Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Running Time: 2hr 45m Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, Margot Robbie

I went to this as a Tarantino virgin. Of course, I’ve seen untold clips from Pulp Fiction and Reservoir dogs, but for some reason, never a whole film, all the way through. It felt like I’d just missed the boat. Even at the beginning, when he was the hippest film maker in town, for some reason our paths did not cross. And latterly, exposed as a ghastly chauvinist and apologist for the likes of Harvey Weinstein, he held little appeal. And then there was the violence. Yes, I know, it was comic book and ironic, knowing and referential, but still it was enough to put me off shelling out to see his films at the cinema.

So I went to this as a sceptic. And came out as a convert. Apart from three minutes of ghastly, gratuitous violence at the end of the film, it was a magnificent, bravura piece of film making. The homage to late Sixties LA culture, with a fabulous soundtrack and wonderful sets and costumes, was delightful. Pitt and DiCaprio were a great double act, with their complex and nuanced “friendship” at the heart of the film. The criticism, on-line and in lots of the reviews, of Tarantino marginalising Margot Robbie by giving her hardly any lines in comparison to the two big beast leads, misses the point, I think. I’d normally be right there, criticising Tarantino’s attitudes to women, but the film is not really about Sharon Tate and therefore isn’t really about Margot Robbie. The handling of the Charles Manson story is subtly skewed so history is reworked and it’s a better film as a result.

There’s also a tantalising bit of evidence that he’s trying to behave himself in the light of #metoo. The Brad Pitt character gives a lift to the clearly underage, sexually aware, hippy girl and she propositions him. He takes the trouble to ascertain her age before turning her down when he finds out she is too young. It was so transparent you could see Tarantino having the conversation with his lawyer behind the screen. Didn’t fit the times nor the character, and there was just a sense that he was “playing” the issue while earning brownie points. Like Sir Geoffrey Boycott sponsoring a women’s refuge.

It’s not perfect, hence the four stars. The opening half is baggy and self-indulgent. You get the feeling that Tarantino was having a whale of a time, and no-one was going to tell him to leave that scene on the cutting room floor, but it could easily have been at least twenty minutes shorter. And there is that nasty blood rage at the end. But I’ll forgive him all of the faults for the scene where Pitt’s character goes to visit an old Hollywood ranch film set where the Westerns used to be made. Now in crumbling disrepair, it’s been effectively squatted by the psychotic hippies that fall in with Manson. Pitt goes to visit an old colleague, concerned for his welfare. He parks just inside the entrance and his buddy lives in a trailer at the far end of the lot. The darkness underlying the Summer of Love and its aftermath, seeps through the luminous sunny colours as Pitt walks the length of the ramshackle film ranch, with every step ratcheting up a sense of fear and foreboding in the audience. It’s a masterclass in creating tension.

Go and see it. And while you do that, I’ll stream all of his others. I’ve already waited too long.