UPDATE (10/14/15): Stop the presses! Quentin Tarantino reached out to Indiewire's Anne Thompson via Facebook to clear up his Selma comments that made it into Monday's NYT Style Magazine interview. Apparently, the director never saw the movie but still felt like it deserved an Emmy instead of an Oscar. The plot thickens.
You can read the statement in full below:
"Dear Anne,
See original story from 10/13/15 below:
Quentin Tarantino has been in the news for all the wrong reasons lately. Back in August he took some subtle shots at It Follows and The Town, two popular and well-liked films. Now he's setting his sights on Selma and critics that always seem to mention his skin color. Tarantino sat down with acclaimed novelist and screenwriter Bret Easton Ellis for the New York Times Style Magazine to talk about losing Best Picture, Original Screenplay, and Director to The Hurt Locker; and the Django Unchained hate, among other things. After admitting that he was OK with Inglorious Bastards losing out to The Hurt Locker in 2010, the two began speaking on the hoopla surrounding Selma's "snub' last year.
The man behind the upcoming western The Hateful Eight said of Ava DuVernay's vehicle, "She did a really good job on Selma but Selma deserved an Emmy.’"
Without explaining why he would say such a thing, Bret Easton Ellis did it for him telling readers that "Django Unchained, with its depictions of antebellum-era institutionalized racism and Mandingo fights and black self-hatred, is a much more shocking and forward-thinking movie than Selma, and audiences turned it into the biggest hit of Tarantino’s career."
They then seamlessly transition to the backlash surrounding Django Unchained upon its release. Tarantino tells Easton Ellis that it didn't bother him saying,
"But when the black critics came out with savage think pieces about Django, I couldn’t have cared less. If people don’t like my movies, they don’t like my movies, and if they don’t get it, it doesn’t matter."
Let it be noted that Quentin has caught flack for his use of the N-word in Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, and Django in the past (Samuel L. Jackson defended him).
You would think it didn't bother him until he says this:
"The bad taste that was left in my mouth had to do with this: It’s been a long time since the subject of a writer’s skin was mentioned as often as mine. You wouldn’t think the color of a writer’s skin should have any effect on the words themselves. In a lot of the more ugly pieces my motives were really brought to bear in the most negative way. It’s like I’m some supervillain coming up with this stuff.’’
Quentin, wateryoudoing?
