Once Upon A Time In Hollywood (2019) - Movie Review

The latest from neo-exploitation junkie Quentin Tarantino is quintessentially him. A period flick set during the golden age of Hollywood, everything from the visuals to the soundtrack to the tan lines scream the 60’s as loud as they can. It’s a flurry of contemporary footage, new footage seamlessly integrated into the contemporary footage (seriously, this has some of the best integration of newer footage over older footage I think I’ve ever seen; Forrest Gump, eat your heart out) and recreated locales and old-school staples that create the most vivid picture of what Tarantino has spent his entire career doing: Tipping his hat to the old guard of cinema that made him who he is as a filmmaker.

The Hateful Eight (2016) - Movie Review

No other singular person in the world of cinema has given more credence to the importance of the screenwriter than Quentin Tarantino. He’s basically an alternate reality version of Randal from Clerks who decided that, rather than bitching about how shit movies are nowadays, actually did something about it and began making his own. After starting off his career with a loud bang with the festival success of Reservoir Dogs, he continued to carve a name for himself with his unique approach to character writing and his homage-heavy fan-boy sensibilities as a story-teller. Unless we’re talking about the film-about-nothing Death Proof or the comedic abomination that is It’s Pat, you’d be hard-pressed to find a film in his filmography that is abjectly bad. So, naturally, when news hit about his latest release, weather reports also came in of a tidal wave of fan-boy drool that threatened to destroy the world. Then there was news of Tarantino taking the film on a roadshow screening tour of Australia, in crisp 70MM film stock. Would probably lose my buff card if I didn’t attend something like that, so bear in mind that everything that follows may differ from the traditional theatrical release as the version I watched was an extended cut. This is The Hateful Eight.