Quentin Recommends: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
10 Movies Quentin Tarantino Wants You to See Before Watching ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’
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- DirectorPhil KarlsonStarsVan HeflinTab HunterKathryn GrantA powerful rancher always protects his wild adult son by paying for damages and bribing witnesses, until his crimes become too serious to rectify.Going into the 1960s, Hollywood was hurting bad for money. The laborious studio system was slow to adapt to the rapidly changing times after World War II and the growing throngs of Baby Boomers wanted something radically different from the movies than the movies were willing to sell them. TV was on the rise as America’s preferred mode entertainment and the film industry needed to get creative if it wanted to see any new money coming into the weekly box office. Color became standardized, various widescreen formats were experimented with, action become bloodier and more brutal and even 3D reared its ugly head as a fly-by-night gimmick. Gunman’s walk is an emblematic confluence of many of these experiential trends in moviemaking, and an interesting artifact in its own right for what audiences were starting to look for going into the 1960s.
- DirectorPaul WendkosStarsCliff RobertsonGia ScalaTeru ShimadaIn 1942 submarine commander Jeff Conway secretly photographs Japanese aircraft carriers in the Coral Sea but his submarine is damaged and he's forced to surrender.One of the highlights of the Once Upon a Time in Hollywood‘s marketing is a brief cutaway in the trailer to one of DiCaprio’s characters WWII-era war movies. Reminiscent of the climactic shootout in Tarantino’s own Inglourious Basterds (2009), DiCaprio lights up a room full of Nazis with a flamethrower while shouting if anybody “ordered fried sauerkraut.” It’s a hilarious little aside that nevertheless sets up the kind of schlock that the character has been struggling to work in over the past decade or more — movies cast much in the mold of Battle of the Coral Sea, an American-centered WWII movie about a group of POWs captured by the Japanese in the days leading up to its titular conflict.
- DirectorWilliam WitneyStarsAudie MurphyMichael DanteBen CooperWhen Quantrill's (Quantrell) gang is almost destroyed two of the captured members agree to join the Arizona Rangers to help finish the job.Tarantino’s never played shy about his love for Westerns. From the TV cowboy at the heart of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood to everything about Django Unchained, they have featured heavily in his films in one form or another over the years. This is perhaps most readily apparent in Arizona Raiders’ lead actor, Audie Murphey, who apparently served as the model for DiCaprio’s character in Hollywood. Struggling to find his place in an increasingly closed-off and unprofitable industry bucking hard against the shifting sands of time, Murphey eventually went on to be one of TVs most recognizable small-screen cowboys, prominently appearing in shows like Gunsmoke and Tumbleweed.
- DirectorDavid MillerStarsVince EdwardsJudy GeesonPeter VaughanAn American agent has tracked down the stronghold of an evil criminal mastermind, determined to take over the world.Another obvious influence for DiCaprio’s character in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Hammerhead is a British wartime thriller about a spy’s desperate attempts to stop a criminal mastermind from stealing vital NATO secrets and turn the tides of battle against them. The comparisons to the grindhouse-adjacent war pictures DiCaprio’s character is apparently known for in Hollywood are pretty obvious on their face, as is the career trajectory of the film’s leading man Vince Edwards, who worked in both television and features while trying to find his footing in a fluxing, mid-century industry.
- DirectorPhil KarlsonStarsDean MartinElke SommerSharon TateGold bullion worth USD 1 billion has been stolen from a hijacked train in Denmark. The main suspect is Count Massimo Contini. The US government sends Matt Helm, one of its top agents, to investigate and recover the gold.Unsurprising given the subject matter, one of the central characters in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is Margot Robbie’s Sharon Tate: wife of the… shall we say “complicated” … European auteur Roman Polanski and best known victim in the Manson Family murders. A struggling actress who never quite found her place in an industry that was far more interested in what her obvious sex appeal could bring to their movies’ box office grosses, her short-lived career lasted for only eight years. Generally considered one of her better films, The Wrecking Crew was the last of her movies released during her lifetime, and one that makes an appearance in Tarantino’s Hollywood.
- DirectorPaul MazurskyStarsNatalie WoodRobert CulpElliott GouldTrendy West Coasters Bob and Carol try wife-swapping with square Ted and Alice.The mid-to-late sixties were keenly interested in exploring the kinds of taboo subject matter that would have been unthinkable only a few years prior. But slumping ticket sales and pressures from outside of the industry made it possible for filmmakers to push back against the draconian censorship standards that defined studio-era Hollywood. And with films like The Graduate (1967) proving that these films could not just be profitable, but critically lauded as well, their successors marched boldly into more and more explicit territory. One of the best known and best regarded of these films has to be Paul Mazursky’s Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, which no doubt informed many of the sexually-charged themes and scenes surrounding Charles Manson’s sex -fueled cult at the center of this new film.
- DirectorGene SaksStarsWalter MatthauIngrid BergmanGoldie HawnA dentist pretends to be married to avoid commitment, but when he falls for his girlfriend and proposes, he must recruit his lovelorn nurse to pose as his wife.Sharing many similarities (and even crew) with the aforementioned Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Cactus Flower is another thoughtful exploration of sex in this uniquely transitory period of Hollywood history. Just as celebrated (although perhaps less well known) as Bob & co., the film’s playful sexual antics and complicated pairings will doubtless have something to say about what we’re bound to see in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
- DirectorDennis HopperStarsPeter FondaDennis HopperJack NicholsonTwo bikers head from L.A. to New Orleans through the open country and desert lands, and along the way they meet a man who bridges a counter-culture gap of which they had been unaware.If ever there was a movie that perfectly captured this exact moment in time on film, it was Easy Rider. Following the good-natured, drug-fueled road-trip across America of a couple of biker buddies, over the course of its lean, 95-minute runtime it documents the death of 1960s hippy optimism and the rise of 1970’s jaded cynicism. The film effectively lays out its thesis right there in the tagline on top of the poster: “A man went looking for America. And couldn’t find it anywhere…”
- DirectorJacques DemyStarsAnouk AiméeGary LockwoodAlexandra HayGeorge is unemployed, broke, about to be drafted to Vietnam, and suddenly madly in love with the divine Lola, a woman he has only briefly glimpsed. Now George searches for his potential amour through the City of Angels.One of the most constant influences on Tarantino’s output as a filmmaker are the films of the French New Wave, when critics-cum-creators went out in the world and learned on-the-job what it took to make great movies. One of the most accomplished of that company was Jacques Demy, whose shared-continuity and recurring characters between films make it, along with Universal’s monster movies, one of the earliest examples of a cinematic universe. Although best known for the lyrical love stories Lola (1961), The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964) and The Young Girls of Rochefort (1967), the commendable Model Shop marks his English-language debut, which cemented his status as a world-class filmmaker.
- DirectorRichard RushStarsElliott GouldCandice BergenRobert F. LyonsA Vietnam vet and former social radical is conflicted by his desire to become a teacher and his sympathy with anti-establishment student protests.It’s important to remember that the late sixties and early seventies were a tumultuous period for more than just the movies. America’s youth were bucking wildly against the system put in place by their parents, and it frequently bubbled over into the streets. From Civil Rights to Vietnam, the entire generation was convulsing at once against the injustices of the world, and nowhere is that more evident than in this film about a returning graduate student who finds himself increasingly drawn to the student protests happening right in front of him.