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The biggest team-up event in the movies is arriving soon, and no, I’m not talking about “Avengers: Doomsday.” Rather, I mean “The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth,” a film written by Quentin Tarantino and directed by David Fincher. Both Tarantino and Fincher are icons of the 1990s “Rebels of the Backlot” wave of filmmakers, but their styles are worlds apart. Can Tarantino’s wordy, stylized dialogue come together with Fincher’s prim bleakness? We’re about to find out, and “The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth” has released a new trailer.
The film is a sequel/spin-off to Tarantino’s most recent film, 2019’s “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood.” Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) was the movie’s co-lead, the best friend and stunt double of struggling actor Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio). A World War II veteran turned professional stuntman, Cliff had been ostracized from the business because he may or may not have killed his wife (Rebecca Gayheart). Cliff also literally changes history when he kills members of the Manson “family” who, in real life, murdered Sharon Tate.
“The Further Mis-Adventures” will pick up with Cliff in the 1970s, when he’s become a fixer for Hollywood studios. Tarantino famously has a self-imposed rule that he will only make 10 films. “Once Upon A Time In Hollywood” was his ninth, and he has become stubbornly committed to sticking to only ten. In 2024, Tarantino scrapped what would’ve been his tenth film, “The Movie Critic.” He also apparently didn’t want to bow out with “The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth,” but was unwilling to let the idea go to waste, he and Netflix recruited Fincher to direct. Watch the trailer above.
The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth looks much different than Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
My first impression of this trailer is how different it looks from “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” and that includes the look of the film. While “Hollywood” had a brighter visual style courtesy of cinematographer Robert Richardson, David Fincher is working with DOPs Erik Messerschmidt and Jeff Cronenweth, who have given “Cliff Booth” a darker, murkier style. Make of that what you will.
Beyond that, we have our first full synopsis for the film. “Murder, blackmail, theft, extortion — just another summer in Hollywood,” it begins. “It’s 1977, eight years since Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) encountered the Manson family in Quentin Tarantino’s parallel history of 1969, Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood. In THE FURTHER MIS-ADVENTURES OF CLIFF BOOTH, directed by David Fincher from a new script by Tarantino, the fairytale is over. Los Angeles no longer needs a hippie-slaying stuntman the way it did. But Hollywood will always have problems, problems that can only be solved by someone with Cliff’s unique (occasionally extralegal) abilities. When he’s not earning his keep bartending or as a projectionist, Cliff Booth is a fixer — solving situations for Hollywood’s great and, sometimes, not so good.”
But wait, there’s more!
‘A cocktail of violence, ambition, and desire’
The lengthy synopsis continues:
“He’s curious when he gets a call from talent agent Karen Crosby (Elizabeth Debicki), on behalf of her client, TV megastar Charlie Peters (Scott Caan) — a man known for doing his own stunts. And he’s further entertained and intrigued when he meets other characters in Charlie’s world, from his knowing wife Toni (Carla Gugino) to pro football champion turned screen star Roderick “Hot Rod” Harrison (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II). Then there are the Verdusco brothers (Matt Groove and JB Tadena), mysterious gangsters causing mayhem across the city. What was once a fairytale is now a crime story — a cocktail of violence, ambition, and desire that could only happen in LA.”
This trailer is fine, I suppose. Speaking for myself, I’ll say that about a decade ago, a pairing of David Fincher and Quentin Tarantino would have me over the moon. Now? I’m a bit more apprehensive, and I say that as someone who absolutely loves “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.”
“The Further Mis-Adventures of Cliff Booth” will open November 25 in IMAX, and then hit Netflix on December 23, 2026.
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