Quentin Tarantino has revealed what led him to agree to allow David Fincher to direct the sequel to Once Upon A Time In Hollywood.
The Adventures Of Cliff Booth is currently in production, the follow-up to 2019’s film about fading actor Rick Dalton, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, and his stunt double Cliff Booth (Brad Pitt) as they navigate Hollywood in 1969 amid the looming threat of the Tate murders.
The new film will be based on an original script from Tarantino, but it was confirmed in April that he would not direct the film, instead giving his approval to Fight Club and Seven director Fincher.
Now, in an episode of his podcast The Church Of Tarantino, he has explained what was behind the decision.
“I think me and David Fincher are the two best directors,” he said. “So the idea that David Fincher actually wants to adapt my work, to me, shows a level of seriousness towards my work that I think needs to be taken into account”.
Pitt will return in the title role, and he will be joined in thew cast by Carla Gugino, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Elizabeth Debicki and Scott Caan. It will be released by Netflix, although no release date has been announced.
In June, Pitt also spoke about why Tarantino won’t be directing the film. “This is something Quentin Tarantino wrote,” he said. “It’s an episode, not really a sequel, of the character from Once Upon A Time. He didn’t want to direct it at this point, so our friend David Fincher stepped in.”
The 2019 film was a critical and box office success, making $329.4million (£242million) and becoming the director’s second highest grossing movie after 2012’s Django Unchained. It also received five stars from NME and was “described as Tarantino’s most satisfying work in decades.”
In the same podcast, Tarantino also shed light on his decision to “pull the plug” on The Movie Critic, which had been due to be his 10th and final directorial effort. He revealed that although he “was very happy” with what he’d originally written as an eight-part series and translated into a feature-length script, he “wasn’t really that excited” when pre-production rolled around.
Despite saying he “really, really likes” the concept behind the film, he added that it felt more like a challenge to set himself: “Can I take the most boring profession in the world and make it an interesting movie?”
“Every Tarantino title promises so much, except The Movie Critic,” he explained. “Who wants to see a TV show about a fucking movie critic? Who wants to see a movie called The Movie Critic? If I can actually make a movie or a TV show about somebody who watches movies interesting, that is an accomplishment.”
