CANNES Festival 2019

[Chris Knipp]

LEO DICAPRIO IN ONCE UPON A TIME...IN HOLLYWOOD

Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood (Quentin Tarantino). Competition.

Controversial, but likely to be up there in ratings, Quentin Tarantino's ninth feature, set in 1969, premiered today on the 25th anniversary of Pulp Fiction's triumphant Cannes opening (it won the Palme d'Or and made the director famous), and the new film is felt by some to have structural and other affinities to the earlier one. A "shocking, gripping, dazzlingly shot" movie, Peter Bradshaw writes in a 5-out-of-5-star Guardian review, "in the celluloid-primary colors of sky blue and sunset gold." He will not reveal the shocking finale. The period is "recovered with all Tarantino’s habitual intensity and delirious, hysterical connoisseurship of pop culture detail," says Bradshaw, with a new thing, not just cinephilia but "TVphilia", with lots about the small screen of the time, an aspect Richard Lawson is particularly interested in in his Vanity Fair review. Rick Dalton, the alcoholic actor played by DiCaprio, becomes a has-been when his TV western series is cancelled. Cliff Booth (Brad PItt) is his stunt double, factotum, and only friend. They live in the shadow of the Manson murders, which have not yet occurred. Sharon Tate is Rick's neighhbor. The cast includes Al Pacino and Margot Robbie. Robbie Collin, in his Telegraph review, likewise gives the movie 5 out of 5 stars and calls it "pure movie-world intoxication," giving more details of its relationship to the Sharon Tate murders - which some believe is when the Hollywood dream ended with a crash. "There’s a gleeful toxicity here that will launch a thousand think-pieces," writes Collin. "Pitt’s character is capital-P problematic, absolutely by design." "But," he concludes, "the transgressive thrill is undeniable, and the artistry mesmerisingly assured." Tweets are enthusiastic, and praise is being heaped on Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate. Al Pacino reportedly has a hilarious cameo as Dalton's agent. "This curious fairy tale may not be the truth, and it may prattle on too long, writes Lawson in Vanity Fair. "But when its stars align, and they let loose with their unmistakable shine, Hollywood movies do seem truly special again. And, sure, maybe TV does too."Justin Chang in his LA Times review calls this a "richly evocative, conceptually jaw-dropping, excessively foot-fetishizing, inescapably terrifying and unexpectedly poignant movie."


MARGOT ROBBIE AS SARON TATE IN ONCE UPON A TIME...IN HOLLYWOOD [Sony Pictures Releasing]