Quentin Tarantino's Manson murders movie

Just read a Facebook post from a guy who wrote a recent book on Manson: Manson's second favourite band was the Moody Blues. Never knew that! Not the best choice, but far from the worst if the window is the late '60s.

I know some of you (all of you?) don't like the Red Letter Media guys, but they made an I think good observation that Tarantino is kind of the last auteur whose movies get wide theatrical releases and big audiences. Am I overlooking someone obvious?

Wrt the soundtrack I'd say he's using music in a slightly different way this time than he has before, which is to pin down a time & place. It seems as if he's using more diegetic music than ever before - much of what you hear is coming from the radio, TVs, record players, etc. And I guess that somewhat constricts his options, since, for example, he has to choose songs that would plausibly be on the radio, and so on.

XPS Karina Longworth touched on that in one of the You Must Remember This Manson eps, even pointing out lyrical similarities between his songs and ones by the Moodies.

Christopher Nolan but he's even more conservative and safe than QT

xxp

Tarantino is kind of the last auteur whose movies get wide theatrical releases and big audiences

Are Fincher & Nolan too mersh or something?

Wes Anderson movies routinely make healthy profits these days.

red letter media guys in being huge dumbasses shocker

Nolan and Fincher I think of mostly as technicians, but Wes Anderson is a pretty good example.

PTA hasn't been in multiplexes this century, and he's arguably the preeminent American auteur and his biggest success was There Will Be Blood with $76m worldwide. QT's highest gross, for Django Unchained, was $425m.

xp Wes Anderson also hasn't been in multiplexes since... Tenenbaums? Rushmore? Was he ever? Anyway, his highest gross is $100m for Grand Budapest Hotel.

frustration and wonky passion (C. Grisso/McCain) at 4:51 31 Jul 19
XPS Karina Longworth touched on that in one of the You Must Remember This Manson eps, even pointing out lyrical similarities between his songs and ones by the Moodies.

Nolan and Fincher are more than technicians, they're for sure auteurs imo, but both are a lot safer and more palatable than QT.
xp

I just mean that the last two Fincher movies were adaptations of big best seller beach reads, and while he made them his own, a lot of people could have made those movies.

xp Wes Anderson also hasn't been in multiplexes since... Tenenbaums? Rushmore? Was he ever? Anyway, his highest gross is $100m for Grand Budapest Hotel.

― flappy bird, Wednesday, July 31, 2019

I saw the dogs thing and The Grand Budapest at an AMC 245 or whatever

For sure. There's also Soderbergh, who imo is an auteur as well whether he's making Unsane or an Ocean's movie, but again it's a different breed. Fincher and Soderbergh work a lot more than QT and Nolan.

Even though Nolan did the Batman trilogy, he's the only solid peer auteur at the same level of QT - well, much higher actually, but he's far more selective and all of his movies are events.

xp I stand corrected. Makes sense- I'm shocked that Budapest is his highest grossing movie for some reason, figured it would be Tenenbaums

yeah I saw Isle Of Dogs at an AMC 10-screen

XP Tenenbaums still is, if you adjust for inflation.

don't adjust for inflation, smelly Marvel doods will come for you

I guess this is a definition of "auteur" that doesn't include Nancy Meyers.

ooh, good call!

or Katherine Bigelow (who I hate tbh)

Bigelow sure, but again, far more conservative and predictable than QT

Nancy Meyers is such a stretch, at least this century

lol, auteur in the same sentence as Nolan, going by them standards I'm Caravaggio, my dog is Benny Hill Beryl Cook. The guy that directed Jossy's Giants is Rossellini.

Nolan's definitely got an identifiable style and consistent themes that pop up in his movies, that's enough to qualify imo (regardless of the quality of his output)

Yeah my point being that QT is the most 'radical' and original auteur in multiplexes in comparison to his very few peers - this is not good.

also? Interstellar was sick

Someone called Michael Mann "Nancy Meyers for men," it works.

Heh.

Anyway, I did finish the Red Letter Media review, and they actually had a lot of interesting things to say about the movie imo. Especially the ending. For example, we cheer the Manson folks getting their faces bashed in, but in the film ... they haven't really done anything yet, let alone to warrant that. Our viewing and feelings are informed by what the real life Manson family did, but of course in this movie, they haven't done that. Sharon Tate is never even really at risk. These are three dummies/kids who walk into a house (sure, wielding weapons) and end up getting brutally murdered by smashing/dog/flamethrower. And we celebrate and enjoy it, but only because we the audience know who they really are and that their murder means the Manson murders don't happen. Factor in a fictional violent comeuppance for a real violent act that said fictional comeuppance "prevents," and ... it's pretty complicated.

they haven't really done anything yet, let alone to warrant that.

We know their intentions from their conversation in the car -- they're going to carve up some piggies, kill the killers, etc.

My feelings about this movie are so complicated -- there are some fragments of interesting filmmaking embedded in a thing that I ultimately wish didn't exist.

We know their intention, but an intention is not a death sentence.

Anyway, yeah, it's complicated. More I think about it, more I'm inclined to see it again, for all the lil' problems I might have had with it.

sure, being labelled a “pig” shouldn’t be a death sentence either.

We know their intentions from their conversation in the car -- they're going to carve up some piggies, kill the killers, etc.

The Family had already killed a guy that summer, and Manson himself thought he'd killed a drug dealer he assumed was connected to the Black Panthers, which was part of why he was eager to get Helter Skelter going.

But we only know that from history, that's not depicted in the movie.

XP Not that that justifies what happens.

OTOH, I'm a little surprised that Booth is presumably still tripping during the killings isn't getting brought up more.

Anyway, I did finish the Red Letter Media review, and they actually had a lot of interesting things to say about the movie imo. Especially the ending. For example, we cheer the Manson folks getting their faces bashed in, but in the film ... they haven't really done anything yet, let alone to warrant that.

we know their intentions. they're home intruders wielding knives and a gun, cliff and rick kill them in self defense.

Our viewing and feelings are informed by what the real life Manson family did, but of course in this movie, they haven't done that.

this movie is constantly playing with reality and our knowledge of the era and the actors in the movie.

Sharon Tate is never even really at risk. These are three dummies/kids who walk into a house (sure, wielding weapons) and end up getting brutally murdered by smashing/dog/flamethrower. And we celebrate and enjoy it, but only because we the audience know who they really are and that their murder means the Manson murders don't happen. Factor in a fictional violent comeuppance for a real violent act that said fictional comeuppance "prevents," and ... it's pretty complicated.

Good lord

I can't believe people are hemming and hawing over the depiction of the Manson Family murderers in a Quentin Tarantino movie. It isn't complicated.

It is, though! Because it's changing history. They're *not* the Manson Family murderers in this movie. They were the people who threatened Brad Pitt and got brutally killed.

flappy bird, meet Josh in Chicago

I'd like to think history doesn't change until Dalton goes out and yells at them.

But we only know that from history, that's not depicted in the movie.

This is silly. A huge chunk of the import of the movie relies on at least some knowledge of the Manson family and Sharon Tate's fate. If you watched the movie in a total vacuum and knew absolutely nothing at all about any of the real people or events involved the movie wouldn't work.

I assume a lot of people seeing the movie don't know anything about Manson, don't you think?

It is, though! Because it's changing history. They're *not* the Manson Family murderers in this movie. They were the people who threatened Brad Pitt and got brutally killed.

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, July 31, 2019 8:35 PM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

the power of the whole sequence rests on our knowledge of what really happened. tex, susan, and patricia murdered everyone at 100500 cielo dr just as brutally and insanely as cliff kills them in this movie. it is legal to kill an armed home intruder in self defense.

I assume a lot of people seeing the movie don't know anything about Manson, don't you think?

I do not think this.

xpost That's sort of what I said. How we react is informed by real life. But this movie alters what happened in real life, so that it didn't happen. So that these people are being killed in this movie for something they did in real life, but of course which didn't happen yet/was prevented in this fictional world. I didn't say it was wrong, I said it was complicated.

complicated in what way?

How we feel is complicated.

not me

I thought about Sharon Tate and Jay Sebring and everyone murdered on that night. the movie venerates Tate and I think it does it with a lot of grace and true melancholy.