By now you have probably heard about Quentin Tarantino and the leak of the Hateful Eight early draft script. If you haven't, click on the link and read about it.
People seek out spoilers. They want to know what they are getting in for. Other people want to avoid them, so that they can have a pristine first experience with their media. Neither is a wrong approach to doing it. Some directors (*cough*J.J. Abrams*cough*) have gone so far as to lie about the things in their movies to avoid spoilers. That rankles me, more than a little bit, but it really isn't the point of this post.
I completely understand why Tarantino reacted the way that he did. This has nothing to do with spoilers, it has to do with trust. Obviously, a joke could be made about how you shouldn't trust Hollywood agents in the first place, but that would be too easy. Whether Tarantino makes this movie or not doesn't really ultimately, I don't think that I've seen one of his movies since Kill Bill anyway. When Tarantino is on as a director and writer, he is phenomenal. When he isn't, his work leaves me cold.
Some may see this as Tarantino "robbing" them of a movie, but he doesn't actually owe anyone the creation of a movie. It is nice for his fans when it happens, but it isn't something that he owes anyone. Getting angry with Tarantino is misplaced, what people should be getting angry at is the institutionalized permissiveness that allows someone to think that it is okay to share something, like a script, with whomever they want. Some have blamed this on Tarantino, saying that he should have watermarked his scripts to protect them. No controversy is complete without a little victim blaming, I guess.
Hopefully this will open up some discussions in Hollywood, and the general public. You're never going to stop the mentality of people wanting to be "in the know." After all, how do you think that you end up getting bloggers? But hopefully people will start understanding that if you don't play right with other people's toys, they can take them away. This time it just lead to a movie being shelved. What happens the next time when someone decides that they don't want to keep making movies because of all of this?
People seek out spoilers. They want to know what they are getting in for. Other people want to avoid them, so that they can have a pristine first experience with their media. Neither is a wrong approach to doing it. Some directors (*cough*J.J. Abrams*cough*) have gone so far as to lie about the things in their movies to avoid spoilers. That rankles me, more than a little bit, but it really isn't the point of this post.
I completely understand why Tarantino reacted the way that he did. This has nothing to do with spoilers, it has to do with trust. Obviously, a joke could be made about how you shouldn't trust Hollywood agents in the first place, but that would be too easy. Whether Tarantino makes this movie or not doesn't really ultimately, I don't think that I've seen one of his movies since Kill Bill anyway. When Tarantino is on as a director and writer, he is phenomenal. When he isn't, his work leaves me cold.
Some may see this as Tarantino "robbing" them of a movie, but he doesn't actually owe anyone the creation of a movie. It is nice for his fans when it happens, but it isn't something that he owes anyone. Getting angry with Tarantino is misplaced, what people should be getting angry at is the institutionalized permissiveness that allows someone to think that it is okay to share something, like a script, with whomever they want. Some have blamed this on Tarantino, saying that he should have watermarked his scripts to protect them. No controversy is complete without a little victim blaming, I guess.
Hopefully this will open up some discussions in Hollywood, and the general public. You're never going to stop the mentality of people wanting to be "in the know." After all, how do you think that you end up getting bloggers? But hopefully people will start understanding that if you don't play right with other people's toys, they can take them away. This time it just lead to a movie being shelved. What happens the next time when someone decides that they don't want to keep making movies because of all of this?