Overindulgent and Laughably Bad

Rating: 3/10 (27 July 2019)

A truly awful film. Aimless, pointless, turgid, and overindulgent with all of Tarantino's pet obsessions annoying instead of titilating or gleefully shocking the viewer. This time, the Tarantino Tropes are unable to even entertain the viewer.
Even the "best" parts of this film fall flat. The entire effort lacks any meaningful purpose and lacks onscreen energy. Tarantino is not good enough a writer--or sophisticated enough--to scratch out a poignant character study, which this film attempts to be. It wallows in nostalgia even more than I do when I talk about the DC Comics of my long-dead youth.
As a longtime 1965-75 obsessive, I found much to appreciate "pop culturally speaking", but even so, that stuff had no business taking up as much of the running time as it did. Such things are better suited to DVD bonus features.
Too bad, because I actually liked DiCaprio and Pitt's characters and their performances, as there is lots of "hang out time" with these guys. Pitt is especially good here, and his style of cinematic cool has never been more effectively captured on film; I daresay that this is one of his best performances.
Pitt even maintains his poise during the embarrassing, "Family Guy"-style finale, which is no mean feat when one remembers just how awful and poorly-rendered an ending it is.
But the film itself? It leaves a TON to be desired.
Young people today seeing "Once Upon a Time..." will say "1969 sure had a lot of lame music, movies, and TV shows!" It'll confirm their belief that the 1960s was an "old people's time."
In fact, "Once Upon a Time..." could single-handedly make even the dreaded Baby Boomers question their 1960s acid-flashback memories and even make those go sour.
The film is topped off by a comically-bad, poorly-acted, and just plain dumb finale--think "Family Guy"; I'm not kidding. It's just embarrassing.
My rating 3/10