Goddamn, Tarantino is good with music. There’s an art to using pop music in film. Your movie can become tacky quick if the song is too well known or too on-the-nose. If done right, it can give the film a kind of life not really possible with orchestral soundtracks. Tarantino never fails to find the right balance. He’s got a great ear for the right deep cuts forgotten hits and other songs time forgot, and knows how to use them to give his films an otherworldly sheen. I always walk away from a Tarantino movie obsessed with a bunch of music I’d never heard before.
ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD isn’t out until July, but I’m already obsessed with the Neil Diamond song closing out the above trailer. It’s this faux-gospel song from 1969 called “Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show.” Maybe you’ve heard it before. I only know Neil Diamond enough to know the cool kids don’t listen to much of his stuff. It’s considered one of his hits, but it’s new to me. My Spotify recommendations are going to be fucked for a while.
What I love about “Brother Love’s Traveling Salvation Show” is how it highlights the absurdity of an evangelical preacher promising salvation with a celebration of the joy his congregation feels when they think they’re being saved. Diamond appreciates the happiness brought by that kind of preaching, even if he understands a lot of it’s just pageantry or theater.
It’s a perfect fit for Tarantino’s Manson-soaked ode to the swinging sixties. Thus far, what we’ve seen of ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD is a celebration of the camp, the bullshit machismo, and this era’s whole vibe as depicted by our nostalgia. Rick Dalton’s existential crisis, as he finds himself a has-been living next door to Sharon Tate’s rising star while his own career cools off, will be what drives our heroes into Manson’s orbit.
Our only hint of the film’s menacing underbelly comes when Brother Love’s gospel beat kicks in: a hippie’s promise to Cliff Booth of how much Charlie will dig him, Manson smiling and nodding like he’s the wacky neighbor on a sitcom, and a final shot of several shadowy figures brandishing knives as they walk with purpose down a street at night. The soundtrack falters as menacing violins threaten to take over, but Cliff is right there to remind his friend he’s Rick fucking Dalton. The implication is there’s nothing he can’t handle, but we know enough from Brother Love to be skeptical of the salvation Tarantino is promising.
July 26th can’t get here soon enough…
A HORSE WITH A PENIS METAPHOR ON ITS HEAD 