Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Licorice Pizza, and LA Confidential

I was watching Once Upon a Time in Hollywood the other night (OUATIH for short), and an immediate connection to "Licorice Pizza"(LP) hit me:

Just as Gary in LP doesn't have a license to drive a car and must rely on Alana Kane to drive him around; Rick Dalton(Leo DiCaprio) in OUATIH doesn't have a license to drive a car and must rely on his stunt double/gofer Cliff Booth(Brad Pitt) to drive HIM around.

Gary doesn't have his license (at the beginning of LP) because he is 15; Leo doesn't have his license because of one too many drunk driving accidents (when Leo tells Al Pacino its because his car is in the shop, narrator Kurt Russell comes on to say "That's a fuckin' lie" and we SEE Leo's car wrecked on Hollywood Boulevard -- right in front of the multi-colored neon sign for "The Frolic Room" bar.

(Delicious sidebar: "The Frolic Room is where Kevin Spacey's 1953 cop Jack Vincennes makes a fateful decision in the 1997 film LA Confidential, so here we have a crossover among three of my favorite movies -- from LA Confidential to OAITH to Licorice Pizza.)

Los Angeles is a town (then and now, but especially then) where you really have to drive to get anywhere...so both Gary in LP and Rick in OAITH are very dependent on their drivers. And bonding takes place in those cars BETWEEN driver and rider. Rick and Cliff have heart to hearts about their respective careers and lives. Gary gets important access to "an older woman" while that woman safely maintains a relationship with the younger man.

A crucial moment comes in Licorice Pizza when Gary and Alana are having one of those odd, incoherent and not-quite-mature fights about their relationship. Alana doesn't want Gary to pursue his latest business scheme(pinball machines) and tells him she won't drive him to see the machines at an appointment. There follows this discussion:

Alana: Well, I won't drive you over there.
Gary: Fine. I got my license. I can drive myself
(Lingering shot on Alana -- taken aback, a little shocked -- she realizes that she has lost her key power over Gary, and you can tell it hurts her in several ways. She reacts HER way:')
Alana: (Angry) BIG MAN!

Soon, Gary walks out of the house and Alana -- her anger totally broken down to weepy-voiced fear -- yells "OK, I'll drive you to see those stupid pinball machines," and Gary just drives away from her.

He has the power of the car now.

---

Some critics tied OAITH to LP and there were easy reasons why. Both are set in Los Angeles around the same time -- Manson Murder 1969 for OAITH, Nixon Oil Embargo/gas line 1973 for LP. Four years is actually a long time "in real life" time, but the characters of both films share a world of sunshine, cars, hillside homes for the stars and "valley houses" for the workers, the proximity of Hollywood as a work place and --- the constant narrative of radio DJs and the songs of the time...in cars. OAITH specifies one channel -- "93 KHJ" and its DJ's and commercials(Tarantino had a stash of audio tapes from the time); LP uses the radio more sparingly(like when Gary watches Alana with new boyfriend Lance from his car...next to his mother, his driver.)

As nostalgia pieces by great directors, Licorice Pizza and OATIH can't be beat and actually DO make a pretty good double bill. If you watch OUATIH first, you get the chronology.

A little bit more on LA Confidential. That movie is set in 1953, a full two decades ahead of Licorice Pizza, a bit less ahead of the Tarantino film. And yet LA Confidential makes some of the same points about Los Angeles in ALL of those eras: the sunshine, the Holllywood adjacency to workers with everyday lives. (LA Confidential differentiates among movies, TV shows and the prostitution business that feeds on both.)

And this: in a key scene in Licorice Pizza, when Gary first encounters a small store selling waterbeds -- on the side -- the soundtrack is the old 40's hit "You've Got to Accentuate the Positive,and E-liminate the Negative"

Which is the opening credit song to LA Confidential. I don't think that's a coincidence.

LA Confidential. Set in 1953, released in 1997. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Set in 1969, released in 2019. Licorice Pizza, set in 1973, released in 2021.

Three great Los Angeles movies.