Quentin Tarantino has delivered a burning verdict on the state of modern Hollywood, describing the industry as a “flavourless sausage factory” and admitting he would rather read a book than watch most of what it is currently producing.
Writing for Sight & Sound magazine, the Oscar-winning director didn’t hold back.
“Flaws, implausibilities, audience pandering, miscast performers or just plain stupid shit usually torpedoes every new movie coming out of the flavourless sausage factory that used to call itself Hollywood,” he wrote.
“These days, the entire concept of what is a movie is more inclined to inspire contempt in me than generosity. Which is fair enough, because by comparison the movies of the last six years make the 80s seem like the 30s.”
He acknowledged a small handful of exceptions, Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story from 2021 and Kevin Costner’s Horizon: An American Saga chapters from 2024 among them, but described his general experience of new cinema as a far cry from the “magical land of enjoyment” that once made him love film above all other art forms.
There was, however, one recent release that broke through his defences entirely: The Rip, the Netflix crime thriller directed by Joe Carnahan and starring Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.
The January release follows two Miami-Dade police officers who uncover corruption tied to $20 million of cartel cash, with a cast that also includes Steven Yeun, Teyana Taylor, Sasha Calle and Kyle Chandler.
Tarantino was praising.
“A suspenseful new movie has come out that did grab me and held me for its entire duration,” he wrote.
“The film is an exciting cop thriller with a novel premise that manages to deliver the goods in really clever ways. The whole package worked for me: Carnahan’s direction, the splendid cast, the look of the film, but the real powerhouse component of this splendid collection is the sensational screenplay by Carnahan and Michael McGrale.”
