The Media Tourist

Worlds Collide in Quentin Tarantino’s Wild Ride Thru the Summer of ’69

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio & Brad Pitt
Directed by Quentin Tarantino
R

An aging movie actor and his faithful stuntman find themselves on a collision course with fate in Quentin Tarantino’s sprawling, deliciously detailed ode to Hollywood’s faded glories.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, the director’s 10th film, is set in the sweltering summer of 1969—a major moment in time in which the world was churning and turning, if not burning, in several ways. The Beatles were breaking up in England, men were walking on the moon, the war in Vietnam was raging, Woodstock was grooving in upstate New York.

In Hollywood, there’s Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio), whose box-office star once shone bright in action-packed movies, and as the lead of his own Western TV series. But now Rick is relegated to guest roles, often as a villain, on other people’s prime-time hits—like The F.B.I, Mannix and The Green Hornet—and he soaks his faltering acting career in booze.

DiCaprio’s Rick Dalton guest-stars as a “heavy” on the 1960s hit TV show “The F.B.I.”

Since Rick lost his license to the bottle, he’s driven around by his longtime stuntman, Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt).

Cliff lives in a dingy trailer behind the Van Nuys Drive-In, with his rust-colored pit bull, Brandy. On Rick’s cul-de-sac at the end of Cielo Drive, in Benedict Canyon, just north of Beverly Hills, he’s jazzed to discover that his new next-door neighbors are Polish director Roman Polanski and his wife, aspiring actress Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie).

On one of their jaunts around town, Rick and Cliff see a bunch of young hippie chicks, dumpster diving in shorty-short cut-off jeans and halter tops. Rick is disgusted, but Cliff is intrigued. Later, he’ll give one of them a ride. Turns out she lives in a commune with a guy named Charlie—as in Charlie Manson.

You probably already know, or can guess, where all this is headed—to a fateful intersection with the horrific events of Aug. 8, 1969, when Manson’s followers went on a killing spree and slaughtered Sharon Tate and four others in her home. But Tarantino’s never felt strictly beholden to facts. Remember, this is the director who blew up Hitler in Inglourious Basterds. Don’t hold him to historical record.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, with a title that begins like a fairy tale, a fable or a children’s bedtime story, is an ode to a golden, gilded age of Hollywood that Tarantino clearly cherishes—a time and a place that shaped his sensibilities as a filmmaker and a savant of pop culture. Meticulously crafted, masterfully curated and obsessively detailed, it’s like a cinematic sandbox of Tarantino touchstones. Hamlet coexists on the same pop-cultural plane with I Love Lucy, and the soundtrack blares tunes from Deep Purple, Paul Revere & The Raiders, Simon & Garfunkel, Neil Diamond, cheesy commercials and snippets of the era’s movie tunes. There are Nazis, cowboys, jocks, jive talk, G.I.s, and a bloody reckoning.

Margo Robbie

And what a cast. DiCaprio—making his first film in four years, since The Revenant—and Pitt are both Tarantino veterans. They’re both great here once again, leathery leading men who have no trouble at all hitting a confident stride through the movie’s inventive interplay of reality, fiction, fantasy, revisionist history and buddy comedy. Al Pacino plays a Hollywood producer who tries to convince Rick that his future lies in making spaghetti Westerns in Italy. There’s Damian Lewis as actor Steve McQueen at a party at the Playboy Mansion; Bruce Dern appears in a scene as George Spahn, the elderly man who allowed Manson and his followers to use his ranch.

Watch closely and you’ll also see Dakota Fanning, Emile Hirsch, Clifton Collins Jr., Scoot McNairy, Lena Dunham and Rumer Willis.

But the centerpiece, and the heart, of the whole thing is Robbie, the Australian actress who previously appeared with DiCaprio The Wolf of Wall Street (2013). As Sharon Tate, she has barely a dozen lines in the whole film, but she’s one of the first characters to appear, she’s threaded into it throughout, and she’s vitally important to its overall theme. She floats and glides, all sunshine and smiles, the embodiment of the innocence and beauty and paradise “lost” as the peace and love of the 1960s busted up and came crashing down in a tumultuous end.

Not all stories that begin “Once upon a time…” end happily after ever, as we know. Sometimes they end…well, like Quentin Tarantino wishes they had, especially when he’s in charge of the storytelling.

In theaters July 26, 2019

New ninja-themed Lego movie follows formula for faithful fans

The Lego Ninjago Movie
Starring the voices of Dave Franco, Fred Armisen, Abbi Jacobs, Kumail Nanjiani, Michael Peña, Zach Woods and Jackie Chan
Directed by Charlie Bean with Paul Fisher and Bob Logan
PG

In the opening live-action scene of this otherwise computer-animated movie, an adult shopkeeper asks a young boy—who’s wandered into his curio emporium—why he’s not playing outside with his friends.

It’s an odd question in a sequence serving to set up this third movie in the mega-franchise built on a toy brand that was always made for playing indoors—little interlocking plastic bricks and blocks, first introduced in 1949, that gradually took over the world, spilling out of the playroom and into pop culture, spawning a universe of toys, characters, models, games, books, magazines, TV shows and movies.

Maybe “playing outside” is a plug for one of the six Lego-themed amusement parks in Europe, North America, Asia and the Middle East.

A commercial plug in a Lego movie? A crazy thought, I know…

Anyway, The Lego Ninjago Movie is based on characters and storylines from a Cartoon Network TV series that’s been cranking since 2011. Maybe you already knew teenage Lego ninjas were a thing. Maybe you already knew they were fighting an evil warlord bent on destroying their island city. Maybe you already purchased Lego’s Ninjago City playset, a behemoth with nearly 5,000 pieces and 20 minifigures, that retails for a whopping $299.99.

Maybe you’re a parent who’s stepped, barefoot, maybe more than once, on some of your kids’ Lego blocks that didn’t get put away.

Garmadon

Lego Ninjago features the voices of Dave Franco, Fred Armisen, Abbi Jacobs, Kumail Nanjiani, Michael Peña and Zach Woods as the teenage ninjas, and Justin Theroux as the evil warlord, Garmadon. New director Charlie Bean, who comes aboard from the Disney XD TV series Tron: Uprising, assisted by animator-directors Paul Fisher and Bob Logan, follows the Lego movie formula—established in The Lego Movie (2014) and The Lego Batman Movie (2017)—of quick, campy quips, whimsical pop-culture riffs and vibrant, colorful action.

The computer animation continues to be amazing, with intricately detailed wizardry that turns pixels into digital Lego blocks, characters, attire, accessories, buildings and other objects. Surface textures look like they have real gloss, nicks and scuffs. Lego faces indicate joy, exasperation, sadness, surprise and shock with minimalist movements of digitized eyes and mouths that flicker on the surfaces of little Lego heads. Ninjago is an entire teeming, sprawling city that resembles a plasticized Hong Kong. The ninjas operate “mechs,” intricate mechanical robots, and Garmadon’s contraptions rise from the sea or fill the skies.

The lead teen ninja, Lloyd (Franco), grapples with some weighty daddy issues: His father is the very evil warlord he and his buddies bust out of school to fend off every week. Lloyd’s dad abandoned him as an infant and never taught him how to do the things dads typically teach sons how to do, like throw a ball—even though Garmadon has two sets of arms.

Master Wu

Lloyd’s now-single mom (Olivia Munn) remembers the charismatic chieftain who once won her heart on the battlefield leading his skeleton army. Martial-arts icon Jackie Chan, appropriately enough, provides the voice of Master Wu, who schools the youngsters in the arts of becoming real ninjas who rely on their own inner powers instead of weaponized mechs.

There’s also a “monstrous” cat, an Ultimate Weapon and hilarious Lego cameos from Michael Strahan and Robin Roberts, who cohost a morning TV show called Good Morning Ninjago, giving chipper a.m. updates about Garmadon’s latest rampages.

“As you can see,” reports Strahan, “our city is in the midst of total annihilation.”

The movie’s high sense of hip, flip whimsy extends to its music. Mark Mothersbaugh, the co-founder and lead singer of the seminal ’80s new wave band Devo, adds to his voluminous soundtrack resume with a slate of original pieces scored to various scenes. Flautist Greg Patillo provides the real musicianship when Master Wu rocks familiar tune-age (including “Welcome to the Jungle” and “It’s a Hard Knock Life”) on his plastic flute.

“Dope fluting, Master Wu,” one of the ninjas compliments him.

A snippet from “The Power,” a hooky 1990 dance song from the German pop group Snap!, gets used a couple of times, and it’s a deliberate, Easter-egg-y Lego nod to The Perfect Weapon, a 1991 cult-classic chopsocky action flick—which used the song extensively—about a young fighter who learns how to refashion his body into a natural weapon with Kenpo Karate.

After two previous movies, the whole Lego shtick doesn’t feel quite as fresh, feisty and lively as it did three years ago. But it still shows just how versatile the whole Lego world can be, and how Lego world-builders can take Legos and make pretty much dang near anything—Batman, Robin, Superman, Wonder Woman, the Joker, Catwoman, King Kong, Han Solo, Gandalf, and now ninjas. And Lego fans show no signs of giving up the blocks.

“I haven’t felt this good in a long time!” Lloyd effuses at one point.

Many Lego lovers will likely feel the same way, out the theater door and all the way to the Lego store.

In theaters Sept. 22, 2017

The Mummy Breathes New Life Into Ancient Tale

The Mummy
Starring Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe & Annabelle Wallis
Directed by Alex Kurtzman
PG-13

She’s dark, sexy, mysterious and dangerous—and 5,000 years old.

She’s the freshly resurrected cadaver, the mummy, in Universal Studio’s big-budget, big-star reboot of one its classic horror franchise flicks.

Algerian actress Sofia Boutella (from Kingsmen: Secret Service and Star Trek Beyond) steps into the spotlight as Ahmanet, the former Egyptian princess awakened from her crypt with a serious chip on her mummified shoulder.

Tom Cruise

Superstar Tom Cruise gets most of the movie’s screen time, however, as Nick Morton, a U.S. Army specialist on duty in Iraq whose sideline of treasure hunting leads to the discovery of Ahmanet’s tomb and the release of her malevolent powers.

Annabelle Wallis (from TV’s Peaky Blinders and the movies Annabelle and King Arthur) has a major costarring role as archeologist Jenny Halsey, who cautions Nick that he’s stumbled across “antiquity’s darkest secret.” Russell (Gladiator) Crowe has a hammy ball as London’s Dr. Henry Jekyll (yes, that Dr. Jekyll), constantly trying to rein in his explosively nasty id, Mr. Hyde.

Russell Crowe

Emmy-winning Courtney B. Vance, who played attorney Johnnie Cochran on TV’s American Crime Story, appears briefly as Nick’s no-nonsense superior, a U.S. Army colonel.

The Mummy puts a new, energetic, action-packed spin on the age-old saga as Nick and Jenny spend most of the film fleeing from—or fighting with—Ahamanet and her resurrected mummy minions. (Think Mission: Impossible—Mummy Nation.) Nick soon figures out he’s been cursed, “chosen” by the princess to become her immortal partner. But he’s not at all interested, especially as it involves some unpleasant business with a big curved dagger and letting his human body become the vessel for the Egyptian god of death.

Following typical modern-blockbuster ratios and proportions, quips, comedic zingers and romantic conflict balance out the scares.

Alex Kurtzman, a former producer and writer whose only previous directorial feature was the 2012 Disney/Dreamworks comedy-drama People Like Us, steps up impressively into the big leagues. Boutella’s slinky, slithering mummy, wrapped in tattered strips of gauzy linen, her skin covered with tattoos of Egyptian hieroglyphs, is a bewitching villainess of terrifying, exotic beauty. But beware her kiss—it’ll literally suck the life right out of you.

There’s a spectacular escape from a military transport plane in a death-spiral nosedive, a sandstorm that sweeps through downtown London, and attacks by swarms of spiders and rats that will give almost anyone giddy goosebumps. An underwater chase by a horde of swimming mummies shows just how far everything has come from the lumbering, shuffling brutes in their earliest Hollywood incarnations at the dawn of the 1900s.

Speaking of which, hasn’t anyone in this movie ever seen a mummy movie before? Don’t they realize you can’t raid a creepy Egyptian tomb without likely running afoul of something awful? Why doesn’t anyone ever say, “Wow! It’s just like in the movies!”?

The mummy is one of our most enduring pop-cultural artifacts, featured on the big screen in more than 30 different titles for over a century, since the days of silent films. Horror fans hold Boris Karloff in high esteem for starring in the classic version in 1932, a year after he played “the monster” in Frankenstein. Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr., Christopher Lee and dozens of other lesser actors have gone under wraps for the role. Though they weren’t mummies, Brendon Frasier and Rachel Weisz starred in a 1999 remake and its 2001 sequel.

But this Mummy is the biggest blowout yet, a $125 million spectacle of marquee stars, eye-popping special effects and flashy setup for Universal’s Dark Universe, a franchise-wide relaunch of its movie-monster properties of yore, including The Invisible Man, Frankenstein and The Bride of Frankenstein.

As Crowe’s Dr. Jekyll says, “Welcome to a new world of gods and monsters.”

Indeed—and as The Mummy ends, it’s obvious something bigger is just beginning to get unwrapped.

In theaters June 9, 2017