The Hateful Eight

Tarantino has said he'll only make ten films, and then retire. I don't know if he still stands by this statement, and if he does we won't know for sometime if he'll fulfill it. Either by choice or (probably knowing Tarantino) by design, The Hateful Eight is his eighth film. The gaps between his films have tended to be around three years, although the gap to Kill Bill was longer, and the gap to his next film will almost certainly be so as well. Given that, he can expect to have done ten films by the time he's sixty. Still young enough, certainly, but I think a lot depends on what kinds of films he gets to do over the next few years. As you may know, The Hateful Eight almost didn't happen after the screenplay was leaked. His turn to westerns after Inglourious Basterds wasn't too surprising. He could be trying to make the perfect film in each genre (somewhat like Kubrick). A science-fiction film could therefore be a possibility in the future, although we know his next film will be about the Manson family. This film certainly feels like an attempt to make a perfect, conceptually complete piece. The intensity of the setting, action and dialogue heightens this. It is, if anything, perhaps too contrived, but that is only on reflection. The experience of watching it is immersive. Your allegiance does shift through the film, as your suspicion lingers on different characters, but I wonder what this would be like on a second viewing. Why the narration halfway through, though? The fourth-wall is broken, but to what purpose? It’s almost as if he did it just to remind us we were watching a Tarantino film. Every time I think I understand Tarantino, however, he surprises me. His influences are so vast and peculiar than you can never quite know what to expect. This, perhaps, is his greatest genius.