Several weeks ago, Quentin Tarantino attended two “Rise Up October” rallies in NYC. The rallies were to draw attention to the deaths of unarmed citizens gunned down by police officers. Tarantino spoke at the rallies, saying in part, “I’m a human being with a conscience … When I see murders, I do not stand by … I have to call a murder a murder, and I have to call the murderers the murderers.” Tarantino got push-back for those words in particular, although to be fair… even if he hadn’t said that exact sentence, I’m sure the police unions would be picking apart something else he said.
After Tarantino’s attendance at those rallies, the police unions threw a series of hissy fits that I still don’t really understand. They tried to say that Tarantino is a cop-hater, or that he called all police officers “murderers,” neither of which is true. The unions threatened boycotts of The Hateful Eight, and Harvey Weinstein is said to be somewhat concerned about the whole controversy. But Quentin isn’t backing down – he gave a slight clarification to the LA Times, but he’s sticking to the main point of his involvement with this cause: that some cops need to have their guns and badges taken away. That some cops kill unarmed citizens for no reason.
Last week, Quentin did a short interview with Chris Hayes on MSNBC, then Quentin appeared on Bill Maher’s Real Time on HBO. Here’s the Real Time video:
Tarantino says in part that the cops “are not dealing in a fair issue. They’re saying that I’m a cop-hater, which is slander, I didn’t say that, and they’re saying — they’re implying that I meant that all cops are murderers. And I wasn’t. What’s really sad about it is that we actually do need to talk to the cops about this. We need to get to the problem. We need to bring this to the table.” If you can’t watch the video, USA Today has a good summary here.
I actually give Tarantino props for not backing down, for standing his ground in the face of some of the scariest police push-back I’ve seen in a while. Jim Pasco, the executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, gave an interview to THR several days ago where he completely threatened Tarantino openly, saying in part: “We’ll be opportunistic. Tarantino has made a good living out of violence and surprise. Our officers make a living trying to stop violence, but surprise is not out of the question. Something is in the works, but the element of surprise is the most important element… The right time and place will come up and we’ll try to hurt him in the only way that seems to matter to him, and that’s economically.” WTF? No, seriously, WHAT THE HELL? Tarantino is literally trying to draw attention to police brutality, so the cop unions are like “hey, let’s behave like thugs and try to destroy this guy by any means necessary.”
