Last week, the film community and casual moviegoers alike were surprised by Quentin Tarantino’s decision not to make The Movie Critic (which apparently would have starred Brad Pitt and Paul Walter Hauser) as his tenth and final feature film. This news, according to Deadline’s initial report, QT “simply changed his mind.” Further, he will be “going back to the drawing board to figure out what the final [film] will be.”
Hmm. Perhaps part of this decision not to pull the trigger has to do with the pressure of this being a final movie (and publicized as such), so QT wants to make this project to reflect well upon his legacy. He surely doesn’t want to end with a Death Proof, which is actually a very fun throwback film that was erroneously released for a mainstream audience with commercial success in mind. However, is there any word from Tarantino’s camp on exactly why The Movie Critic fell by the wayside? Hollywood Reporter has some “close source”-type hints (and speculation below, too):
Those who know Tarantino (who had no comment for this story) aren’t saying precisely why he shelved the film, only that he had grown more excited by other ideas. “He has a lot of scripts that he’s thrown away,” says one longtime talent representative familiar with Tarantino’s thinking. The filmmaker had also previously emphasized that he liked the idea of “going out on top,” which perhaps added legacy-preserving pressure to his selection of a final film … He is a pure artist,” says a source close to the filmmaker.
As well, Hollywood Reporter surfaces some chatter about how Tom Cruise has been a dream “get” for Tarantino, and he reportedly had planned to use the Maverick man for the Cliff Booth role in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood. As everyone is aware, that role went to Brad Pitt, and that’s probably how it should be because Tom Cruise has already completed too many bonkers, life-risking stunts to be phased by hanging out shirtless on a rooftop.
However, there will surely now be speculation regarding “a Cruise-Tarantino pairing” because “The Movie Critic wasn’t actually going to bring them together.” So, whatever the final Tarantino film turns out to be, perhaps Cruise will ride into that danger zone. That isn’t officially a “Tom Cruise Destroyed The Movie Critic” headline, but you gotta admit that it’s a funky and funny possibility. Maybe Tom Cruise’s Feet even did the deed.
(Via Hollywood Reporter)