Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Is A Surface-Level Though Enjoyable Trip To 1969

Whether it's in characters discussing the definition of a TV pilot or sadistic movie stuntmen, Quentin Tarantino has always made his love for all things cinematic a prominent part of nearly all of his directorial efforts. Keeping that in mind, it's shocking that it's taken him this long into his career as a filmmaker to make a movie entirely set in Hollywood. Well folks, the time has finally come with Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which see Tarantino doing his fourth-consecutive period piece in chronicling the exploits of a trio of characters across Hollywood in 1969, a pivotal year for Tinseltown if there ever was one.

With A Story And Cast This Good, No Wonder Jackie Brown Is So Thoroughly Entertaining

We all know how much Quentin Tarantino loves making movies that extensively pay homage to genres of cinema that proved highly influential to him while also putting his own spin on said genres, it's his own trademark as a filmmaker. While I've heard Jackie Brown frequently referred to as Tarantino doing a homage to blaxploitation cinema of the 1970's, I wouldn't quite classify it as occupying that specific region of filmmaking beyond the font used for the title and of course the casting of Pam Grier in the titular lead role. Like another 1990's movie I reviewed recently, Miller's Crossing, Jackie Brown actually skews closer to 1940's movies like The Big Sleep involving a lead character of questionable morals trying to keep their head above water among numerous intersecting storylines.

Kill Bill Slays Thanks To Thoughtfully Realized Characters And Uma Thurman's Formidable Lead Performance

In retrospect, it's nuts that Quentin Tarantino had a whopping six years separating the release of his third film, Jackie Brown, and his fourth film, Kill Bill (which was split into two individual movies upon its initial release). In every part of his career, Tarantino has only taken three or four years maximum in between projects, but then again, he hasn't really done anything as large in scale as the expansive Kill Bill saga in the rest of his filmography, perhaps that extensive break between films was necessary for him to properly prepare for a motion picture of this magnitude. Whether that's true or not, that extensive wait was totally worth it as Kill Bill is a terrific feature that gathers up depth as it goes along like a snowball picking up snow as it travels down a snow-covered mountainside.