So the impact that film has on the world
is profound
whether it's an animated short and indie
or a Hollywood blockbuster, film has a
huge influence on attitudes, fashion,
music, politics and culture. The
revolutionary filmmaker we're about to
hear from has consistently pushed the
boundaries of convention and he's become
a cult figure in the process. From
reservoir dogs to the hateful eight a
Tarantino film is instantly recognizable
and never forgotten.
Please welcome Quentin Tarantino.
Adult supervision is required.
You start seeing pictures ain't you.
No one said this job supposed to be easy.
Nobody said it's supposed to be that hard neither.
Host: Quentin Tarantino!
Host: Welcome.
Quentin: Hey everybody.
Host: Oh my God!
Quentin: Thanks for coming out.
Host: Yeah
Oh look at all those cameras, wow. Okay, so
we just saw five young filmmakers, I
think you met them backstage
Quentin: Yeah I sure did.
Host: Right?
Host: So tell us how you got your start.
Quentin: Well it's kind of a two-prong answer to that when
it comes to actually me becoming a
professional filmmaker, I did that
through screenwriting. Basically I tried
to write a few scripts, I wrote True
Romance and tried to get that going for a
long time.
Host: True Romance?
Quentin: Yeah.
Quentin: I couldn't even sell it
forget about getting it going, and then I
wrote natural born killers,
alright, and I tried to get that going
for a long time and I didn't have like
Host: Like how long?
Quentin: Like, you know, l think I
Quentin: tried three years on True Romance and
then I tried two years on glo, on a
Natural Born Killers.
Host: Natural Born Killers
Quentin: and then from that I wrote Reservoir Dogs
and it got made after, after like three
years and on True Romance, two years on
Natural Born Killers. After I wrote
Reservoir Dogs, we were shooting, we were on
the set shooting in about six months.
Host: Wow
Quentin: You know, it was just one of those, it
was, it was one of those, if you
were going to invest in a movie for like
1.3 million dollars and you're going to
take a chance on somebody, the script was
really good, you could just look at the
script and feel that it was going to be
okay, hardly could tell was already
attached
alright, so he gave us a vote of
confidence.
So it was through screenwriting that I
got into the business in a professional
way however, how I sort of, kind of
learned filmmaking for, you know, as much as I
ever did, alright, was I didn't go to film
school or anything.
Host: and did you really work in a video store?
Quentin: Oh yeah, no, no for five years I wrote all those
scripts, not, not Reservoir Dogs but
everything else I put while I was
working at that video store and
but the thing is though I, I was a thing, I
oh yeah, what I ended up doing was instead I
couldn't go to film school because I didn't have
any money to go to film school, I
tried to enroll in AFI, I got turned down
and so what happened was, I tried to make
a movie.
I, when I borrowed a 16-millimeter camera,
from a guy I barely knew frankly, and
I was going to make it short and so I
work for a couple of weeks on this short
and then I thought whoa, hey, you know
Stranger Than Paradise had come out not
that long ago and so I was like well
let's, I don't know what I can do with a
short but I could do a feature and so
then I worked for three years shooting
this 16-millimeter feature. Now the
feature ended up becoming nothing, like
guitar picks at the end of the day but I
kind of learned how to make a movie
Host: You're self taught.
Quentin: Yeah, I didn't know,
when you look at the stuff that I did in
the first part of it, I didn't
really know what I was doing, but the
stuff
three years later, that I had shot, was
better, I had kind of learned what I was
doing and, and I basically only, on the
course of those three years maybe put
out about three thousand dollars, I mean
I was only had a minimum wage job, but
that was actually a lot, I did learn a
lot about filmmaking and I did it for a
lot cheaper than I would have at a
university.
Host: Wow, okay, so your films have some common
elements, the're kind of dark, there's
humor, there's great dialogue, amazing
soundtrack, but the stories are very
different.
So how do you come up with the different
stories? They're in different genres,
they're very different.
Quentin: Well I do, you know, I'm a fan of genre
you know, I mean there's a whole lot of
directors, especially a lot of the directors that
came out of, before the movie Bratz,
before the Scorsese's and the Spielbergs
and diplomas, the directors that came out
in the early seven, late sixties,
early seventies were coming from a very
much a post sixties anti-establishment
kind of thing, and you get the impression
that they, that they considered genre bad
work, they wanted to consider themselves
artists that were above genre and if
they did genre, it was always deconstruction
Host: yeah.
Quentin: of a genre. That's not me, I can
appreciate that, but I love genre, I love
genre movies growing up and now, I'm
trying to deconstruct it as well but not
from a cynical, I have, I don't have respect
for it, kind of way
I'm just want to do my own version, I
want to do my own take on it, my own thing
of it.
Having said that I, whatever pleasures
there are from that genre, I want to
deliver.
I mean, do I think, you know, the Kill Bill
movies sit on a higher plane, then
75-percent of most of the films that
played on Black Belt Theatre, alright, on
local television in the seventies,
yeah, I actually do think it exists on a
slightly higher plane, not all of
them, not a hundred percent of them, but
75-percent of them, nevertheless, a
hundred percent of them delivered some
entertainment value of martial art
movies that I liked and I, I can't
deliver that, then I'm just doing a, you
know, a art film meditation on genre which
is not what I'm about at all.
Host: Yeah. Do you have a favorite Tarantino film?
Quentin: No. No, I, I
Host: You think he's any good?
Quentin: Like, I love, I love them all but the
thing, you know, for every once in a
while I'll get, one more move to the
top of the pack for a short period of
time. 
Host: So like, how about today?
Quentin: I'll go back to my standard answer, Reservoir
Dogs.
Host: There you go.
because it's the one that changed my life.
Host: Good answer.
Host: I just watched it again on
Sunday and it's still good.
So once you have an idea, what's your
creative process like? You have 10,000 creative
people here and they'd love to hear about
your process.
Quentin: Well it's kind of a, it's interesting, you
know, as a writer everything with me
starts from being a writer, and the only
film I've ever done that was like
adapted from something else somebody
else wrote was Jackie Brown, which is adapted
from an Elmore Leonard novel and I love Jackie Brown
and I'm very happy about that and I
could maybe do something like that again
but I get a tremendous amount of
satisfaction when
I've done the locations on a movie, we've
spent all the time to shoot the movie and
then maybe, now I'm going around the
world, I'm traveling the entire globe
selling it and going to the different
countries as it opens up and everything
and so maybe I'm sitting in a restaurant in
Germany or in Brazil or something, and my
movie's opening there, I'm doing the press
on it, there's this incredible
satisfaction for me to think back to,
usually only two years ago,
not like five years ago or six years
ago but only two years ago to think that
there was a moment in time where, that me
and a pen,
we're sitting at a table in front of a
blank piece of paper and then two years
later now, or two and a half years later
I'm sitting in Brazil with this big
movie that I've made that hopefully is
entertaining the world, but knowing that
it can all come back down to that pen and
that piece of paper when it was just a
thought in my head is very gratifying
for me, now, what gets me going on this
story as opposed to another story
that's a little harder to determine, you
know, it's almost like I'm a fish and
there's a lot of hooks with bait out
there you don't quite
Host: Is your head like, full of stories?
Quentin: which one is, I dont know if it's jam-packed
but you know there's always, you know,
there's always three or four stories I
could do and part of them, answer to your
question for the process, is I trust
myself as a writer, I have a, I just, I
trust, I trust my process, I have, it's
done very well by me and so I, I have
complete and utter trust in it and what
I mean by that is, I know when something
needs to sit in the incubator, and the
incubator is here and I, you know, I never
try to take anything out too soon, I
never try to do anything of premature, if
I do, I realize it and I put it back,
I just, I know when it's time for it to
come out, I know when it's time and then
I usually do a few building blocks to
just make it more solid and like, one of
the things that I've said before, and it's
true though,
is, but it doesn't work for every
single movie, but, you know, if, if I can
give you a knockout, blow your socks off,
opening credit sequence, I will, I want to
do that
alright, I want to grab you right from
the very beginning and not every movie
is applicable for that alright, but if
I can do that, I will and normally that
will be revolved around the song so when
I start coming up with some idea that
I'm thinking about, I have a record room,
I have a big vinyl collection it's,
the room's kind of design like a used
record store with bins and broken down
into different categories and then I'll
go through those, those records and what
I'm looking for is yeah, I'm looking for
the the beat of the movie, I'm looking
for the sound of the movie and that
might be other old soundtracks that
might be rock and roll music, it could be,
in certain things, German music, it
could be all kinds of things, but I'm
trying to find the rhythm 
Host: and have you written,
have you written anything when
you're doing that, or the idea is still
in your head?
Quentin: No, no this is yeah, it's a pro, this
is a process that goes all the way
throughout, until I actually lock print, but this
is before I'd even officially started,
but I'm really starting to think
seriously about it.
Host: Okay.
Quentin: And you know I'm, when I find some
songs that i can just kind of pace
around in my room and imagine a really
groovy opening credit sequence and
"everybody at the con palet" is just loving it,
in my little brain, alright, that goes a long
way to encouragement and then I go further.
Host: Okay.
Quentin: And even as I'm writing and stuff and
when I want a little pick-me-up
I just go in and put some of that music
on and pace and now I'm, I'm right back
in it again, I'm like in love all over again.
Host: Well the music's a huge part of your films so,
okay, I have to ask you about technology so,
anyone can pretty much make a film today
and the technology is pretty accessible,
software, which we make, hardware and I'm
just wondering do you think that's a
good thing, do you think it's great for
all these filmmakers to be able to make films?
Quentin: Yeah, you know, that, I, I think there is,
there's a parenthetical downside to it
that is completely dwarfed by the upside
and the upside is the fact that with the
technology that exists today a filmmaker,
filmmaking can be a democratic process
that it never was before, basically, other
people, other than rich white men, can now
make movies and
Host: and a lot of them are here
Quentin: Yeah, yeah, well it's also,
I mean it's a kind of and will also in a weird
way, now that the technology has become a
more conducive, or I mean, really, you
know, you know, a kid, a kid
in a project can actually
make a movie about their life, can make
their version of 400 blows if they want to
alright, and they have the tenacity to, to
take it all the way, that is, that is
available to them in a way that was
never available to me, a little part of me
feels jealous about that *mumbles*
but there is a, so that
is this really terrific aspect
Host: So are you going to tell me the downside?
Quentin: Well to me the downside is, I,
there was a thing when the
fact that when you had to go and
convince people and get the money to
make a movie, there was a filtering out
process, alright
not every movie needs to be made, not
every movie should be made,
alright, there is some hurdles
that's right it's not bad to go through alright,
look and I'm talking about one of
these guys who made one of those movies
that did not need to be made, it needed
to be made to teach me how to make a
movie, but no one ever really needed to see
that fucking thing,
alright, and
but it did its job for me
alright, and me learning about that.
Having said that, the other, to me the
parenthetical that really is the biggest,
and you know it's actually not a bad
thing, it's just I think it puts even
more of a responsibility on the young
filmmaker to work hard, to achieve a
level of craft, because now craftlessness
is almost being, if not, encourage,
accepted and, and, and, quality there's the
quality of a look when it comes to
certain work, has dropped by half and
that's actually me being kind of generous
compared to say the nineties, when people
had to shoot their movies on film and
actually the cinematographer was an
important part of the process of making
a movie, go figure,
and, and you know, a lot of the movies I
see, they, they lack a visual quality
which I can't truly understand because
in the nineties, when we're trying to
make our movies, whether it was six,
whether it's sixty thousand dollars or a
hundred and sixty thousand dollars or a
million dollars, we were trying to make
them look as good as we possibly can, we
wanted them to look like a real movie,
now, you could also shoot something like
Henry: Portrait of a serial killer on
16-millimeter and now the grain itself
becomes a quality, the fact that it looks
like Vietnam footage is actually part of
the quality about the movie that makes
it work
nevertheless, there still is a visual
component to it and the thing that, to me
the saddest part of the parenthetical is, I
don't even know how important that is to
young filmmakers, the visual aspect of
the movie, I think they kind of bought
the dogma and mumblecore kind of thing
that a movie should look like you just
woke up.
Host: I suspect there's a spectrum
Quentin: I think there is, I, I hope there is but my
point being is that doesn't damn
everything else, I, the technology out
there it just
makes it more, lays it more on the
shoulders
Host: Yeah
of the filmmaker, to make it look more than like just the camcorder.
Host: Yeah, totally. So
Quentin: But, you know, at the same
time I've seen those camcorder movies they can
actually be quite effective.
Host: And some of them
Quentin: So it's just, yeah it's just the, the you know, it's all
about the filmmaker.
Host: Well let's stand that
just for a second because film
distribution is also changed and like
people can watch movies, independent of
what they are, pretty much anywhere on
any device
Quentin: Yeah
so you're on a plane and
you see someone watching Reservoir Dogs
on their phone,
so, is that ok?
Quentin: Okay, this is like, I, not that I've heard this
question before but I put this idea
Host: Okay
Quentin: Alright, I might just be completely
out of touch, but anybody here who has
watched a movie from beginning to end on
their cell phone, that maybe wasn't on an
airplane, but just like at home watching
on your cell phone,
clap your hands.
Host: Ask them about a tablet
Quentin: Okay, well you know, this is 10,000 people,
that was actually a weak
clapping of hands, alright
Host: How about a tablet?
Quentin: Unless I intimidated you, which I'm not
trying to, alright, you know, I'm not
saying that's the worst thing in,
on the planet Earth, I just can't imagine,
I can't imagine sitting down and
watching There Will Be Blood
you know, from beginning to end on my cell phone.
Host: Of course there are no twelve-year-olds here either.
Quentin: Yeah that's true okay, well I, in a
weird way I can imagine watching Frozen
on a, if I was gonna watch something
like that, it would be like that, you know,
You know, ultimately look, like growing
up in Los Angeles, in the seventies we
had to exist with the 330 movie on
Channel Seven, alright, where they would
Host: After school movie?
Quentin: Yeah, they would cut
the crap out of it so it was completely
unrecognizable with tons of commercials
you know, they actually once fit Lawrence
of Arabia into a 90 minute slot. So I
guess watching it on iphone is better
than that. 
Host: Okay, okay so
Quentin: watching it on the plane device or something
oh that's good, no, that's exciting. 
Host: yeah that's not that bad.
Quentin: Yeah, but it's a little bit, it's a little bit
Host: Alright.
Quentin: Well, also you're not holding it
Host: Yeah. I don't know.
Quentin: Imagine holding your
screen for a two-and-a-half-hour.
Host: Yeah.
A short maybe.
Quentin: Yeah, yeah.
Host: A short.
Quentin: But my movies are kind of long.
Host:They are kind of long. Okay.
But good. Alright, you've won lots of awards, you
were named one of times a hundred most
influential people, you've got a star on
the hollywood walk of fame, but how do
you personally define success?
Quentin: That's a good question.
Look at the end of the day, I mean if
you're going to get right down to it,
hopefully, the way I define success is
when I'm finished with the career, I'm
considered one of the greatest
filmmakers who ever lived.
Alright, you know, that would 
Host: Check.
That would be successful, you know, and then to go
further than that I was just like, you
know, that it would be considered like a
great artist and not just a film
director, but a great artist, you know, all
of, you know, with other artists who don't
just direct and, but recently I had a
thought, that would be a really, really
nice thought, I was at a film festival in
Lyon, France and it's a festival dedicated
to older movies, so they have a lot of
retrospectives and stuff and I was
sitting in a jam packed movie theater
watching Buster Keaton's The General and
everybody loved it and it was a great
night at the movies and the movie was
magnificent and we all laughed and we
all enjoyed it and there was even little
kids in the audience and they were digging
it and I go wow, if 80 years from now, 80
years after, you know, 60 years after my death,
80 years after I've made the movie
if I, if I was, if it was playing in a field
theater, that people wanted to see it and
it was enjoyable and they had the time
but the people that I was watching with
had watching The General, that would be
really awesome.
Host: That would be really awesome
and I, you have a pretty good, pretty good
chance.
So, I heard you've been doing some
research on the seventies, my favorite
decade, for your next project is there
anything that you're working on there?
Quentin: No, that, that it's like, miss, no, I mean I
am doing it, but it's not for a movie
project I'm, I'm working on a, on
like a film critic project that's about
the year in cinema, 1970. That's a very
important year in cinema, especially in
the development of new Hollywood, but
then I even opened it up to world cinema
in that year, that was a pretty profound
year and it's too boring to go into the
nuances of it here, but it's a world, it's
kind of a moveable feast, I'm kind of
figuring out what I want to do with it,
do I want to do is a book,
do I want to do it as a documentary
about that year and cinema, do I want to
do it is a five or six part podcast, I'm
not quite sure, me going to Lyon and
actually showing about 12 movies from
that year and talking before each of
them and then having a two-hour
symposium, was like my first attempt
after studying it for four years, my first
attempt to do something with it in
public so,
I'm still figuring it out.
Host: Okay, alright.
There's a rumor that you plan to retire
after making your tenth film and I think
you've made eight so far,
Quentin: Yeah, right.
Host: So, is that true?
Quentin: Yeah.
Host: So two more films?
Quentin: Two more.
Host: Thats all you have.
Quentin: Yeah, and then drop the mic, boom. Tell everybody, match that shit.
Host: Okay, so, we're out of time,
sadly, but before you go I wanted to do a
quick word association.
Quentin: My favorite curse
word? No I'm joking.
Host: Good.
Quentin: I think i already said it.
Host: This is a creative arena, you may say whatever you like, okay.
So I'm going to give you a word and you're
going to give me one word back.
Quentin: Okay. 
Host: Alright, are you ready?
Host: Okay, actor?
Quentin: Artist.
Host: Writer?
Quentin: King.
Host: Director?
Quentin: God.
Host: This is really good with you. Okay.
This is two words, Pulp Fiction?
Quentin: Palme D'or
Host: Quentin Tarantino?
Quentin: You can't do that with me.
That's not fair
Host: That's six words.
Host: One word.
Quentin: Artist.
Host: Alright, ladies and gentlemen
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin: Thanks everybody.
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