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| Image courtesy of Columbia Pictures. |
In the case of the latter character, who was brutally murdered by members of the Manson family on Aug. 8, 1969, the song could be seen as a little on the nose. In regard to the other two characters, the use of The Rolling Stones' song is all part of a thematic melancholy that presides over the film, which is both the most emotionally resonant picture in Tarantino's oeuvre since "Jackie Brown" and the first Tarantino picture since that 1997 classic that could be described as a "hangout movie."
There have been numerous films that have explored how the late 1960s were the years that began to change it all, from the music and movie industries to American culture at large, but Tarantino's movie is one that focuses on the folks who were left behind and, as Jagger would tell it, "out of time."
As the film opens, Rick's former glory years as a TV cowboy on a show known as "Bounty Law" are in the rearview mirror, and he has resorted to playing villains on episodes of other shows, often forgetting his lines and spending the evenings getting drunk. An agent played by Al Pacino warns him that as audiences watch him get beat up on TV every week as a different villain, it'll become harder for him to make a case to the studios that he's still leading man material. Hence, the suggestion - one to which Rick doesn't take kindly - that he should fly to Rome to work on spaghetti westerns.
On the other hand, Cliff - whom we are told falls somewhere in the spectrum between assistant and wife to Rick - appears to just be going with the flow. His career has also stalled, although he still acts as Rick's stunt double. Pitt's performance is deceptively rich - Cliff is rather laconic, so the actor's relatively easygoing portrayal might occasionally be outshined by DiCaprio's more showy - and also excellent - work as the melodramatic Rick. But Pitt's measured work here deserves some recognition.
Much of what we know about the enigmatic Cliff comes from rumors spread by others - he was a war hero, but managed to avoid prison after apparently killing his wife. Although there's a sense of darkness revolving around Pitt's character, there's also a lot of room for humor, especially during a sequence in which he finds himself in a scuffle with a cocky Bruce Lee (Mike Moh).
Cliff is also involved in two of the film's most intense set pieces, both involving the Manson family. Although the film's finale involves some bloody violence, an earlier scene during which Cliff finds himself at the Spahn ranch, where Bruce Dern gives an amusingly cranky turn as George Spahn, is the more unnerving. Cliff has been led to the ranch by a hitchhiking young woman who he often spots on the side of the road, and he appears to be unsettled upon meeting the rest of the family at the ranch. While the film's first half is often buoyantly full of life, the encounters with the Manson family cast a gloomy and eerie pall over the second half.
But the picture's eventual darkness can't quite overshadow the joyfulness of Tarantino's portrayal of 1969 Los Angeles, from the lovingly recreated and heavily detail-oriented scenes in which Cliff zips down Sunset and Hollywood boulevards - the iconic El Coyote and Peaches record store are among the sites brought back to life - to the neon signs advertising hotels, recording studios and movie theaters that light up the night. Much like Jacques Demy's sadly forgotten 1969 film "Model Shop," Tarantino's film gets a lot of mileage - excuse the pun - out of driving sequences around Los Angeles, many of which are from the vantage point of a backseat driver.
And speaking of movie theaters, the scene that is perhaps the film's best involves Tate, played with a glow of pure joy by Robbie, finagling her way into a free movie screening of "The Wrecking Crew," one in the Matt Helm (played by Dean Martin) spy spoof series in which Tate portrayed the klutzy sidekick. There's something moving about seeing the actress view the real-life Tate on screen and feel buoyed when the audience laughs at her onscreen hijinks. The scene involves little dialogue from Robbie, but her work during this sequence is among the picture's acting highlights.
There's been somewhat of a brouhaha about Robbie's minuscule amount of dialogue in the film, but I'd humbly submit that these arguments have sort of missed the point about her portrayal. The film doesn't aim to do a deep dive into Tate, but rather portray her as a symbol - or sacrifice - involved in an incident that some - Joan Didion included - viewed as the moment when the pulse of the late 1960s movement was lost.
The most information we get about Tate from others is when Steve McQueen (Damian Lewis) relays information at a party about her relationship with Roman Polanski (Rafal Zawierucha) and love affair-turned friendship with Hollywood hair stylist Jay Sebring (Emile Hirsch), another Manson family victim, all the while alerting us to the fact that McQueen himself once had a thing for her. His comment that he never stood a chance is, interestingly enough, mirrored by a similar comment by Rick later in the film regarding a role he lost to McQueen.
Those familiar with Tarantino's past decade of work - most notably, "Inglorious Basterds" and "Django Unchained" - will recall the director's penchant for revisionist history with a bent toward justice, and suffice it to say that the events of Aug. 8, 1969 in his film diverge, well, a bit from the historical record. The finale is violently jolting, although it's followed by a moving coda involving a camera angle from up above.
During the one scene in which the audience gets the Manson family's point of view, four characters sit in a car at the bottom of Cielo Drive to discuss their planned night of mayhem. One Manson family member notes that as children they grew up watching violence and murder on TV, so it's fitting that by attacking movie stars and Hollywood figures they are "killing the people who taught us to kill."
This terrifying concept is only the most extreme example of the picture's overall view that the events of that night were the beginning of the end of the Peace and Love Generation, paving the way for the cynical comedown of the 1970s. But the juxtaposition of the Mansons and the film's aging Hollywood stars provides for an emotionally resonant exploration of one generation pushing the other out of the way into an uncertain future. "Once Upon a Time... In Hollywood," a title that only appears onscreen at the film's end for good reason, is a deeply satisfying elegy about the pain and acceptance that comes with realizing that one's time is up.
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