63a first-time trial. “I was this immovable force
who could get what I wanted on-screen, but
once I got my cut and we locked print, I kind
of let go of the handle because I had just ac-
complished it and was tired,” he recalls. “But
we still had color timing and sound mixing to
do! Sally took charge and explained all of this
stuff to me. If we got something back from the
lab and she and I didn’t like it, I wasn’t irate
at them. I was just sad that it looked that way.
But Sally was like, ‘No! That’s absolutely unac-
ceptable! Send it back! Do it again!’ I felt sorry
for the lab people, but Sally knew when to get
tough. There was a learning curve, and she
actually lead the way by obstinance.”
Tarantino has long professed that an editor
is a film’s only other “co-writer.” Menke’s
sudden passing from heat-induced exhaustion
during a hike in 2010 left him with huge shoes
to fill. He liked what he saw in Fred Raskin,
an adroit editor of action who had cut three
entries in the Fast and the Furious franchise,
and recruited him to do the filling. After tak-
ing a typical two-to-three-year break between
movies, “the first month back in the editing
room with Sally would be me just remember-
ing how to do it all,” he says. Raskin embraced
that same process when they first teamed up
to make Django Unchained, and that made
him feel at ease. “Working all day, going home,
and then watching the next day’s dailies all
through the evening is all about me get-ting into the rhythm again. Once Fred and I
started, we were right in step as storytellers—
one foot in front of the other.”
Inside and outside of the editing bay,
Raskin’s wit and astute eye are two sides
of the same coin, Tarantino says fondly. “He’s
your favorite of your friends that talk about
this week’s new movie. He always brings up
something about a movie you saw, and you’re
like, ‘Oh yeah, you’re right.’ And, well, that’s
a really good eye that he points at my
movies! We were just finalizing the cut of
Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood, and I said,
‘What if we took out this little thing or that lit-
tle thing?’ Fred said, ‘Nah, I’m not taking that
out.’ I said, ‘Why not?’ And he had this perfect
reason not to take it out: ‘I see why you’d want
to cut it, but 70 minutes later, when this hap-
pens to that character, we won’t feel the same
way because we didn’t see this one moment.
We could end up feeling the same way—but I
wouldn’t risk it.’ That’s invaluable to have.”
When Raskin’s not weighing in critically,
he has a way of reassuring Tarantino that the
jokes he filmed are landing: “Fred laughs at
every funny line in my movie every single
time he hears it. We can edit a movie for four
months, and every time we play any of those
scenes or lines, he’s always had—at the very
least—a smile on his face. The fact that he’s
constantly amused by the material keeps you
constantly amused.”LABOR AND LOVE
If we’re to take him at his word that he’ll
be retiring after his 10th, then that makes
Tarantino’s ninth film also his penultimate.
He’s always had a “healthy ego,” he says, which
comes as no shock to his admirers and detrac-
tors. But as long as he’s working with the best
craftspeople in the business, the proverbial
old dog is going to keep sniffing for what new
tricks he can pick up.
Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood gave
him his best crash course in locations and
production design to date. Over time, the L.A.
of 50 years ago has changed along with Tar-
antino, and the challenge set before him and
production designer Barbara Ling, he says,
was “to find where we can go today that
could be changed back to 1969. Physically—
not by erasing in post, but by taking shit
down and putting shit up, on a block we
control, with enough of the right buildings
to build a nice mosaic.”
Through all of production, nothing was
harder for Tarantino than pinpointing areas
that fit that bill. “And however hard it was
to find them now, it’s gonna be twice as hard
three years from now. It’s like crossing a
bridge with the bridge burning behind you,”“LOOKING BACK, I COULD’VE DONE THINGS DIFFERENTLY. BUT I MADE A DECISION THAT MY VOICE IS WHAT I HAD.”
DANCING ON AIR: RICK (DICAPRIO, C) BUSTS
A MOVE ON THE PRIMETIME MUSICAL VARIETY SHOW
HULLABALOO IN ONCE UPON A TIME... IN HOLLYWOODTARANTINO CONTINUED ON » PAGE 77