If there is one thing you can count on Quentin Tarantino to do, it's to give you his honest opinion on movies and filmmakers. The director has made a career out of paying homage to the exploitation and B-movies he adores, as well as classic films from almost every wave of filmmaking throughout the world.
But Tarantino isn’t always about praising films. His appreciation for lowbrow cinema is matched by his criticism of cinema’s most revered filmmakers who are often not alive to defend themselves.
During a Sight & Sound interview with Tarantino and hisVideo Archives Podcast co-host Roger Avary, Tarantino compared Claude Chabrol to French New Wave iconFrançois Truffaut, particularly the thrillers that the director made later in his career.
Influential French New Wave director François TruffautCredit: Anglo Enterprise/Vineyard/Kobal/Shutterstock
“[Chabrol’s] thrillers are drastically better than the abysmal Truffaut-Hitchcock movies, which I think are just awful,” Tarantino said. “I’m not a Truffaut fan that much anyway. There are some exceptions, the main one being The Story of Adele H. But for the most part, I feel about Truffaut like I feel about Ed Wood.”
Tarantino punctuated his feelings about the director by saying, “I think he’s a very passionate, bumbling amateur.”
This isn’t Tarantino’s first time calling out Truffaut. In his novelization of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Cliff Booth goes on an extended tangent about Truffaut’s The 400 Blows and Jules and Jim, calling the latter “a fucking drag.”
Although Tarantino maintains that Booth’s film opinions do not necessarily reflect his own, Tarantino didn’t hesitate to voice his thoughts on Truffaut’s most notable work.
In the novel, Tarantino wrote:
“[Booth] tried Truffaut twice, but he didn’t respond to him. Not because the films were boring (they were), but that wasn’t the only reason Cliff didn’t respond. The first two films he watched (in a Truffaut double feature) just didn’t grab him. The first film, The 400 Blows, left him cold. He really didn’t understand why that little boy did half the shit he did. And he thought the mopey dopes in Jules and Jim were a fucking drag.”
Truth be told, Truffaut has had plenty of misses in his career, but that is a consequence of being a filmmaker who takes risks. Not every filmmaker has a list of films they made that everyone thinks are good, and that’s okay. Making something that creates discourse means making something exciting and entertaining.
We do not make films to appeal to everyone. We are filmmakers because we are passionate about the stories we want to tell the world. Does it really matter if Tarantino doesn’t like your work? Not really.
Plus, there is a strong chance Tarantino wouldn’t say anything about your film until you’re no longer around to stand up for your film.
Do you agree with Tarantino’s take on the French New Wave director? What's a director whose work you don't love? Let us know in the comments below!
Source: Sight & Sound
