By Kayleigh Donaldson | Film | March 20, 2019 |
By Kayleigh Donaldson | Film | March 20, 2019 |
Quentin Tarantino has claimed that he plans to stop directing films once he’s made ten of them. As the marketing makes very clear, Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood is his ninth. So what better way to go out in style than by making your penultimate movie a huge ensemble piece dedicated to the film industry at the moment of major social change, as sparked by the Manson Family murders?
Star Leonardo DiCaprio shared the first trailer for the movie on Twitter today, which you can watch below.
Experience a version of 1969 that could only happen #OnceUponATimeInHollywood - the 9th film from Quentin Tarantino. pic.twitter.com/AuNpgTMUmE
— Leonardo DiCaprio (@LeoDiCaprio) March 20, 2019
The ad campaign for the film so far has been… Well, have you seen those posters?
Hollywood. 1969. #OnceUponATimeInHollywood pic.twitter.com/1CRSiiQ643
— Leonardo DiCaprio (@LeoDiCaprio) March 18, 2019
Yeah, it’s been oddly lackluster, which has proven especially confusing given that Quentin Tarantino of all people knows how to throw together one hell of a marketing campaign for his movies. He’s king of old-school Hollywood homage iconography, and it’s not like 1969 Hollywood was short of that. Still, that bad poster is emblematic of something: You don’t even need to include DiCaprio or Brad Pitt’s names on it. They’re that big a deal, and that’ll play well for a lot of general cinema-goers who don’t care about the plot and such. DiCaprio doesn’t make a lot of movies. Indeed, this is his first role since winning an Oscar for The Revenant. So this is something of an event.
But if Leo doesn’t do it for you then don’t worry because literally everyone is in this movie. The cast includes *deep breath* Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate, Al Pacino, Damien Lewis (as Steve McQueen), Bruce Dern, Dakota Fanning (as Squeaky Fromme), the late Luke Perry, Lena Dunham, Scoot McNairy, Timothy Olyphant, James Marsden, Rumer Willis, Margaret Qualley, Zoe Bell, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Mike Moh as Bruce Lee and oh so many more.
The film is inevitably going to be one of the major cinematic talking points of 2019. How could one of the most popular directors of his era taking on the Manson murders not be? I remain hugely cynical about Tarantino’s ability to tackle that particular story but damn if the tone of this trailer didn’t win me over somewhat. I’m all in on egotistical TV star Leo, we finally get to see Margot Robbie actually looks like as Sharon Tate, and the Hail, Caesar! vibe of it all, as my fellow Overlords noted, just works, at least in this context.
What do you guys think?
Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood opens in American theatres on July 26th, but don’t be surprised if this thing ends up in the Cannes line-up.