Quentin Tarantino has some bat blood! The iconic director took a shot at one of the stars of The Batman for their performance in a cult classic.
In many ways, Hollywood is an industry known for its sanitization. Every word out of a star’s mouth is often ran by layers upon layers of publicists. This is not something that can be said about Quentin Tarantino. The director has always been one of the most vocal folks in Hollywood, letting his opinion be known on everything from Marvel movies to obscure indie flicks.
Recently, Quentin Tarantino revealed his top 20 movies of the 21st century. It’s a discussion that got pretty dicey, with the director dropping some rather controversial takes. However, one of the most shocking was when Tarantino took a shot at The Batman star Paul Dano, calling him one of the worst working actors in Hollywood.
“There Will Be Blood would stand a good chance at being #1 or #2 [on my list] if it didn’t have a big, giant flaw in it,” Tarantino explained on The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast. “And the flaw is Paul Dano. Obviously, it’s supposed to be a two-hander, but it’s also drastically obvious that it’s not a two-hander. [Dano] is weak sauce, man. He is the weak sister. Austin Butler would have been wonderful in that role. He’s just such a weak, weak, uninteresting guy. The weakest f***king actor in SAG.”
Quentin Tarantino’s Hollywood Feuds
Anyone familiar with Quentin Tarantino’s movies knows that he is a man of extremes, for better and for worse. While many may see this as an over-the-top reaction to Paul Dano’s performance in the film, it’s likely that the director has no bad blood toward The Batman actor. Even in the same podcast, he called out Martin Scorsese in a similarly exaggerated way for his film catalogue this century.
Perhaps the most interesting thing to come out of Quentin Tarantino’s comments is the realization that this statement couldn’t have been made in old Hollywood. The studio system was so tightly controlled before Tarantino made his rise with Resevoir Dogs that no director would have the platform to speak out against an actor in this way. So even if Batman fans may chafe at how he addressed Paul Dano, it’s at least the sign of a more open industry.
The Batman sequel is currently set to hit theaters on October 1, 2027. Stay tuned for the latest news regarding Matt Reeves’ The Batman universe.
