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\n Warning! This post and episode contain huge spoilers.
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\nDr G and Dr Rad always enjoy a trip to the movies, as you tell from our past forays in classics like Spartacus, Gladiator, and the contemporary farce Hail, Caesar! We are planning to record more special episodes when we see a historical flick or television series that sparks our interest. This week we saw Tarantino\u2019s latest offering, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019).
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\n Bonus Episode - Once Upon a Time in HollywoodThe audio is a little variable on this one, but we decided to keep at much as possible rather than cut. Equipment checking is a high priority before our next recording session.
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\nDid we mention the spoilers? They are coming...
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\nThe two main
\ncharacters in this film (Rick Dalton, played by Leonardo DiCaprio,
\nand Cliff Booth, played by Brad Pitt) are fictional, but the backdrop
\nto their story is historical. Whilst occasionally flashing back to
\nearlier points, the majority of the film takes place in Hollywood,
\n1969. 2019 marks the fifty-year anniversary, so the release is
\ntimely. This was a pivotal year for America in many ways. The protest
\nmovement against the Vietnam War reached new heights in the wake of
\nthe Tet Offensive in 1968, not only in terms of the numbers who
\nattended protests such as Vietnam Moratorium Day, but also with the
\ntrial of the Chicago Eight for demonstrations during the August 1968
\nDemocratic National Convention. This was also the year that the
\nassassin of Martin Luther King Jr was captured and tried, and the
\nBlack Panthers were named as enemies of the state by the FBI for
\nbeing a communist organisation. These are not the events that
\nTarantino focuses on.
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\nWhat is Hollywood Anyway?
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\nDalton is an actor trying to keep his career afloat and Booth is his stuntman, BFF and all-round handyman. The Hollywood that they used to know is disappearing. For decades, the film industry had been controlled by the major studios (such as MGM, Paramount, Warner Bros) and each movie was subject to strict censorship rules. By 1969, the studios were no longer as dominant and the Production Code had been abandoned, opening the door for a wider range of artists and film subjects. The Graduate (1967) would have been unthinkable at the beginning of the decade and in 1969 Dennis Hopper\u2019s ground-breaking, counter-cultural classic, Easy Rider, would be released.
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\nEven so, Hollywood was about to be rocked by something more earth-shattering than a progressive movie. In August 1969, Charles Manson decided that it was time for his followers to unleash the race war that he had dubbed \u2018Helter Skelter\u2019 after the Beatles song from the 1968 White Album. This would lead to the grisly Tate and La Bianca murders. The crimes committed by the Manson Family had many implications, but it is the build-up to these events that Tarantino traces as Dalton and Booth cruise through Hollywood.
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\nHollywood with a Twist
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\nJust as the audience is preparing to see Sharon Tate and her house guests get brutally murdered by Manson\u2019s drug-addled followers, Tarantino turns audience expectations on their head. Dalton and Booth, who live next door to Tate and Polanski, are attacked by the Family and it is the latter who suffer a gruesome end. This is not the first time that Tarantino has ventured down this road with historical fare. Django Unchained (2013) and Inglorious Basterds (2009) both...