Page 30 - ARUBA TODAY

A30 PEOPLE & ARTS
Tuesday 23 July 2019

In Tarantino’s latest, a radiant Hollywood fable

By JAKE COYLE generally presided as the
Associated Press pre-eminent B-movie evan-
Quentin Tarantino has, for a gelist for a generation. The
while now, been reminding power and thrill of exploita-
us what’s so great about tion movies, he has earnest-
movies — or at least, what ly espoused, can conquer
he thinks is so great about all evils — or at least slav-
them. ery (“Django Unchained”)
He’s made an old-fash- and the Nazis (“Inglourious
ioned double-feature Basterds”).
(“Death Proof,” of “Grind- But “Once Upon a Time ... in
house”), resurrected the Hollywood,” set in 1969 Los
wide-screen format of Angeles, is Tarantino’s most
70mm Ultra Panavision affectionate and poignant
(“The Hateful Eight”) and ode yet to the movie busi-

This image released by Sony Pictures shows Leonardo DiCaprio in Quentin Tarantino’s “Once
Upon a Time in Hollywood.”
Associated Press
ness. It’s a breezy, woozy Burt Reynolds-type actor where Manson’s mostly fe-
Hollywood fable that luxuri- of TV Westerns (his claim to male acolytes emerge and
ates in the simple pleasures fame is the ‘50s hit “Bounty Booth goes to check on
of the movies and the col- Law”) whose career is stall- the owner, an old friend,
orful swirl of the Dream Fac- ing. George Spahn (Bruce
tory’s backlot. Some plea- Pitt is Cliff Booth, his stunt Dern). Dalton and Booth
sures are nostalgic, and double and best friend, are fictional concoctions
some — like driving down a war veteran with a bad surrounded by real people,
Sunset Boulevard or marti- reputation but a friend- including their neighbors:
nis at Musso & Frank — are ly, relaxed manner. They Tate and her husband, Ro-
everlasting. have a natural, easy rap- man Polanski (Rafal Zawi-
Here, movie love feels con- port, with Booth doubling erucha).
tagious, like something in as a drinking buddy and By the film’s climax, blood
the air. In one of the film’s support system for Dalton, will spill and movie-made
best scenes, Margot Rob- who’s increasingly anxious historical revisionism will
bie’s Sharon Tate explains about his typecast future. have its day. But I suspect
at a theater’s ticket office (Al Pacino, as his agent, a lot of Tarantino fans will
that she’s in the movie, the urges him to head to Italy be taken by surprise at the
newly released caper “The for a spaghetti Western.) film’s leisurely pace, set
Wrecking Crew,” (“I’m the In DiCaprio’s finest se- more to a (and this a good
klutz!” she says cheerfully). quence, he chats between thing) “Jackie Brown”
Inside, she giggles with de- takes on a Western called speed.
light at seeing herself on “Lancer” with a frightfully As in that film, Tarantino isn’t
the big screen, giddily mim- serious Method Acting purely living in an over-the-
icking her character’s mar- 8-year-old co-star (Julia top movie fantasy world,
tial-arts moves and watch- Butters) before forgetting but one teetering intrigu-
ing to see if the audience his lines. ingly between dream and
laughs at one of her lines. After a bout of self-loathing reality. The dialogue and
(They do.) in his trailer, he returns and action has slowed down
The pleasures in “Once nails the scene. DiCaprio, enough to allow a little wist-
Upon a Time” are also a preternaturally self-pos- fulness and melancholy to
ours. Tarantino, has low- sessed actor himself, cap- creep in.
ered his typically feverish tures the whole arc beauti- At times, his path is a little
temperature to a warming fully. wayward and prone to di-
simmer, bathing us in the It’s not that “Once Upon gressions.
golden California light and a Time ... in Hollywood” Tarantino feels perilously
the movie-star glow of his doesn’t revolve around close to simply turning his
leading men, Leonardo Di- that grisly tragedy. It looms movie into several of Dal-
Caprio and Brad Pitt. They always in the background, ton’s, so eager is he (like
spend copious amounts of and eventually in the fore- the Coens were in “Hail,
time driving through the ground, too, after Booth Caesar!”) to lovingly adopt
Hollywood Hills in a creamy picks up a hitchhiker (Mar- those period styles. But usu-
Coupe de Ville, riding garet Qualley) who leads ally, the detours are hard
along like Butch and Sun- him to the Manson com- to resist. In one, Booth ends
dance and just as nice to pound at Spahn Ranch, up in a fight with Bruce Lee
look at. the former production site (Mike Moh) on the set of
DiCaprio is Rick Dalton, a of TV and film Westerns “The Green Hornet.”q