Quentin Tarantino's Manson murders movie

VG, I agree with your reading of how Rick and Cliff's roles are sustained through the ending (also that you have been OTM all over this thread)

on reflection, my difficulties with the ending all seem to stem from Tarantino's lack of interest in realistic violence, illustrated here by his decision to play the killings of the Manson family members for comedic effects

the timing of Cliff's decision to smoke the acid-dipped cigarette is a nice touch; our anxiety for everyone in the house spikes when we realize he's going to be tripping his head off at the worst possible moment; like Rick, we’ve learned to depend on Cliff, and now his cool competence will be most at risk when it's most needed

this is an obvious opportunity for Tarantino to ramp up some terror; Cliff ought to be more disoriented when the family members appear and more frightened, confused, and clumsy when the violence starts; but Tarantino chooses instead to have him continue looking good and cracking wise

Cliff's throwing the dog food can is the most visceral and persuasive moment of violence in the whole film, but as soon as Brandy leaps to the rescue, one horror after another is visited on the hapless bad guys without much sense of danger to the good guys

Cliff strolls through the carnage of the next minute or so in such a relaxed way that the knife wound in his hip doesn't feel dangerous; it's more of an inconvenience, swiftly punished by protracted head-smashing; we get multiple shots of him pulverizing a woman's head against various hard surfaces, but iirc little if any of her brains and blood appear on Cliff, and we get no particular emotional reaction from him before he passes out

the other face-smashed woman's popping up, firing the handgun, running through the glass door, falling in the pool, and getting roasted are all bits out of a slasher movie, but without a slasher movie's suggestions of Michael-Myers-style invulnerability; she doesn’t seem to be much of a threat to the heroes during any of these mishaps, making her final napalming gratuitous as well as corny

once the violence kicked off, I cringed during the face-smashings, but the sense of risk to the good guys dissipated so quickly that I felt I was supposed to be appreciating the gore either as comedy horror or as justified cruelty to the cruel-in-another-timeline home invaders ... neither sentiment worked for me in the moment

the same sequence, even the use of that stupid flamethrower, could have generated more terror and horror and a stronger cathartic effect if it had been staged with Cliff, Rick, and Francesca experiencing more damage and trauma, with their survival held in doubt until the end

but maybe that would have been too suggestive of the actual Cielo Drive killings, or too much like a horror movie, or inconsistent with the tone Tarantino was trying to maintain

those were my reactions seeing it yesterday; I wouldn't be surprised if I missed some important details or if I respond to it differently seeing it again

I could hang in the back seat of Polanski’s car for awhile

idk man, MG’s are *not* roomy

some nice moments in this Esquire piece w Tarantino, Pitt & DiCaprio.
https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a27458589/once-upon-a-time-in-hollywood-leonardo-dicaprio-brad-pitt-quentin-tarantino-interview/

This was p funny:

[DiCaprio: ...But doing a film that’s set over only two, three days? It is an experiment that I don’t think I’ve ever done before. [Looks to Pitt.] Have you done it?

QT: Well . . . Titanic is only a couple days. Right?

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LD: [Goes silent. Then:] Truuuuue.

MH: I don’t remember that movie. What happened?

BP: Yeah, how does it end? [Laughs.]

LD: [Laughs. Looks at Hainey and Pitt.] I guess you’re right. [Laughs again.] I stand corrected. I guess it is.

Tarantino should totally do a Tiranic film where they kick that fuckin' iceberg's ass

but maybe that would have been too suggestive of the actual Cielo Drive killings, or too much like a horror movie, or inconsistent with the tone Tarantino was trying to maintain

I think this is why it works, the actual murders were so much more brutal and sadistic... relegating Manson himself to one pathetic scene, and reducing the murderers to completely hapless exploding punching bags for comedic effect is an oddly poignant revision in context.

XP Kinda weird that QT has never worked w/Billy Zane.

More rabbithole stuff - new interview with stuntman Gary Kent, on the long list of inspirations for Cliff & who had some run-ins w the Mansin family on Spahn Ranch in ‘69 before the murders

https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2019/07/22/lights-camera-action-an-interview-with-legendary-stuntman-gary-kent

post the other one Veg!

?

Quentin Tarantino's Manson murders movie

When Tarantino killed Hitler, Hitler was already dead ... but Watson and Krenwinkel are still alive! I wonder what they think about it.

xxposts to sic

oh right! i forgot abt Floyd!

he talks about Little Girl& Floyd in this odd/interesting one-off Spotify podcast he did with Rolling Stone’s David Wild, where he breaks down his music choices for the soundtrack

https://open.spotify.com/show/7yLvxyJ9xPj3er5nE7QKnC

It can be kind of a lot bc QT is kind of a lot obv, but there’s good nuggets if you can hang with it

it’s broken into “sides” so you dont have to listen all in one chunk or skip to section of songs yr interested in

actually I can't listen to any of it but thanks!

:(

there’s also a non-spotify ep of the New Beverly podcast about his cinematic influences for the movie if yr interested

it’s pretty good! link to podcast in here
https://www.slashfilm.com/quentin-tarantino-podcast/

yeah I listen to Pure Cinema semi-regularly - link for anyone else curious

once upon a boomer nostalgia porn

morbs is that you?

yes i'm the only Tarantella skeptic on earth

K Austin Collins must be me too

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/07/tarantino-once-upon-a-time-in-hollywood-revenge-fantasy-manson-family

So what did you think about the movie, Morbs?

I skimmed the Vanity Fair quickly--it doesn't seem to be a pan (at the very least, half-and-half).

hey Mood -- nothing post-IB and I will die that way

The Wiki for James Stacy, the actor played by Timothy Olyphant in OUATIH, is a real rollercoaster pic.twitter.com/87eYHrNaz4

— Very Stable Pagliacci (@writtenlow) August 6, 2019

jesus

Hey guys! So I am gonna see this next week!

we cant wait for you to hate it lol

ilx discussion to-date makes me expect I will like it tbh

going again tonight ($5 DCP screening)

Tarantino should totally do a Tiranic film where they kick that fuckin' iceberg's ass

― Mario Meatwagon (Moodles), Sunday, August 4, 2019 8:37 PM (two days ago)

^^^^^
Lol.

xpost :D

HUSH
HUSH

NAAAAAAH
NANA
NAAHHH
NANA
NAAHHH
NANA
NAAHHH

(BOMP BOMP BOMP BA BOMP BA BOMP BOMP)

That song makes everything better despite its crap lyrics.

Killer jams & crap lyrics is Deep Purple’s eternal guarantee to you

The jams transcend.

it’s kinda crazy that Hush is their first single. like, way to make an entrance.

Ian Paice is so funky

Purple didn’t write Hush tho, Joe South did

oh thats true huh
well, still very on-brand for them

Deep Purple were awesome, I won't countenance any argument on that point

no one itt has suggested otherwise

I'm just preempting any potential argument

there will be no such thing while i live & breathe

I still am thinking a lot about the movie

One of the things I really like but that has been slow to coalesce for me is the character of Rick.

There is something about his flawed shallowness that is poignant. It’s weirdly touching to see Rick slowly grasp some basic fundamentals of acting. while it’s funny to see his mind get blown by little Maddie’s truthbombs, it also in a subtle way strikes at the heart of this breed of actor that Tarantino is showing us. he came to Hollywood to be The Guy, to be cool & handsome & say the lines in the right way, and his whole career was made on that alone.

His discovery of something more than that, of an enjoyment of going a little deeper, is important, but in a small, seemingly insignificant way storywise.

it gives him a little bit of hope that there is still enjoyment in this for him. Even in a villain role in someone else’s show. That makes him less worried about failing & maybe lets him enjoy the possibility of doing something different to what he’s done befire. that seems to be why he changes his mind about going to Italy.

It’s not that now he understands acting & is going to build on that to hone his craft & blow everyone away. He’s still Rick Dalton & his learning curve is fairly shallow. But maybe now that he’s seen that all of his experience, even the bad parts, makes his acting better, not worse, maybe just -knowing~ that means he won’t ever go back to the point where blowing his brains out in the pool is even a remote possibilty.

I dunno. I’ve always been interested in that idea from tv and b movies anyway. The struggles of an ~average~ actor and how many (unlike Rick) never made it past their worst, loneliest moment.

*maddie? trudi

In The Los Angeles Times, Mary McNamara observed that the moral of Tarantino’s new fairy tale, “Once Upon A Time In … Hollywood,” is, “Who doesn’t miss the good old days when cars had fins and white men were the heroes of everything?”

Dubbing the cowboys-versus-hippies movie starring Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio “nostalgia porn,” McNamara notes: “Watching two middle-aged white guys grapple with a world that does not value them as much as they believe it should, it was tough not to wonder if that something was the same narrow, reductive and mythologized view of history that has made red MAGA hats the couture of conservative fashion.”

https://thumbs.gfycat.com/BoldLeanAracari-size_restricted.gif