Why Quentin Tarantino won’t lie

Director explains why he had to use graphic ways to depict atrocities of slavery in Django

Last updated: September 16, 2018 | 01:17

5 MIN READ

REUTERS

Q: What would you say to black filmmakers who are offended by the use of the word “nigger” and/or offended by the depictions of the horrors of slavery in the film?

Quentin Tarantino:

Q: Well, guess what? You succeed at that. One of the things that will disturb people much more than the use of the n-word, or much more even than the horrors of slavery, was Samuel L. Jackson’s amazing depiction of Stephen. His character, Stephen, makes Stepin Fetchit look like Malcolm X. Did you write that or did Sam riff on that? Was he improvising?

QT:

Q: Why was it important for you to set up an opposition between the baddest black cowboy in the West, as Django, and the biggest Uncle Tom in the history of film, as Stephen? Why is that binary opposition important to your narrative structure?

QT:

Q: Oh, the greatest economic boom in the history of the United States up until that time was from the cotton plantations in Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia.

QT:

Q: And you named that explicitly by including the tale within the tale, the myth within the myth.

QT:

Q: I remember those characters and hated them. So creepy.

QT:

Q: Well, it is an award-winning performance. It is so diabolically evil and selfish and self-loathing.

QT:

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