14 DAY TRIAL // A while ago, Quentin Tarantino, one of the most talented and original directors of the day, said that his biggest accomplishment was the ability to “steal” from other movies and create his own style with the bits and pieces.
“I steal from every single movie ever made,” he said. “If my work has anything, it’s that I’m taking this from this and that from that and mixing them together.”
He wasn’t lying or exaggerating, just in case you were wondering. Tarantino’s originality is highly dependent on intertextuality, in that he can take stuff from other movies, from an angle to the composition of an entire scene, and turn it into something else by changing the context around it.
This is no classic Michael Bay-type of situation here, where he just recycles the same scene over and over again, bringing nothing new to the table with it.
The video below, posted by Jacob T. Swinney to YouTube, highlights just that: Tarantino pays homage to his favorite movies, which are usually westerns or karate films, by taking scenes that have the most impact on him and incorporating them in his work - but not before reinterpreting them.
This way, he pays homage to his favorites while also using what he “steals” in the creation of his distinctive vision. This isn’t laziness, this is genius.
