Bastards Sent Around

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A couple of hours ago Nikki Finke posted an exclusive report concerning Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Bastards project. She wrote that (a) the script went out yesterday (Monday) to Universal, Warner Bros and Paramount, and to Sony today, and (b) that there's "a possibility" that Harvey Weinstein will be producing (along with Lawrence Bender) but not financing it, which "certainly adds fuel to those rumors that The Weinstein Co is having movie money woes."

The question I would have asked if one of my agent sources had called me about this is "how many pages"? Is it, like, 180 or 200 pages? I ask because of that reported-about interview between original Inglorious Bastards director Enzo G. Castellari and Tarantino on the forthcoming three-disc DVD (out 7.29) of his 1978 film reveals that Tarantino's new version will be a two-parter like Kill Bill. In other words, something that may be leisurely paced, elephantine, long.

If I was running production at one of the four studios, I would insist that everyone reading and making a call about Tarantino's Bastards script should also see Castellari's original 99-minute film, which came out in '78. We all know that Tarantino routinely flavors his scripts with his sassy talky-talk, and that Bastards, though set in World War II, will completely ignore the idioms of G.I. speech at that time in favor of the Quentin music. Which is fine. But I would want to know if the "music" or perhaps the extra plotting is really worth the expense of making and releasing two movies. (If, that is, the script indeed runs around 180 or 200 pages. Maybe it doesn't. Maybe the movie Tarantino talks about on the Bastards DVD is no more.)

It may also be that Tarantino's Bastards has a natural "fighting weight" length of 180 minutes or longer, and no ifs, ands or buts. But I also might insist, depending on the length of the script, that the theatrical version of the film be shot and cut to run no more than 115 to 120 minutes, and that a three-hour version (or perhaps a Part I and Part II) be confined to the DVD market. Because I really wouldn't want to go through any sort of Grindhouse-type experience.

And because I believe that any movie or novel or essay is always a little better if it's been pruned and tightened to within an inch of its life. The Tarantino I've heard about all these years doesn't know from pruning. He is no longer, by most accounts, the guy he was in '92 or '94 or even '97. He seems to be someone who believes in and stokes the fires of his own legend, and who seems to have a sense of his own genius, invincibility and entitlement. Not a mentality, in short, that's likely to produce something lean and mean.

comment #1

Richardson says ...

Being fair, even '92 or '94 Tarantino wasn't a good pruner. I know that, in 'Pulp Fiction', he would leave in references to scenes which were cut ("an Elvis man like yourself should enjoy it") which didn't really make sense without the context. I remember there being one or two of these in 'Reservoir Dogs' as well; there's a big chunk that was cut out (I don't think it was ever shot), but I think there were one or two things which actually referenced those cut bits.

comment #2

p.Vice says ...

Considering Tarantino's two best movies are roughly 150 minutes each, it's pretty clear where the target area lies. However, I completely agree about Quentin then vs. now. We'll be lucky if we ever see another movie from him that creates its own world instead of trying to rip one out of his vault of 16mm throwaways.

comment #3

Amazing Larry says ...

Tarantino's best movie is still DOGS, and I don't care what you say, that fucka is lean and mean. It has less meat on it's bones than Bridget Fonda.



Now I'm all pissed off all over again about GRINDHOUSE. Those 2 movies should've been made for about $1.2 mil each, and then fourwalled on 5 screens at a time tops and made to crawl across the country on its belly. The whole enterprise was screwed up royally by everybody concerned, when anybody with half a brain in their head coulda told you the whole schmiel was gonna turn out that way.



QT & Roddy Rod need to spend some time in Movie Jail for a coupla years. Read some gorram books and stay away from movin' pictures for a spell, ya clowns.

comment #4

bmcintire says ...

Enough with posting this picture of Will Smith and Akiva. . .oh, wait.

comment #5

Abhay says ...

> he would leave in references to scenes which were cut
> ("an Elvis man like yourself should enjoy it") which didn't
> really make sense without the context"

I know-- what an unsolvable mystery! That was the moment where people in my theater walked out and left.

comment #6

rgmax99 says ...

DOGS and PULP: CLASSIC
JACKIE: GOOD
KILL BILL 1 & 2: A SPOILED AND HYPER KID OD-ING ON HIS WET DREAMS. ONE FILM WOULD HAVE BEEN ENOUGH.
GRINDHOUSE: HORRIFIC

Now, what where we saying about Will and Akiva?

comment #7

gruver1 says ...

Wells to Amazing Larry: Funnypost but "gorram" books? Who's Roddy Rod? The Yankees player? I'm lost.

comment #8

storymark says ...

I love seeing "gorram" pop up in postings/conversations. Always makes me chuckle.

It's a Chinese curse word roughly equivalent to "goddam", and has entered the geek vernacular thanks to it's use in Joss Whedon's Firefly/Serenity.

comment #9

DarthCorleone says ...

Robert Rodriguez = Roddy Rod, I would assume.

Hasn't D.Z. sensed the existence of this post yet? He should be registering his utter hatred of Q.T. in just about T-minus 5...4...3...2...

comment #10

Krillian says ...

Roddy Rod is Robert Rodriguez, QT's partner in crime.

I agree QT needs an editor. If you've read the original Pulp Fiction script it was about 180 pages. There was a 5-page conversation between Harvey Kietel's Wolf and Julia Sweeney that was cut. Travolta & Thurman discuss Elvis vs. Beatles before they go to Jack Rabbit SLims where we also learn Vince is cousins with Suzanne Vega.

I never saw Grinadhouse in theaters, mainly due to the 3hr 15min runnign time, and it bugs me they've never released it on DVD as it was theatrically. There are some coll fauz trailers I've heard about but never seen due to that.

Also Kill Bill easily could have been one 150 minute movie if QT would have recognized how much fluff he had in there, especially in Part 2.

comment #11

Krillian says ...

Roddy Rod is Robert Rodriguez, QT's partner in crime.

I agree QT needs an editor. If you've read the original Pulp Fiction script it was about 180 pages. There was a 5-page conversation between Harvey Kietel's Wolf and Julia Sweeney that was cut. Travolta & Thurman discuss Elvis vs. Beatles before they go to Jack Rabbit Slims where we also learn Vince is cousins with Suzanne Vega.

I never saw Grindhouse in theaters, mainly due to the 3hr 15min runnign time, and it bugs me they've never released it on DVD as it was theatrically. There are some cool faux trailers I've heard about but never seen due to that.

Also Kill Bill easily could have been one 140 minute movie if QT would have recognized how much fluff he had in there, especially in Part 2.

comment #12

Josh B. says ...

Roddy Rod = Rodriguez

comment #13

Mjs says ...

"An Elvis man like yourself should enjoy it"

Maybe it's just me, but I had no trouble understanding the line. I think it was better than if he had left in the Beatles versus Elvis dialogue.

comment #14

Legowombat says ...

All four trailers are viewable on YouTube. They're all about as clever as the Cramp's 'Bikini Girls With Machine Guns' video, and only beaten in sheer dullness by the Grindhouse features themselves.

We're lucky the movie failed - they'd threatened to expand all of them into full length movies.

comment #15

Richardson says ...

"Maybe it's just me, but I had no trouble understanding the line."

I wouldn't say I didn't understand the line, but the first time I saw the movie, I thought it was completely unprompted. It came out of nowhere, especially since there is nothing about Vincent Vega to suggest that he is an "Elvis man". (Like most Tarantino characters, he seems like a '70's guy, not a late '50's/early '60's guy... which makes it a bit strange that she is saying that he would like a '50's style diner.) Soon after, he made a point of announcing that there were cut scenes which he'd had to lose to shorten time, and it seemed as if it actually bothered him to have to cut *anything* from his movies.

It's like he feels compelled to leave in lines which reference the fact that scenes were shot and cut.

comment #16

dangovich says ...

I read the script. The opening scene has a bunch of soldiers sitting around the rubble of a bombed-out French village discussing Betty Grable's Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B as a metaphor for fellatio.

comment #17

Amazing Larry says ...

Gruver1, Rodriquez is to QT what Rod Roddy was to Bob Barker. Hence, Roddy Rod. I dunno. Just a nickname me and the boys tossed on him after WUNSA PONNA TIE MINMEXICO.



I don't hate these guys, I just want them to come up with fresh frames of reference. Okay, you guys love '70s exploitation flicks, we get it awl ready!



Am I the only one who sees that pic of Quentin at the top of the page and imagines Waylon Flowers' arm stickin' out of his tucchus? Mebbe it's just me.

comment #18

raygo says ...

That photo of QT and Harvey Weinstein seems appropriately analogous to the Akiva Goldsman/Will Smith photo.

comment #19

ZayTonday says ...

Yeah Quentin, just make a run of the mill movie and get rid of all the cool trademark stuff you do, that'll put the asses in the seats!

If the studios wanted that they'd get Paul W.S. Anderson to write and direct a mundane war film for them and he'd probably do it a lot cheaper.

comment #20

MilkMan says ...

I read the script too, and my favorite part is when they liberate a concentration camp, and lo and behold, there's an emaciated Samuel L. Jackson, clad in only a pair of soiled pinstripe jammies, saying, "It's about time, motherfuckers! We're starving up here in this bitch! Shalom my ass! Motherfuckers stroll in here like it's Bilitis, or some shit! Fuck! Can a nigger get a knish, or what?"

comment #21

corey3rd says ...

Death Proof could have been cut down to a 15 minute film.

He edits his films like he is stoned at the computer.

comment #22

MilkMan says ...

He doesn't edit his films LIKE he's stoned at the computer, Corey; he IS stoned at the computer. I would gather that QT is stoned from the conception of the idea until the moment he hears about the opening weekend's grosses.

FYI, apropos of absolutely nothing: I had to watch Without Limits last night for my job, and wowwwww, what a piece of shit that was.

comment #23

Mr. Gittes says ...

Tarantino wants Brad Pitt to star in Bastards?

That's what Nikki Finke is reporting: http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/update-quentin-tarantino-talking-to-brad-pitt-to-star-in-inglorious-bastards/

comment #24

CinemaPhreek says ...

Here's the deal with Tarantino - he would make a fantastic director for hire (check out JACKIE BROWN), but without a writing partner he comes up short.

He want more stuff on the level of DOGS and PULP, then you need go get him partnered back with Roger Avery. Considering Avery might have a lot of time on his hands soon, he might welcomed something to do when he's not walking the yard...

comment #25

D.Z. says ...

"The Departed" is another remake unnecessarily longer than the original.

p.vice: "We'll be lucky if we ever see another movie from him that creates its own world instead of trying to rip one out of his vault of 16mm throwaways."

You don't seem to get that all his movies are like that.

comment #26

CinemaPhreek says ...

D.Z - Five and half hours? Man, you're slipping...

comment #27

ZayTonday says ...

CinemaPhreek: Roger Avary used his last ounces of creativity on The Rules Of Attraction. He was the main reason Silent Hill sucked, because Gans did an AWESOME AWESOME job with the direction and capturing the feel.

comment #28

D.Z. says ...

Phreek: Busy.

Zay: Avary played all the games and scouted the locations...

comment #29

D.Z. says ...

Oh, and more on Harvey's money troubles. http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117988640.html?categoryid=13&cs=1

comment #30

Admiral82 says ...

I intially thought he was talking about Rowdy Rowdy Piper.

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