, Chris, that that ambient dread that hangs over the scene like a cloud is meant to indicate what's coming for our country, what's coming for the city of Los Angeles, but also just what's coming for the character. I felt myself just anxious for Cliff,

who certainly we learn can handle himself, but how'd you feel about the sort of way that a lot of these young women were presented? I don't think I had ever imagined the ranch in the way that it was still a tourist destination. And that there were folks that were visiting and being led on horse-drawn tours. That kind of literalized it in a way that I hadn't quite thought about before. I was kind of distracted by the feet.

Or the feet in the... I guess when they're all watching TV, the feet are in that as well. And Kweli puts her feet up on the dashboard. As far as depiction, the objectification of of women it seems mostly limited to feet and even that just seemed like a a purposeful you guys think i have a foot thing so here we go that is definitely what it was yeah that it was clearly like i've seen all of your blog posts yes and i will one up the with five more sets of feet on screen which which, you know, different strokes, you know? God bless.

Just act accordingly. Any other thoughts about the Spahn Ranch? I thought it was interesting, just you mentioned the tourist thing and this idea that it was both functioning as a, like, that the hippies were entertainment themselves as they were being, you know, it's

like everyone in this movie is enthralled to something, whether you're enthralled at Charles Manson or you're enthralled at Hollywood or you're enthralled to your career. And I think that the movie both really is empathetic with that, but because Quentin Tarantino is enthralled to a lot of things and is also a bit more skeptical of it than perhaps his other movies. And I don't know if it like literally engages with Vietnam on the horizon. I mean, it does in the sense of the radio. I hope someone will do a rundown of every single reference in the radio because that's just some real Easter egg stuff.

I assure you someone will. I know. I'm just, you know, good luck. Keep working on that blog post. But I do think that there is just the tension is not limited to this Bond ranch in this movie. The tension that it's, as you said, a movie about transition and that there is unease on the borders and is creeping in. I still think that's kind of why I interpreted the last shot the way I did, because it doesn't feel like resolution. Unfinished. interpreted the last shot the way I did because it doesn't feel like resolution unfinished yeah it's unfinished and there are like literal shadows up from the shot and I'm like okay we'll see I've formed a very big relationship in the week since I've seen this movie with all the songs in this

movie oh yeah and once again he has somehow managed to create a soundtrack full of songs that were popular in their time and have virtually vanished from regular traditional modern culture and revived them um you know just a handful obviously there were a couple that appeared in the trailer that were kind of revelations to me brother loves traveling salvation show the neil diamond song i was like I got the babies and grab the old ladies And everyone goes, cause everyone knows Brother Loves Traveling, Salvation Show, the Neil Diamond song. I was like, what the fuck is this? And I guess that now means I'm a fan of Neil Diamond in the 1960s, which is not something that I knew before.

But there, in particular, there's a Vanilla Fudge's cover of You Keep Me Hanging On. Set me free, why don't you, babe? Vanilla Fudge's cover of You Keep Me Hanging On. It's played in that final violent showdown. And that's the record that, is it Brad Pitt who puts the record on? Yeah, Cliff puts it on. Yeah. And it is like a wall of sound.

It is like an amazing sensory experience. Yes. Frances capucci is that her name played by lorenza iso portraying i think she's colombian portraying an italian actress who may or may not be who chris uh it's there's a bunch of spaghetti western actresses who then like kind of came over there's like one in particular who was in thunderball the james bond, who I was thinking it might be, but it's hard to say. I also can't remember her name. But there's just a series of jams in this movie. I mean, Out of Time is the one that we...

Baby, baby, baby, you're out of time You are, you're out Out of there with a out of doubt Cause baby, baby, baby You're out of time When that was playing, that's not the Stones version, right? No, it is the Stones version.

Oh, it is the Stones version. Okay, so when Out of Time was playing, it was just like, man, just about only two or three people know how to use music in movies like this. So, you know, I don't know if you guys remember this, but there is a very famous out-of-time needle drop. It's the opening credit sequence, which may be the greatest opening credit sequence in movies, in my opinion, which is in Hal Ashby's Coming Home, which shows us Bruce Dern running on a track after he has returned home from the war. And he's the man who's out of time. And of course, Bruce Dern is in this movie as

George Spahn, a man who is out of time at the end of a run of Hollywood. Like that is one of those pinboard crazy Quentin Tarantino, like, wouldn't it be cool if I just took this song over here and put it over here? Moments where you're like, on the one hand, he ripped off a great filmmaker using one of the all-time great music cues but it's also an incredible homage to one of the all-time great music cues as a human man I'm like so inspired and excited by dumb shit like that I can't believe like I and it hit me immediately and there's a bunch of other things here too there's Jose Feliciano's California Dreamin which is like an incredible cover Billy Stewart's Summertimeiano's California Dreamin', which is like an incredible cover, Billy Stewart's Summertime. All of these songs that are,

that seem like alternate versions of very famous things. What's she listening to when she's driving to Westwood with the hitchhiker? Outside my window was a steeple. It's like something about the seasons and the child.

It's like a real, it sounds like Mamas and the Papas, but I'm not sure it is. Yes, that is, it's called 1230. Young girls are coming to the canyon. And it's like, I can see the women in the canyons. And it's kind of the all-time Laurel Canyon song around like Crosby, Sills, Nash & Young and Joni Mitchell. And like that era is also starting to change and evolve in 1969 where it's not all cupcakes and roses.

Please listen to my interview with David Crosby on this show. He can tell you all about how things came apart there. They came apart especially for him. Every single choice like this has intentionality. And it's not just like, wouldn't it be cool if this song was here and sounded good? There's a thinking behind all of that. And I get so excited about that. Yeah. At the same time, it is clearly so dense and full of so much movie lore as all his movies are. I was thinking that this is possibly the most accessible of the Quentin Tarantino movies because you can do the pinboard thing

that you just did or you can just be like, wow, they're driving around L.A. and they're blasting music and it's Brad Pitt. And when he pulls into the van, I was driving. Exactly. I recognize these landmarks. And it is it's a version of of Hollywood and of Los Angeles that we've all been sold in the movies for literally 50 years now. So, you know, I thought that was really interesting that for being like total video nerd, super Easter eggy movie, it's also like, I think you could put this

in front of anyone and they would kind of understand the major references. Yeah, I'll take my mom to this. You know, like I don't know that I would take her to Hateful Eight,

but I, you know, I would, she would love this. Okay, so then let's talk about some of the external aspects of this movie i'm so interested to see if it is uh an oscar movie god i really hope so because i really hope it's going to be a hit i don't know if it's going to be a hit i think it's hard to sell a movie like this especially with all the weird things that we've put our

our fingers on in this episode i i'd like to take my family to this movie too. But there is a scene where the Manson family is murdered in an imaginary actor's home by a guy who's high on acid. You know, like, it's a stretch. That's true. Though even there, it's preceded by a scene where the Manson murderers sit in a car and yell at each other. And there's the iconic line, which I'll be using against you forever, which is,

sorry if I don't remember every fascist who's been on TV, Sadie. Which, incredible. And again, it's that self-knowledge. You can use that, like Quentin Tarantino, to describe this movie. So even there, there is comic relief in it. The last scene's unbelievably, horrifically violent.

It's also two hours and 30, 40 minutes. It's long. And that's kind of, in terms of it being a popular movie, I could probably warn my mother and take her to this movie and just tell her not to watch the... I'm going to be like, it's violent. Don't look. But I don't know whether the hour of Westerns is really going to be widely popular. I don't know. It's hard to say.

I mean, we don't have to worry too much about the box office. It will be what it will be. I raise it because I think if it's successful, it will help it much more significantly in the Oscar race. And I would much prefer to be talking about this movie for the next seven months than I don't want to blaspheme something I haven't seen. But something that is going to be invariably like dull and there you know tiff was announced this week there's a lot of great stuff on that tiff lineup there's also a lot of stuff that is just classic oscar bullshit that we're gonna have to watch and pretend to care about and analyze over and over again this movie is a rich fucking text does bob sony have any

really hot releases coming besides this i'll have to give him a buzz. Yeah. I'll have to check in with him. Bob Sony's office. So this is the sum total of Quentin Tarantino's Oscar nominations. I'm going to read them to you. Best original screenplay, 2013, Django Unchained. Best original screenplay, 2010, Inglourious Bastards. Best original screenplay, Pulp Fiction, 1995. He won. He also won for Django. Best Director, 2010 and Glorious Bastards. Best Director, 1995, Pulp Fiction. He's got two wins, both for original screenplay. This movie will definitely be nominated for original screenplay. Not a doubt in my mind.

Because it is an ode to Hollywood. It is a master in his 50s doing something great. He said that he wants to win original screenplay so many times, they call it the Quentin. That's very interesting. I don't know who his greatest competition is there. Yeah, I don't know how many times

did Goldman win. He adapted a lot. He only won twice. Chayefsky, I think, won twice. I'm not sure. Maybe Waldo Salt, somebody like that.

Sorkin won for the Social Network. That's an interesting gambit. He'd have to win four times. He's only got one movie left. Theoretically, I challenge the Quentin Tarantino.

You think this is going to be nominated for Best Picture? I sure hope so. I was thinking a lot Tarantino you think this is gonna be nominated for best picture I sure hope so though I was thinking a lot about a conversation you and I had a couple weeks ago and we were kind of a moaning box office stuff and I agree let's keep the box office out of it with this movie but you pointed out that there are a lot of meta movies this year and that they have not done that well and this is a super meta movie. The meta-est of them all. Yeah. And I think that there's obviously a real audience for this. We also talked about movies needing to find that

passionate audience. I think there will be for this. I mean, there obviously has been a Tarantino audience for 20, 25 years now. I don't know whether that will translate to Academy stuff. Traditionally, they like a movie about Hollywood. They also ignored A Star is Born last year. They'll have to reckon with the Polanski stuff in a real way. If this gets pushed out, there's a lot of things that are going to come to the forefront that I think that sometimes they like to brush under the rug a little bit. Yeah, and I think the fact that this is a Sony film and they have really thrown their lot in with it very aggressively will be interesting. And I presume that they will make a hard push

because they've got big-ass stars. And man, if Leo is not nominated, fucking burn the whole thing down. You have to figure that. You know, the Leo, we didn't talk about it, but the Leo meltdown in his trailer is like, that's on a loop in my mind. I was actually weeping during it i was laughing so hard

it's just unbelievable and also felt so personally sour it's just who who can relate yeah why did i just drink three or four because i'm an alcoholic just i just god damn it i love leo in this movie so much so i'm god, he'll be there. Brad Pitt has not won an Oscar as an actor. He's often not nominated. He wasn't nominated for Moneyball. That's the other thing I learned when I went on my Moneyball journey last week of outrage. He does have a Best Picture Oscar for 12 Years a Slave.

That'd be nice to see him nominated. I don't expect to see anybody else. I do expect to see Margot Qualley become a very famous person. And I wonder if she keeps playing people that are like dirtbag witches. That seems to be like her lane right now. Somebody needs to give her like a real part with some real lines. But she is like... Just like make a Glenn Powell movie. Take it easy.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. She keeps like getting throttled in movies. It's very uncomfortable. But she's got such incredible screen presence. And you're kind of captivated by her throughout the movie. And I have been in the last couple of things that she's done, even though she's often meeting these very strange endings. I'm sure that there will be cinematography and things like that that will also be in the mix

for Oscars for the movie. What about in the pantheon of Tarantino? Where is this movie going to sit for you guys, if you had to guess? I have to think about it. I think I have to see it again. I do really feel like Chris and I said we walked out and we were silent, and that was more out of emotions and sitting and processing, which I think will do for a while. I have to imagine it'll be very high for me because of the subject matter. Like I said, because it is accessible and I, you know, I can't watch Django that many times or any of the, it was funny, the Arclight, which is our great movie theater, was doing a rewatch of, they were rescreening all the Tarantino movies before Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. And I didn't have anything to do,

like I think last Friday or something. And so I was like, maybe I'll just, and Reservoir Dogs was there. And I was like, maybe I'll go see Reservoir Dogs. And my husband was like, do you remember what happens in Reservoir Dogs? Because you definitely don't want to go see that again. It's really violent. And I was like, that's a great point. So this has, for me, the greatest ratio of things, or maybe among the greatest ratio of things I respond to in a Tarantino film versus things that I abide because he does other things well. Chris, where is it going to sit for you if you had to guess? I think it's probably my favorite since Bastards. And I think it would be in my top five.

We just did the big picture top five for the Tarantino movies. I think I would probably put it in my top five. I can't wait to go watch it as a train spotter and try and figure out every corner it's shot on and every single thing that I know that's in it. I can't wait to go back and just pay attention to Bounty Law and FBI and Mannix and all the shows that are on it. And then I can't wait to go back and really take in the Manson stuff again and try and figure out how I really feel about that. Yeah. I feel similarly. I'm very eager to see it again. I will be seeing it again on Friday afternoon, like Sharon Tate in the middle of the day, just while in the hours away,

letting it all wash over me like a warm bath, hopefully before not getting murdered. Yeah. As she is not murdered. No, we're saving that for your Sweden trip. Yeah. For midsummer trip. That's right. That's what I'll be doing soon. Any lingering thoughts

about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood? Something tells me this won't be the last time we talk about this movie. No. I just wanted to say I've been to both of the Mexican restaurants featured in the climactic. Yeah, this is important. I'm glad we're taking a second. Both El Coyote and Casa Vega. Yeah. Never been to Casa Vega. It's great. I prefer it to El Coyote just in terms of a food experience.

Is it decor or culinary-wise you prefer it? Culinary-wise, though, I think it is where the Leo and the Brad character would go as opposed to the Sharon Tate character. And that's kind of my vibe. I'm trying to have the goblet of margarita and be slumped in the corner booth after saying something rude to the person next to me. Also, I do think the food's good, but I would love to host a Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Mexican restaurant tour across Los Angeles. Just let me know. Careful what you wish for. It's called Friday and Saturday.

Guys, this has been very fun. I'm sure we'll circle back on this movie in the near future. Please stay tuned to this podcast. Next week, Amanda Dobbins and I are going to be doing what? we're going to be recording a couple of episodes in the anticipation

of my trip to Sweden which will include a Sense and Sensibility and Into the Spiderverse showdown finally fucking happening is it a showdown?

yes and you will lose it's a show I thought that this was like a fucking peace offering after I like cleaned the floor with you last week she called it a cultural exchange yesterday i i'm all right that's fine i shall have my revenge upon thee great i'm so glad that this is the energy that you're bringing i i take back the happy birthday that i gave you at the beginning of this episode thank you so much for that uh i'll also be having a conversation scar

though can we talk about him? Have any more thoughts on the New Testament that you'd like to share with us? The Western canon? All I'm saying is, Did you do your homework? Scar and Thanos were right. That's all I'm saying.

In addition to that, I'll be having a conversation with the director of Hobbs & Shaw, David Leitch. That was a very enlightening conversation about the mechanics of Fast & Furious movies and also the Directors Guild of America. Please stay tuned for that. And then we'll have a whole bunch of other stuff happening in the month of August. Amandaious movies and also the Directors Guild of America. Please stay tuned for that.

And then we'll have a whole bunch of other stuff happening in the month of August. Amanda, what else should we preview? That's a great question. Should we take requests? Should you watch The Sound of Music as well? Should I just take all my revenge on you at once? You know what?

This is where we conclude this because it came to light that Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio... Play the whole clip. Play the whole clip because after they're like, you know what? I've never seen Sound of Music. Both of those bozos are like, well, we're the number one film nerds in the world.

It's so important. We know everything. We love old cinema. And they're like, oh, never seen Sound of Music. And then God bless Margot Robbie, who's like, what? And then she recounts how on The Wolf of Wall Street, Leonardo DiCaprio just sat there, given her movie recommendation after movie recommendation. She watched all her stuff, got this dumb boy film education.

Leo couldn't even watch one Best Picture winning film. If that's not a summation of this podcast, then I don't know what is. Once upon a time in Hollywood, Leo was king. Thank you for listening to The Big Picture. We'll see you next week one last thing guys before we go if you've made it this far into this podcast then you must surely love quentin tarantino and you will surely love our new podcast mini-series it's called quentin tarantino's feature presentation and this is what it's going to be like. If you go to Quentin Tarantino's New Beverly Cinema in Los Angeles,

you're going to hear that feature presentation song. And when the movie starts, you're going to step in to Quentin Tarantino's brain. If you own a movie, you own a print of a film, it feels like it's your movie. Consequently, it's like if people really like the movie and they go,

wow, that movie was terrific. My response was, oh, thank you very much. I was like, I took credit for it because, well, it was my print. And I put the whole thing together to show it. So I actually felt like

they were complimenting me. This is Quentin Tarantino's feature presentation, a new three-part podcast miniseries hosted by me, film critic Amy Nicholson of Unschooled and Halloween Unmasked. Before the release of his new film, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Quentin and I sat down to talk about five films that he's programmed at the New Beverly. And we wound up talking about his life, his work, and how this movie crazy kid became a director who defined a generation.

Waiting for the lights to go down, and no one knows what to expect. Is this going to be one of those special times? Is it not going to be one of those special times? Is it going to be a forgettable time? The first episode of Quentin Tarantino's feature presentation is out later this week. It is the closest thing to sharing a bucket of popcorn with the man himself, so subscribe now wherever you hear podcasts.