Like Capote's "In Cold Blood", but not....

Rating: 8/10 (28 August 2019)

If you ever read Capote's "In Cold Blood" about the Clutter family murders in '59, you may see how this movie emulates it in part. Capote wrote a historical novel based on real events and kept the results the same, with some embelishment and controversy that still gets argued about today. Tarantino put together a historical novel based on real events but added fictional characters to drive a "what if" embelishment, with controversy that will be argued over for decades. I like this movie's play on history as it alters the timeline to something that would have been forgotten rather than infamous. By doing this, he kind of blots out Manson's name, destroys the murders and wipes their act from memory, and plays a comic angle to show how different that night could have been if just one or two persons were different.
On the alternate history note, it could be possible that Bruce Lee was more of a dancer than a weapon in this timeline, some songs and movies may have come out earlier, and the Manson family could be more hillbilly than counter cultural. This movie is a fable where facts are altered and a bygone era is detailed in a painstaking manner. In Cold Blood was painstaking too, as it detailed daily life, preludes to the crime, hearsay, and odd snippets from the killers' lives that lent to the meta story. OUATIH does exactly the same thing but in a different medium. The Capote movie that talked about making the book was nowhere near the book, but Tarantino's movie was done with intent to be its best representation of the meta story.
The movie has flaws, but it sticks with your mind and gets you to research the real events, songs, movies, and people displayed. So, in that regard, it goes beyond most cinema that can be forgotten after the credits roll.
At least that's how I see it as I look back at it over time.