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Tarantino delivers expletive-laden Cannes Masterclass
2008-05-23
Cult director Quentin Tarantino delivered an expletive-laden Cinema Masterclass at Cannes Thursday in which he mixed tips on movie-making with reflections on his own greatness. "At the end of the day if there's one thing I'm doing it's forging a new type of comedy," he said, noting that his violence-filled oeuvre gave people a "thrill" because it made them "laugh at things that aren't usually funny." Tarantino held a thousand-strong audience captive for 90 minutes with rapid-fire commentary on clips from "Reservoir Dogs," "Pulp Fiction" and "Death Proof" and talk about how he rose from video store obscurity to cinematic glory. "Trying to make a feature film yourself with no money is the best film school you can do," he said, recounting how he spent three years making his first film during his weekends off work. Spaghetti westerns, kung fu flicks and Brian da Palma were his inspiration, said Tarantino, who took home the Cannes film fest's coveted Palme d'Or award in 1994 for "Pulp Fiction." His own films, noted for their snappy dialogue, pop culture obsessions, and graphic violence, fit into two categories, said the 45-year-old director, dressed for his Masterclass in a shiny black jacket and black shirt and trousers. There are the hyper-realistic movies like his 1992 debut feature "Reservoir Dogs," a botched jewel heist story whose ensemble cast includes Harvey Keitel and Tim Roth, and "Pulp Fiction," another crime drama starring John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson and Uma Thurman. And then there are the "movie movies," he said, which include the two "Kill Bill" films and "Death Proof," which pay tribute to genres such as martial arts movies, samurai movies and serial killer films. "I look on 'Kill Bill' as my 'Apocalypse Now'," he said, referring to the 1979 Vietnam War film by Francis Ford Coppola, seen as one of the greatest films of all time. Tarantino, whose "Death Proof" last year failed to scoop the Palme d'Or here, is noted for the use he makes of music, picking pop classics or music from cult television series. "I have one of the best soundtrack collections in America," he noted, adding that he often films a scene around a particular song and that he could never commission a composer. "I just don't trust any composer to do it. Who the f(expletive) is this guy coming in here and throwing his s(expletive) over my movie. What if I don't like it? And the guy's already been paid!" he quipped to howls of laughter. Tarantino also said he had been told by "millions" of other directors that his opening scene in "Reservoir Dogs," a 10-minute sequence featuring eight black-suited men eating breakfast at a diner, had made it very difficult for them to do restaurant scenes. "They've come to me and said, we can't do it, it's Reservoir Dogs, it's your technique," he said. Previous directors who have given the Masterclass here include Martin Scorsese, Nanni Moretti, Wong Kar Wai and Sydney Pollack.
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