Quentin Tarantino : A director that never matured

[Prefect]

I fucked up the title and don't know how to change it. The title should be "Quentin Tarantino: A director that never matured".


This is coming from someone that enjoyed a bunch of his movies but there was one thing that really bothered me about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. I don't give a shit about any of the characters. Not one character is worth giving a shit about. It is just a collection of scenes he came up with that he thought were cool. This got me thinking about all of his movies and I can't think of one character I cared about. Hateful 8 was one of the worst with me not giving a shit about anyone in that cabin. In Django, the only guy I gave a shit about was the german just because he was cool but that movie was so vapid that I didn't give a shit if Djano got back with his wife or got even with the slave masters. In Pulp Fiction, I think I was rooting for a few of the characters but I don't think I was really invested in any of them. People direct movies from what they know and I strong suspect that if you ever got down and talked with Quentin, he is probably a bit of a narcissist or something and doesn't a basic understanding of people or has any strong relationships. he knows how to shoot a movie and write clever dialogue but he style is so basic. In Kill Bill, I never gave two shits about anyone in the movie but I am not going to lie, it was entertaining. I think Quentin was traumatized or something and never really progressed emotionally passed that of a 12 year old. Maybe, he has aspergers. He never really matured as a director and if anything his movies kind of regressed as he got older in that there were even fewer reasons to care about his characters.

 

[BisexualMMA]

He writes very good dialogue and interesting situations but on the whole I don't walk away liking or cheering for many of his characters either. There are times I think he and the movie are on the side of a character but I am not particularly won over by the character.

That said...I liked Cliff Booth from Once Upon a Time.

I didn't like The Hateful Eight very much the first time I saw it...but it has grown on me maybe more than any other movie has relative to my first viewing. I usually know where a movie stands with me right away but that one gained ground over time.

 

[Prefect]

He writes very good dialogue and interesting situations but on the whole I don't walk away liking or cheering for many of his characters either. There are times I think he and the movie are on the side of a character but I am not particularly won over by the character.

That said...I liked Cliff Booth from Once Upon a Time.

I didn't like The Hateful Eight very much the first time I saw it...but it has grown on me maybe more than any other movie has relative to my first viewing. I usually know where a movie stands with me right away but that one gained ground over time.

I kind of feel that a lot of his liked characters were the result of a famous actor giving a good performance rather than anything Quentin did. How hard is it to really get a likeable performance out of Brad Pitt, who has made a career being a cool Hollywood dude? I am not saying that he doesn't have some interesting characters but strongly suspect that he just gives the actor room to breath and if they are good, they are good. If not, then not. I don't know what direction he can offer since it is kind of clear he doesn't on a very basic level understand people. I think most or nearly all his direction is technical in nature as to how to frame a shot or make a scene.

 

[BisexualMMA]

I kind of feel that a lot of his liked characters were the result of a famous actor giving a good performance rather than anything Quentin did. How hard is it to really get a likeable performance out of Brad Pitt, who has made a career being a cool Hollywood dude?

I considered that...but the situations written for Brad Pitt made me like the character. Checking in on Bruce Dern, his interactions with the hippies, his loyalty to DiCaprio, etc. I think making the Bruce Lee scene work as well as it did is due to Brad Pitt's performance. The other stuff...any good actor would have probably left a good impression with the character I think.

 

[Madmick]

I don't know if there was ever room to mature within his style. I recall all the praise when Pulp Fiction came out marveling at how a 20-something director could have made something so advanced, and that it was the closest thing since Orson Welles dropped Citizen Kane that we'd seen a debut with such a fully actualized voice. I suppose his closest analogue in the film business that is on an opposite trajectory, or is at least trying, is Guy Ritchie.

But yeah, you don't care about his characters, and what's strange is that he seems to think we will care when we don't. I never care who wins. I'm there for the swordplay contained in his dialogue.

Conversely, I rewatched Uncut Gems, recently, and found myself even more impressed with Adam Sandler's incredible performance than the first time I watched it. He plays such a piece of shit, and yet somehow, the Safdies and Sandler make you root for him. It's nuts. Also, in her incredibly limited screentime, I think Idina Menzel gave one of the best performances we've seen in recent years. She truly oozed, out of every pore, a middle-class wife who can't stand the sight of her husband's face anymore. Not just a singer, that lady. What a haunting movie.

 

[HenryFlower]

the characters in Hateful Eight are fantastic. i don’t necessarily “like” any of them, because they’re all pieces of shit in one way or another, but i am intrigued by their scenario, personalities, & how they all interact & behave within these parameters.

 

[Prefect]

I don't know if there was ever room to mature within his style. I recall all the praise when Pulp Fiction came out marveling at how a 20-something director could have made something so advanced, and that it was the closest thing since Orson Welles dropped Citizen Kane that we'd seen a debut with such a fully actualized voice. I suppose his closest analogue in the film business that is on an opposite trajectory, or is at least trying, is Guy Ritchie.

But yeah, you don't care about his characters, and what's strange is that he seems to think we will care when we don't. I never care who wins. I'm there for the swordplay contained in his dialogue.

Conversely, I rewatched Uncut Gems, recently, and found myself even more impressed with Adam Sandler's incredible performance than the first time I watched it. He plays such a piece of shit, and yet somehow, the Safdies and Sandler make you root for him. It's nuts. Also, in her incredibly limited screentime, I think Idina Menzel gave one of the best performances we've seen in recent years. She truly oozed, out of every pore, a middle-class wife who can't stand the sight of her husband's face anymore. Not just a singer, that lady. What a haunting movie.

I think Guy Ritchie is the British version of Tarantino. I don't know how anyone could say that Pulp Fiction was advanced when it was nothing more than a bunch of very short stories stitched together. That has been the hallmark of a director that either doesn't have a story or know what the movie should be about in most cases. Clerks by Kevin Smith is stitched together because you have a first time director just trying to put together something that sort of works.

 

[emefer]

He’s like the real life embodiment of Ernie Douglass

 

[Prefect]

the characters in Hateful Eight are fantastic. i don’t necessarily “like” any of them, because they’re all pieces of shit in one way or another, but i am intrigued by their scenario, personalities, & how they all interact & behave within these parameters.

Compare that to any version of 12 Angry Men and you kind of see how little depth the characters have. They might as well be cardboard cutouts.

 

[BisexualMMA]

Compare that to any version of 12 Angry Men and you kind of see how little depth the characters have. They might as well be cardboard cutouts.

I think there's quite a bit to the Samuel L. Jackson character. To some degree Walton Goggins and Kurt Russell as well. After that it's pretty one dimensional but the characters are fit for purpose in terms of getting through the story.

 

[armbarforhire]

I agree, but I did like Cliff Booth. Dicapro was meh and Margot Robbie was not even a character, she was more like a "idea" or QT fantasy idealization of a person. , the scene were she is barefoot and smiling like a idiot feel like a 13 yo masturbatory fantasy.

 

[HenryFlower]

Compare that to any version of 12 Angry Men and you kind of see how little depth the characters have. They might as well be cardboard cutouts.

i disagree

 

[Yoel Bromero]

If you don't see any evolution or growth over his career you should have wear a helmet while you shower.

Same guy made resevoir dogs and jackie brown. Pulp fiction and hateful 8. Django and once upon a time in hollywood. Kill bill and inglorious basterds. They're all very different films with very different characters and stories. He has created iconic characters through his career.

He doesnt have a character prototype that you see in every movie. Except some sexy feet and a lot of f bombs.

Not A huge tarantino fan but I honestly dont know how you got to that conclusion if you've watched more than one of his movies. Feels like a troll job.

 

[Bobby00]

I dont have to like the characters to watch it. I only need to be interested by the story. I rarely root for a character but just want to see how it plays out.

 

[moreorless87]

I tend to think Tarantino himself has kind of sold the image that he's only interested in pulp entertainment, perhaps because his rise was almost a reaction to the kind of self conscious arthouse like Kieslowski. I do think his production company being called A Band Apart kind of reveals the truth a bit more, named after a Goddard film which takes pulp genre cinema(a heist) and makes a more self consciously arty film which picks apart the idea. He maybe doesnt do it to the degree of Goddard but there is generally some substance behind his films not just "cool".

Once Upon A Time In Hollywood for example I'd say ends up being a story of a pulp actor and his stuntman who discover what they do does have worth and then take down the Mansons and there reactionary anti pulp views.

 

[Cherry Brigand]

Inglorious basterds has two of the greatest scenes ever put on film: the farmhouse milk seen and the standoff in the basement. And theyre both better than anything in pulp fiction. That's enough maturation for me.

 

[Bojka]

I guess it's true about the characters. A lot of the main characters die in his movies and I generally don't care that they did. Sometimes I'm glad that they did like Mr Orange from Reservoir Dogs...

 

[HARRISON_3]

He has a major foot fetish.

 

[blaseblase]

I dont really agree with the premise of the thread. "Doesn't have likeable characters" isnt a characteristic I associate with his films.

 

[TheNinja]

If you don't see any evolution or growth over his career you should have wear a helmet while you shower.

Same guy made resevoir dogs and jackie brown. Pulp fiction and hateful 8. Django and once upon a time in hollywood. Kill bill and inglorious basterds. They're all very different films with very different characters and stories. He has created iconic characters through his career.

He doesnt have a character prototype that you see in every movie. Except some sexy feet and a lot of f bombs.

Not A huge tarantino fan but I honestly dont know how you got to that conclusion if you've watched more than one of his movies. Feels like a troll job.

yup. He has some of the most well known characters and scenes ever. I love QT movies.