
Pitt's aged stuntman, Cliff Booth, is a fascinating character and wholly deserving in his recent Golden Globe win. The best elements of ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD are Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt. Did these horrendous cult members deserve to be burned alive? Absolutely, but it doesn't fit with the rest of the film. There really is no benefit to the story sparing Sharon Tate and having Charles Manson's acolytes brutally dispatched by Cliff Booth and Rick Dalton outside of some sort of torture porn.

Where Tarantino used INGLORIOUS BASTERDS as a send-up of B-movie war flicks through the lens of revisionist history, ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is wonderfully grounded in a realistic and historically accurate narrative until the final act goes completely and nonsensically off the rails. Namely, ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is a mish-mosh of genres, styles, and techniques and not in a good way. But, a film that revels in these kinds of minute details cannot sacrifice the big picture. The era of Hollywood in which this film is set is meticulously realized on screen and the research involved to populate the real actors and filmmakers that serve as supporting players is quite impressive. Quentin Tarantino is an absolute fan of cinema, that is clearly apparent. At times, it feels like Tarantino had the germination of an idea for three different movies and when he couldn't flesh them out individually, he crammed them all together.
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Despite two leads delivering some of the best performances of their careers, ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is two-thirds of a great movie with the rest a virtually incomprehensible mess. From the almost three hour run-time to the unnecessarily drawn out driving sequences, Quentin Tarantino's first non-Weinsten produced film showcases a filmmaker without anyone serving as a sounding board on where he could have trimmed or tightened things up. ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is a prime example of excess. Having seen the movie when it initially hit theaters and again on the recent 4K release, there are a lot of elements to the movie that are quite good, but not only is it one of the most overrated movies of last year but overall it is one of if not the weakest entries in Tarantino's ouvre. One such film is Quentin Tarantino's ninth film, ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD, which has been lauded by many as a masterpiece. Invariably, these lists name a consistent group of movie that are expected to slide right up to the Oscar podium in a few weeks time.
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With awards season in full swing, many critics and fans have posted their rankings of the best films of 2019. We're hoping this column will promote constructive and geek fueled discussion. THE UNPOPULAR OPINION is an ongoing column featuring different takes on films that either the writer HATED, but that the majority of film fans LOVED, or that the writer LOVED, but that most others LOATHED.
