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what's up guys michael here with our
latest book vs film
today we're talking quentin tarantino's
once upon a time in hollywood
which in the director's classic
non-linear fashion made it to a theater
near you
long before the book reached your
nightstand drawing from a long history
of movie novelizations published as
promotional tie-ins once upon a time in
hollywood gave us a chance to revisit
our favorite 60s bromance
but is this book just a simple
transcription of the oscar-nominated
screenplay
or did tarantino have more ambitious
plans
let's find out in this book versus film
on once upon a time in hollywood
and of course spoilers are ahead for
both the book and the film
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show
as always let's start by taking a glance
at the similarities
both versions of once upon a time in
hollywood are mostly
quiet ruminative nostalgia pieces with
some major meta vibes
the tv shows and movies within the movie
conceit
translates pretty well to the novel
tarantino basically treats the lancer tv
show sequences as a book
within the book he tells the story of
the lancer clan as it might have been
told in the western dime novels of
yesteryear
beyond that the book basically has the
same story characters and feel as the
movie
there are some occasional shifts in
perspective and the book glosses over
some of the movie's key plot details but
the characters
journeys are relatively unchanged from
what we saw on screen
tarantino even references some of the
same songs from the movie's soundtrack
but if the tooth decks were carbon
copies this video would be super boring
so let's dive into the differences
difference number one
cliff's a real jerk in the book in the
movie brad pitt's stuntman character
cliff
booth seems equal parts zen and zoro
he is war hero with a stillwater's
demeanor
who we know can handle himself in a
fight before we ever
see him in action he has a devil may
care attitude and is more than happy to
spend his days taking
punches for his best bud rick dalton is
that
how you describe your job cliff well
carrying his load
yeah it's about right but despite his
cool head he's hounded by rumors that he
murdered his
wife and seems humbled by his near brush
with the prison system
chris tried to get me all my life ain't
got me yet today it does
it won't be because of you guilty or not
cliff seems to see the death of his wife
as a turning point a second and perhaps
undeserved chance at life
he seems like someone who doesn't take
his freedom for granted and has a
sincere appreciation for life's little
blessings
or even just the day-to-day errands of a
hollywood gopher
while bookcliff is mostly recognizable
he doesn't seem chastened to the same
degree as his on-screen counterpart
it's revealed pretty early on that cliff
did intentionally kill his wife billy
though his internal monologue spouts a
laundry list of qualifying
factors and semi-excuses what's more
this isn't the only straight-up murder
he's gotten
away with one scene lays out how cliff
despite offering a
very flimsy explanation to the cops got
away with killing a couple of seedy
italian mafiosos giving him the
shakedown
the book reads if a world war ii hero
wanted to shoot him dead in a pizza
parlor
the police would pay for the pizza cliff
even takes some time to taunt the
unarmed men with war stories about how
many italians he killed to earn his
medal of valor
before putting a bullet into each of
their heads
for the day i got that pointing at the
medal of valor
i killed at least seven maybe as many as
nine but at least seven
cliff continued and that was just one
[ __ ] day
when i was in sicily i killed italians
every day
while he's far less cavalier about
murdering his wife
the book repeatedly emphasizes the ease
and
maybe even pleasure with which cliff is
capable of committing murder
this all kind of undercuts the depth
that brad pitt brought to his first
oscar-winning
role overall cliff really doesn't seem
especially complicated in the book
frankly he often just seems like a
lunatic
in the movie despite his violent past
and killer instincts when backed into a
corner
cliff spends most of his time just being
like the most solid hang in hollywood
he's happiest when kicking it with rick
dalton and helping hitchhike and hippie
chicks named pussycat
while refusing their underage sexual
advances
while turning down pussycat may just be
an act of self-preservation
it still lends an era of asceticism that
all contributes to his monk-like
mystique
in the book though cliff has no
compunction about using his movie star
looks and easy charm
to get laid in fact tarantino makes a
pretty big
point of how absurdly prolific cliff's
sex life actually is
in one particularly cringe inducing
passage a french pimp
explains the extremely not suitable for
work intricacies of sex work to cliff
who is considering a post-war career as
a mac
and upon returning to europe decades
later to double for rick and spaghetti
westerns
tarantino assures the reader that cliff
got busy betting
a bevy of italian beauties in the second
draft of his revisionist history
tarantino also addresses the controversy
surrounding cliff's now
infamous victory over bruce lee in a
fistfight he qualifies both men's
fighting abilities and attempts to build
an argument for
cliff's endurance in the ring with cato
writing
while cliff wasn't anywhere near as
skilled as the opponents he fought in
any of his martial arts tournaments
he was something they weren't he was a
killer he could see cliff
wasn't fighting bruce lee cliff was
fighting his instinct to
kill bruce lee while this passage might
defuse some folk's objections to that
scene
though it only further angered the lee
family it definitely does serve to
reinforce the book's notion of cliff
as a killer first which is quite
literally
the last thing the movie depicts him as
not only does the book foreground
cliff's ruthlessness
it actively diminishes two of his most
humanizing characteristics
his friendship with rick and his love
for his dog brandy
tarantino cuts the quiet scenes of the
men bonding over late night drinks and
fbi guest spots and more alarmingly
tells us that cliff
has made brandy compete in dogfights all
over california
now it goes without saying that a big
part of cliff's on-screen allure
aside from brad pitt's handsome mug is
the sense of
mystery surrounding the character he's
also funny
loyal charming and a really good friend
when his backstory gets filled out in
the book
it feels like a betrayal of the cliff
that we loved
on screen screencliff seems like a
dangerous but mostly decent person
whose relationships with brandy and rick
serve as constant reminders
that he isn't defined by his violent
past
but bookcliff often just seems like a
horny
homicidal maniac i don't know about you
but i like my cliff booth to be a dog
lover
not a dog fighter and if my perfect
friend
just absolutely has to kill all i ask
is that he saves his wrath for the
murderous racist hippie cult kicking in
the door of my house in the hills
and that brings us to difference number
two the manson family is
even creepier in the book in the film
the manson family's real life history of
crime isn't made apparent
until the end for the most part
tarantino just trades on the audience's
awareness of charles manson
to wring tension out of what might
otherwise seem like
totally innocuous scenes a dude given
some hippie chick a ride out to the
desert
isn't inherently nerve-wracking the same
can be said of their beloved leaders
showing up to a house in the hills
looking to track down an old friend if
you're somehow not already familiar with
charles manson
those scenes would probably play a whole
lot differently on a first
watch in contrast the book makes
explicit pretty early on
that this family is super duper sinister
in chapter 5 titled pussycat's creepy
crawl
tarantino details one of the manson
mandated home invasions
that were designed to test the nerves
and commitment of his acolytes
pussycat creeps through an open back
door strips naked
and well crawls around the house
compelled at every moment by
thoughts of charles manson this
establishes the manson family as a
threat and demonstrates their leader's
spend golly-like hold on
before describing creepy crawling at her
grand jury testimony
susan adkins one of the manson family
murderers seen here eating her full of
dog food
described the manner in which she felt
programmed by
charlie she said the words that would
come from his mouth would not come from
inside him
they would come from what i call the
infinite
tarantino illustrates that programming
by having manson hijack pussycats in her
monologue
to guide her through the process of
sneaking upstairs
and jumping into bed between the
sleeping homeowners
despite the rude awakening these folks
are otherwise
unharmed in reality the creepy crawls
were subtle but still
threatening manson's followers would
move household items around to plant
seeds of paranoia in homeowners minds
and if you ask
vincent vogliosi the prosecuting
attorney in the trial of charles manson
and author of helter skelter these
creepy crawling expeditions
were dress rehearsals for murder in this
way the book paints a clear picture of
the threat these hippies posed in real
life
on the other hand some folks criticized
the film arguing that the manson family
is never depicted doing anything
bad enough to justify the excessive
violence they endure
but there is one very subtle factor that
this criticism overlooks which is
[ __ ] the manson family even if your
heart goes out to the hapless would-be
killers in the movie
the book makes it clear that they
weren't just in the wrong
place at the wrong time up until the
film's final sequence
they're mostly presented as a harmless
nuisance but the book shows the manson
family doing the devil's business
long before they ever make it to cielo
drive
speaking of finales let's get into
difference number three
the book ends with a new beginning now
the film
famously concludes in a total bloodbath
with cliff and brandy doing most of the
heavy lifting
even italian starlet francesca kabuche
gets in a few licks before rick goes all
14 fists of mccluskie on susan atkins
and the film's final shot shows tate
inviting rick into her home
which bodes well for his career but
overall
leaves a lot to the imagination in
contrast the book addresses this
climactic encounter
with just a couple paragraphs pretty
early on and
pretty casually on page 110 tarantino
writes
that rick and cliff made short order of
the house breakers
killing all three in a brutal fight he
adds that cliff
bashed in the faces of the guy and one
of the girls and rick
set the assailant on fire with the
practice flamethrower left over from
mccluskey and that's
more or less all the book says about the
gory details of the film's climax
while the book does describe the
publicity bump and career revitalization
rick dalton received from the home
invasion gone wrong
it's not terribly concerned with what
went down that night
in fact the book ends somewhere near the
film's midpoint
with rick wrapping his first day on the
lancer set and hitting up a bar
where he's greeted by adoring fans one
of whom
is young quentin tarantino's stepfather
but that's not the only time tarantino
is mentioned in this bizarro hollywood
history
he also gets a shout out for directing
an oscar-nominated performance
by the film's child actress character
trudy frazier
tarantino's fondness for frasier is
clear in the film but even more
apparent in the book several of trudy's
scenes that were shot but ultimately cut
from the movie
make their way back into the story here
including a phone call between her and
rick that ends the novelization trudy
and rick run their lines together over
the phone
dialing into their characters and making
each other laugh and cheer as they
perform the lancer finale
rick seems grateful for the wild bronco
ride that's been his life
and the book makes sure to let us know
that he and trudy knocked them
dead on set the next day the phone call
they share recalls a moment earlier in
the book
when trudy teaches rick about method
acting she tells him
the script is the script and we're doing
the script but at the actors studio they
ask the question
what if the script didn't say that then
what would your character do
then what choice would your character
make it's simply about
understanding who your character is when
they're not
dictated by the text trudy's words
essentially function as tarantino's
thesis statement
hinted at in the movie but made far more
explicit here in the book
she embodies the future of the industry
and is the ultimate counterpoint to rick
dalton's red apple smoke and rodeo
writer
in addition to her nascent feminist
sensibilities trudy represents a new
generation of screen actors in both
age and mentality the john waynes and
rick daltons of the world
are yesterday's men tomorrow's silver
screen belongs to the
sensitive soul-searching students of
famous method acting coaches like
lee strasberg stella adler and sanford
meisner
of course absent sharon tate's murder
the future as we know it
is no longer certain and through his
revisionist history tarantino is
challenging us to consider a future that
as trudy says
is no longer dictated by the text
to that end the book gives rick an
unqualified win for his career that the
movie only hints at
it shows him embracing method acting and
lets him revel in the joys and luxuries
of playing cowboy for a little bit
longer
while reducing the violent horrors of
the film's ending to little more than a
footnote in his life story
youtubers just sounds like a good novel
in this way while the movie and book
both celebrate a hollywood that
was and imagine a world in which the 60s
hadn't ended so violently
the book takes that optimism a step
further the movie wraps up by saving
sharon tate
in contrast the book makes a slightly
bigger claim
suggesting that saving her and the other
manson victims
might also have saved a part of the film
industry itself
giving the stoic matinee idols of the
studio era a few more years in the
western sun
before pivoting towards the more cynical
auteur-driven films that revolutionized
the industry in the 70s
the book ends with rick dalton primed to
step back into the limelight
his on-screen partnership with a
different young actress inspiring him to
embrace the next stage of his career
in a movie business no longer haunted by
the gruesome specter of the tate
labianca murders
despite their many differences both
versions of this hollywood fairy tale
end with a happily ever after but only
the book gives us an indication of
all that ever after might entail so
what do you think folks are you ready to
rush out and pick up this paperback or
should tarantino have stuck to the
script let us know in the comments
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[Music]