MovieChat Forums > Quentin Tarantino Discussion > MUCH better director than writer. Anyone...

MUCH better director than writer. Anyone agree?

posted 4 months ago by e3e34ifj (1912)
14 replies | jump to latest

Everyone compliments and praises QT for his writing but he doesn't get as much appraisal for his direction. I mean, I guess he does, but it feels like he's always singled out for his writing abilities and would be 100 times before being singled out for his directing abilities.

Yet, I think he's a FAR better director than writer. His scripts are always so meandering, so long, in desperate need of being trimmed down. Endless monologues, shoe-horned references to random 70's exploitation movies that only he's seen. Django, H8, and OUAT...IH all suffered from overlong writing and scenes that seem to bare nothing to the plot. Hell, Kill Bill was overlong too, and don't get me started on Death Proof.

Yet, those films LOOK outstanding. They have brilliant editing, cinematography, and especially acting, and all of that falls onto the director. H8, for as flawed as its script is, has some of the best ensemble acting of all time. QT really has a magnificent eye for camera placement and shot composition. He's one of the best directors of all time. Even Death Proof is immaculately made by a technical genius; that film would be basically unwatchable if it wasn't for its directorial style and cinematography. He has written great screenplays but they always feel very 1st-drafty and obviously, they never had any second opinions from friends who'd offer sound advice.

To me it feels like a lot of that praise for his writing is directed towards his snappy and catchy dialogue, which is only one small part of the screenwriting process. I'd rather a film have a groundbreaking story and flowing narrative than punchy dialogue.

[–] GreenGoblinsOck8 (7815) 4 months ago

Funny you say that since he's won 2 best screenplay Oscars and has yet to win best director. I suppose he might eventually.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1201) 3 months ago

His direction for action scenes is great. The sword fights/martial arts scenes in Kill Bill, and car chase in Death Proof make me wonder how they even achieved some of it. But then he resorted back to lame shoot em up movies starting with inglorious basterds and lost that eastern cinema thing he was doing, which was a shame

[–] Heisenberg (6730) 3 months ago

I think he's a much better writer than director.

He is a good writer (7 or 8/10), just an ok director (5 or 6/10).

He is quite lacking on both department in many ways, but I like him, he is entertaining if not very deep and too often silly.

[–] Toomer (179) 3 months ago

I can't wait to see all the movies you write and direct that'll blow Tarantino's movies out of the water!

[–] Heisenberg (6730) 3 months ago

ahahahah, you really got me there.....not!........what a moron.

that has got less than 0 to do with anything we are talking about here.

[–] roger1 (3876) 2 months ago

We have had (Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, John Ford) good directors who were not screenwriters on their films, and we DO have some such today(Scorese above all -- has David Fincher every written a script for one of his films? I think Spielberg took a credit on Close Encounters.)

But generally the ability to write a truly GREAT screenplay is worth its weight in gold in Hollywood and some of our greatest writer-directors(Billy Wilder, Woody Allen, Orson Welles -- I think -- and Quentin Tarantino) are "the best of the best" -- at least AT their best (Woody has been kinda stalled for years.)

And two Best Screenplay Oscars. And more Best Screenplay nominations.

I'd say QT is a better writer than director and that is what makes him IMPORTANT.

But I must admit he surprised the hell out of me after three "dialogue heavy movies" (Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown) -- he took a six year break and came back as an INCREDIBLE action director -- the swordfights in Kill Bill, the car chases in Death Proof, the gunbattles in Inglorious Bastereds and Django Unchained..

But those are had great scripts, too. Written by The Man.

PS. There was a prolific but not-terribly successful writer for TV (a lot) and movies (a little) named Harlan Ellison. Big in the 60s and 70s mainly. In his non-fiction writings about Hollywood, he was SURE that directors as a group were talentless and over-hyped and that its good writing that should matter the most. I'm not sure myself. On the other hand, director Frank Capra had some screenwriter he worked with who handed him an empty sheet of paper in a pique and said "here, let me see you put the Capra touch on THIS!:

[–] FilmBuff (7358) 2 months ago

I agree with pretty much everything you wrote, but you left out the two best greatest writer-directors of all time, Preston Sturges and Akira Kurosawa. I'd put them at the very top of my list, with Wilder, Woody, Welles, and Tarantino all fighting it out for third place.

Tarantino is remarkable in the way he can direct seemingly any genre, as you pointed out.

[–] roger1 (3876) 2 months ago

I agree with pretty much everything you wrote, but you left out the two best greatest writer-directors of all time, Preston Sturges and Akira Kurosawa.

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Oh, yes. You know, I'm familiar with Sturges as a WRITER-Director but I'm not up on my Kurosawa. I didn't realize he was so much of a writer too. So certainly...the top of anyone's list is where Sturges and Kurosawa should be.

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I'd put them at the very top of my list, with Wilder, Woody, Welles, and Tarantino all fighting it out for third place.

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Man, that's a hard fight for third. I'd say right now, Tarantino has been far more CONSISTANT with his 9 or so films, than Billy Wilder (who rather "climaxed" with the one-two punch of Some Like It Hot and The Apartment, but kept writing films to diminshing returns as his "personal writing voice" became dated really quickly(Irma La Duce, Kiss Me Stupid, The Fortune Cookie...and the final film nadir of Buddy Buddy.) Tarantino keeps talklng about DIRECTORS should quit before they get too old, but it was much easier for Wilder to DIRECT his final films than to WRITE good scripts for them as he grew old and out of touch (Wilder was told he was "out of these times" and Wilder replied "Who would want to be OF these times?".

But that's just QT versus Wilder. I guess Woody has a similar issue(and he's ANOTHER director who has stayed in the game longer than QT thinks they should)...a run of truly great scripts from 1969 through 1979 (even the "early funny ones"), then intermittant greatness over DECADES but...perhaps just too MANY scripts and movies since, say 2000.

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Tarantino is remarkable in the way he can direct seemingly any genre, as you pointed out.

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Yes. Tarantino seems to be making a practice these days of being a film critic - and insulting a lot of movies and movie actors in the process -- but he NEVER lost my fealty on the basis of his filmed work. Its always exciting, always entertaining, always well written always well shot...

[–] [deleted] 2 months ago

[–] Porsche911 (3737) 2 months ago

LOL she’s terrible

[–] roger1 (3876) 2 months ago

Cant say ive paid enough attention to have an opinion on that but I do remember the 1st time I watched Death Proof and my god was the dialogue awful. Especially from that Aussie stunt women he keeps giving rolls to. she for sure cant act or dialogue.

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Zoe Bell.

Well, she sure hung onto the hood of a speeding car by a strap pretty damn well...which was her main contribution to Death Proof.

He was rewarding Zoe Bell for her exemplary stunt double work in Kill Bills 1 and 2.

Later she played a really sweet and nice woman in The Hateful Eight, and a really man bitch in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. At last QT modulated her characters.

Tarantino himself says that Death Proof is the worst of his films...but still good enough -- says he, and says I -- mainly because of that terrific car chase at the end(and that horrific car collision -- true body horror stuff) mid-film.
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But at that time, I for one went to Tarantino movies expressly to hear his NEW DIALOGUE...just like you go to action movies to see new action scenes, and Death Proof was sorely disappointing.

In this one, he only "wrote well" for star psycho Kurt Russell and for only one of the women in the large female cast -- Rose McGowan(pert, witty, sexy...doomed.) The rest of the girls got horrible dialogue but QT MIGHT have been excused -- he was writing a "grindhouse B minus" movie...on purpose.

"Rumor has it" that in the six years between Jackie Brown and the Kill Bills, QT CHANGED. Hung with a younger film nerd horror crowd(Eli Roth.) Drugs, maybe(but who doesn't in Holywood.)

Kill Bill (which was two movies split in half) and Death Proof(which was one half of a fake double bill) were pretty experimental and exploitational.

QT "returned" with the solidity of Inglorious Basterds in 2009 and from then on...the scripts - and the dialogue were great again.

CONT

[–] roger1 (3876) 2 months ago

PS. Did Death Proof mean "QT can't write women?" Not really. He wrote well for Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, Pam Grier and Bridget Fonda in Jackie Brown, Uma Thurman and Darryl Hannah in Kill Bill...it seems like Death Proof was a one off...though I did love that rock song and singers that sing it: "Dave, Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick, and Tich." Evidently a REAL band, with a REAL song("Hold tight.")

[–] CaptBeefBlower (335) a month ago

He's made nothing outstanding since Pulp Fiction, and nothing good since Jackie Brown. Everything since then has been overly referential and wrapped up in his nerdy movie world. I feel that he didn't have enough life experience before becoming successful, and doesn't have enough ideas, originality or philosophy to progress beyond integrating various influences. He has no voice of his own and nothing to say.

[–] AnthonySocksss (1201) a month ago

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