Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood!

I like movies where the story is about movies, that is about actors, directors, screenwriters, cameramen and the list goes on. Movies that show how to make a movie or movies about the life of actors. When it comes to Hollywood actors then everything becomes much more dynamic and interesting. Because Hollywood showed in the public space only a bright and glamorous image, making the actors almost gods. Very convenient for the big studios and their stars, this image bringing a lot of people to the cinemas and a lot of millions of dollars in their pockets.

This is what happened in the last century. Closer to our times, information began to appear in the press and on TV about the true face of the film industry. Real earthquakes! That's how it turned out that a great seducer, after which millions of women fainted, was actually gay. The Roch Hudson case. Many, many of the same kind began to be known by spectators and admirers.

Over time, this news and rumors from the world of the film were heard not only in the press or TV, but they began to make movies about them. I want to talk about such a film now. Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood!

A film by Quentin Tarantino. All Tarantino's films were controversial, some I love this director and others hate it, mostly because of the extreme violence that puts in his movies where blood is not economics. I like it a lot because it innovates and pushes limits because it always shows in movies that it has a film culture. Quotes and references to famous scenes from old movies can be found in all his movies.

It's hard and easy to talk about this movie, it depends on what interests you in the first place. After watching a movie, I try to understand what the main theme was, the message conveyed. What's left after this movie.
From my point of view, this is again a film about friendship, the long friendship between an actor and a stuntman (his dubbing in dangerous scenes). Rick Dalton and Cliff Booth, played by Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt.

It's a nostalgic movie. Nostalgia for the years 68-70. Of course, there is no nostalgia for young people and I probably don't even understand the era, but I was 16 years old and I was fascinated by cinema.

In the 70's it was a big drama in Hollywood. Sharon Tate, a young actress, the wife of the Polish director in vogue at the time, Roman Polanski.

She was killed in her villa in Beverly Hills, along with her friends, by a hippie group led by Charles Manson. Sharon was pregnant and had to give birth in those days. It was an atrocious and gratuitous crime, dictated by Manson's leftist ideology and contempt for wealth and luxury.

Although this crime is not explicitly stated, it floats in the air and those who know the incident understand what it is about. The final scene of the film, one of the best and most intense, moves the murder or rather the attempted murder from Bel Air, this is the name of Sharon Tate's residence, at Rick Dalton's house, located a little lower on the hill. Here the murder fails, in fact the hippies are killed by Rick Dalton, Cliff Booth and his faithful dog, Brandy!

A terrible scene, Tarantino brand, where extreme violence mixes with a good comic situation.

The film recreates an era, the 60s and 70s in a Hollywood that is beginning to modernize and where the old stars no longer take place. Rick Dalton is trying to resist and it is getting harder. He also tries to find work for his friend, Cliff Booth, the stuntman. However, a former war veteran, an unadapted one, manages to ... fail, gets into all sorts of trouble on the set. One of these is the confrontation with Bruce Lee. Another memorable scene from the movie.

On the set, Bruce Lee brags that he would defeat Cassius Clay in a fight, a statement that bothered our stuntman, who provokes the Japanese to fight and defeats him. That would lead to dismissal.

Another part of the film is about the hippy movement, of course about Manson and his colony, in the context of the Bel Air crime.

The scene from the farm where the hippies had gathered and their confrontation with the stuntman has something of a western film. Another reference to the film industry.

In contrast and as a cause of the threats of hippy groups are the carefree and fun-filled life of Hollywood stars. Parties where Sharon Tate was very popular.

Petreceri populate de vedetele timpului, cum ar fi flegmaticul Steve McQuinn sau frumoasa Jean Seberg. Actori de mult plecati, multi nici nu au auzit de ei.

I scored a few moments from the movie. An important and highly anticipated film in its time (2019). So long awaited that it was chosen to open the prestigious Cannes Film Festival!

The film is long, it is grandiose, it is made in the Hollywood style but with the genius of Tarantino.

Source of all photos

I hope that the few references to the film and the chosen images will arouse your interest to watch it.