Everything we know about Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood so far

The ninth film on Quentin Tarantino’s “ten movies until I retire” list and every scrap of information gathered on it, including cast and backstory

For over twenty years Tarantino has worked hard at earning his position as one of the greatest directors of all time. Since shocking and serenading movie goers with “The Greatest Independent Film of All Time”, Reservoir Dogs, he’s pumped out one satirical stylized flick after another.

The director has never shied away from the controversial, the taboo or excessive bloodshed and he’s pretty much the king of being dramatically over the top. What might be simple blood splatter in a regular movie is worse than the bucket of pig’s blood from Carrie. We’ve had an assassin easily fight off an army of men with a samurai sword, Daryl Hannah with an eye patch, a school girl swinging a meteor hammer, Hitler burning to death in a movie theater, some of the greatest diner scenes ever written, a violent car chase involving a death proof vehicle, a plantation owner pretending to be French and poor Marvin’s head exploding in the backseat of Jules’s car; audiences have come to expect the extreme when walking into a Tarantino movie.

According to the man himself, his tenth film will be his last. He might continue writing scripts, but his directing days will be no more (please let him change his mind) and if counting both volumes of Kill Bill as one movie, then Once Upon in Time in Hollywood will be his ninth. His tenth will be the untitled Star Trek film he’s working on, but then there’s also rumors of a third Kill Bill in the works, and a Bonnie and Clyde script in development, so who knows what Tarantino wants to do.

The Bonnie and Clyde film might have been just a potential idea he was considering, because it was mentioned before his green-lit Manson movie and hasn’t been mentioned since.

Manson and family

Born to a 16-year-old alcoholic prostitute, Kathleen Maddox, and an unknown father his mother knew as “Colonel”, Charles Manson was born to a mother who didn’t want him and was named No Name Maddox. The name Charles came in weeks later, but his birth certificate still has No Name written on there. Living a traumatic and violent childhood and teen-hood, Manson quickly became anti-social and angry, going from place to place and started surrounding himself with people (mainly women) that he could easily manipulate.

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Living on the street, he met 23-year-old Mary Brunner “Mother Mary”, the first member of the Manson Family and the mother of Manson’s third son. Manson’s collection of women grew and soon the two were sharing Brunner’s home with 18 other women. That was when Manson proclaimed himself a love guru and claimed to be the reincarnation of Christ.

Murder of Sharon Tate

The reason behind the Manson murders was never a vital piece of information for most, one of the few cases where people didn’t care to hear an explanation because of its grotesque nature. Therefore, Manson’s reasons for the murders have always been lightly debated and easily labeled a mindless evil. Contrary to popular belief Manson didn’t go on his killing spree just for violence’s sake, but claimed it was to start Armageddon. Manson predicated in his anti-establishment gospel that a black uprising was brewing in America and would give his followers the perfect opportunity to strike the nation. Once the war was over, the Family could take over America.

Manson named this insurrection Helter Skelter because he believed details of it were revealed in the song of the same name on the Beatles’ White Album. However, there is a different theory that Manson didn’t want to be king of the world, but just wanted a record deal.

The cult leader spent his whole life dreaming of becoming a singer-songwriter, but never managed to break big. He actually did sell some of his songs to some big-name bands such as The Beach Boys, but his work went uncredited (even though he knowingly sold his rights to them). His album, “Lie: The Love and Terror Cult” had 14 originals songs, some of which were covered by bands including Guns N’ Roses and the Lemonheads. Maybe if he waited a few years, he might have made steady money writing songs, but he wanted fame.

He tried to set up a record contract with producer Terry Melcher, but the deal fell through and an angry Manson arrived at Melcher’s house to confront him. Turns out, Melcher had moved months earlier and the house was the home of director Roman Polanski and his wife, actress Sharon Tate. Polanski wasn’t home, but Tate was there with three friends, Wojtek Frykowski, Abigail Folger and Jay Sebring, all who died that night. Manson left the house but told his followers to kill the group and they did. With Tate’s blood they wrote the word “Pig” on the front door.

The dam broke and Manson was in a frenzy. He then randomly targeted Leno and Rosemary LaBianca, owners of a chain of grocery stores. The Family murdered the couple with Manson’s command and carved “War” in Leno LaBianca’s abdomen. They also wrote “Rise” and “Death to pigs” on the walls and “Healter Skelter” on the refrigerator door.

Manson’s rage had been building up for thirty-five years until it finally boiled over into a murder spree. Powerless as a child, he acted as if he was a God that wanted to rule the world but really was just an angry man that thought the world had tossed him aside.

Tarantino’s ninth film

Complete with an incredibly talented cast, a rather large cast, Tarantino’s new film was a big deal moments after he announced its existence. It had spent half a decade in development, with Tarantino making sure it matched the image of the now extinct L.A. that he wanted audiences to see. Like The Hateful Eight, it will be shot on 65mm film, and was promised by Tarantino to be similar in some ways to Pulp Fiction.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt in lead roles and is set in the height of hippy Hollywood. “Sony and myself will be coming to the theaters with the most exciting star dynamic since Paul Newman and Robert Redford,” Tarantino said of DiCaprio and Pitt. DiCaprio plays Rick Dalton, a fictional actor that’s washed up after staring in a popular Western TV series Bounty Law (a series that’s as real as Big Kahuna Burger) and Pitt plays Dalton’s longtime stunt double Cliff Booth.

Both characters are fictional, and one has to wonder how they’ll work in an extremely high-profile true-life crime story, but according to the plot, Dalton is Sharon Tate’s neighbor.

Not a film that’ll revolve around Manson, the gruesome murders is being used as a backdrop to the story of Dalton and Booth as they struggle to stay afloat in a Hollywood “they don’t recognize anymore.” The film’s act of showing a former Western TV star overrun by the Manson Family is a type of allegory for the literal takeover of old Hollywood by mainstream America’s fears of the 60s youth movements.

Margot Robbie is playing Tate, and the one picture she shared of herself in character proves that she’s the perfect actress to bring Tate to life.

The role of Charles Manson will be played by Damon Herriman, known for his recurring role on Justified and for appearing in an episode of Breaking Bad. In a twist of irony, Herriman has also been casted to play Manson on the second season of the Netflix series Mindhunter. He either plays a really good Manson or got struck by lightning twice.

Other cast members include Burt Reynolds, Damian Lewis as Steve McQueen, Luke Perry as Wayne Maunder, Mike Moh as Bruce Lee, Rafal Zawierucha as Roman Polanski, Emile Hirsch as Jay Sebring, Kurt Russell, James Marsden, Tim Roth and many others. Members of the Manson family will be played by Dakota Fanning, Lena Dunham, Austin Butler and possibly Maya Hawke (I’m assuming she’ll be a Manson girl because her character’s name is Flower Child). None of the members responsible for Tate’s and her friends’s murders seem to have been casted yet. Al Pacino reportedly joined the cast in an unspecified role.

Originally scheduled to be released on August 9, 2019, on the 50th anniversary of the murders, Sony moved the date up to July 26, 2019. Mark your calendars, it’ll be here sooner than you think, just eleven months away.