The Adventures Of Cliff Booth Brings Tarantino’s Story To The '70s
Move over, HBO, there’s a new Pitt in town.
Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon A Time In Hollywood struck the perfect chord at the perfect time. The 2019 period film capitalized on Old Hollywood nostalgia with a tale of the swingin’ ‘60s and the Manson family just before Hollywood itself shut down and changed forever. Of course, that wasn’t the only draw. There was also Leonardo DiCaprio pointing at the screen and wielding a flamethrower, a who’s who of future It Girls from Sydney Sweeney to Margaret Qualley, and Julia Butters delivering an Oscar-worthy bit part at 10 years old.
But among the audience, one of the biggest highlights of the movie was Cliff Booth, the nonchalant stuntman played by Brad Pitt. Now, he’s getting his own sequel movie, The Adventures of Cliff Booth, and even though Quentin Tarantino won’t be directing, it’s still a star-packed 1970s saga. Check out the (somewhat redacted) teaser below.
This new film stars Brad Pitt alongside Elizabeth Debicki, Scott Caan, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Holt McCallany, and Carla Gugino. Aside from Pitt, the only other returning cast member from Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is Timothy Olyphant, who will reprise his role as real-life star of Lancer James Stacy.
“So, you helped Rick subdue those hippie intruders, huh?” Debicki’s character asks him at the beginning of the teaser. “Something like that,” Cliff responds. That’s one of the few pieces of dialogue in the trailer, so it’s hard to ascertain anything about the plot of the movie.
However, one thing is very evident: the look. This sequel is written by Tarantino but directed by Zodiac’s David Fincher, who has always favored a more neo-noir tone. From the very first shot, Fincher makes the change in creative direction obvious: now, everything is cloaked in shadow, and it’s often difficult to tell what’s going on even outside of typically dark environments like a movie theater or nightclub.
Controversial elements like cigarettes are censored from this first-look teaser.
But perhaps this shift is a natural progression considering the undeniable passage of time. In the real-world, more dynamic and shadowy lighting is (for better or for worse) now becoming more common. But also, Cliff Booth has now moved from the 1960s and its bright psychedelic patterns to the 1970s and the shift in American culture that came with the Vietnam era. Society has changed, and crucially, so has Hollywood. It’s a little bit more The Nice Guys now.
As this is our first look at the film, it’s likely the next trailer will reveal some plot elements, or, at the very least, a cigarette. But with this teaser confirming that The Adventures of Cliff Booth will come out in 2026, we won’t have long to wait to see the entire movie itself. Hopefully, this Netflix original is given a hefty theatrical release so Brad Pitt can have his Margot-Robbie-as-Sharon-Tate moment.
