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IFH 480: Making Quentin Tarantino’s Lost First Feature Film

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Now, I was scanning the web the other day, and I came across a book about the making of Quentin Tarantino‘s first feature film. Quite fascinated that someone took the time to dig into the unreleased, My Best Friend’s Birthday, which I’ve spoken about a bit on my podcast and also written a couple of articles about the film. So, as per usual, I invited the author, Andy Rausch to the show to talk a bit more about his book.

Before this interview, I did not know that Andy has spent years interviewing other prominent industry names and has authored over forty non-fiction on specific works of established entertainment contributors.

Writing forty books is no small feat.

Some of Rausch’s publications include Turning Points in Film History (2004), The Films of Martin Scorsese and Robert De Niro (2010), Making Movies with Orson Welles, a Gary Graver memoir, and Fifty Filmmakers: Conversations with Directors from Roger Avary to Steven Zaillian (2008).

But today, l would like to get into the weeds on Rausch’s 2019, My Best Friend’s Birthday: The Making of a Quentin Tarantino Film book, which is the story of a group of friends who set out to make their own movie in 1983, financing it with Tarantino’s minimum-wage earnings from his job at a video store. In most biographies and Tarantino histories, this unfinished $5,000 film is mentioned only in passing and is looked upon as little more than a curiosity. But with this oral history, author/editor Andrew J. Rausch details how each of the friends came together, other early film projects they worked on, and how they ended up making (or trying to make) a black-and-white screwball comedy.

Check out the show notes below for links to some of Andy’s other books, all available on Amazon.

Enjoy my chat with writer, Andy Rausch.

Alex Ferrari 0:12
I'd like to welcome to the show Andy Rausch man, how you doing, Andy?

Andy Rausch 0:15
Hey, how's it going, man?

Alex Ferrari 0:16
I'm good, man. I'm good. Thank you so much for your patience. On forgetting it's getting us together. It's been. It's been a minute, but we're here now. It's been a it's been a little while, but Oh, good things, you know, all good things come to, for those who waits to get this thing together. So we're on here. Now I was scanning the the the World Wide Web the other day. And I came across your book about the making of Quentin Tarantino's first, quote unquote, feature. And I was fascinated that someone took the time to dig into the unreleased film, my best friend's birthday, which I've spoken about a bit on the on the show and also written a couple articles about it. And done in just in there's there's some of it available online to people to watch and stuff. But I really love to get into the into the weeds on it. So for those who don't know, where Quintin got his start, can you kind of talk a little bit about his origins and getting into into this project?

Andy Rausch 1:25
Okay, well, one of the things that the book focuses on in some of the the even earlier projects that Clinton had worked on my best friend's birthday was the first one that he directed, but he'd helped out and on some other films, it was basically the, essentially the same crew that worked on those. And so really, it evolved. So he worked on these are no budget movies, shot in people's backyards on you know, basically on video, and and these were in the early 80s. And, like, there's one where, you know, Quinn's the bad guy, and everybody talks about it, but there's no, you know, they were like, He's great. But you know, there's no, there's no footage left of it. And, you know, that was, I believe, directed by alcohol, which is a member of that group that everybody talks about outs passed on now. But um, you know, and I think that was kind of a mix of, I'm trying to remember. It was kind of like assault on precinct 13. Meat, something else I can't even remember. But then like Quinn, and I think Craig Hammond who co wrote my best friend's birthday, were the bad guys, if I remember correctly in that movie, and they don't exist anymore.

Alex Ferrari 2:37
they don't exist anymore. And they don't, none of those footage exists anymore.

Andy Rausch 2:41
No, not as far as I know. And he worked on some other stuff here in there. So he ends up getting them Well, not really even getting the money, he ends up getting the desire to make his own movie. So he talks to his friend Craig Hammon, they come up with this idea. So they're going to make a movie, they have no money, Quentin works a minimum wage job, as everybody knows that video archives. They have no money, but they have this, this desire. So Craig writes a script at the time for my best friend's birthday, which is a very, very short script at the time. And it's a screwball comedy, which that's one of the things I find interesting here is that not only could I with this book, shark, the evolution of Quentin, as a filmmaker, as a writer, as you know, a creative, but also, it's interesting, because we as we think of him as Mr. Gun, you know, he talked about that one time, everybody thinks of me, as Mr. Gun, he does crime, or he does Western something where, you know, people are going to get shot and all that good stuff. And, but this was a screwball comedy. So then, and so Craig writes a script, when it comes in and expands it, somewhat, rewrites it, but then they go out and they shoot and they have to shoot piece by piece by piece. They're out stealing shots, because they can't afford, you know, locations that can and well, and what's funny, I'm skipping around, but on the film that they shot before that Warzone. There was a time when they were there that's detailed in the story in the book and is very funny, where they were stealing shots. And so they all have these guns, and they're, you know, supposed to be tough guys, and there's a motorcycle and the cops show up and, and aim their guns at everybody and make them lay down on the ground. And what's really funny, and this is the great part about an oral history, where it's all told in the dialogue, is it some of the people are like, you know, I Clinton's like, we weren't scared at all. And if someone else is like, we were all crying and you know, and it's just it's completely different. These different takes on in an oral history is great, because it gives you this Rashomon kind of story where you have all these different perspectives which which are different generally, even if it's something that just happen But when you you take a story that happened in the 1980s, and you tell it, you know, you're gonna get different versions of that. So anyway, they're making my best friend's birthday on Quinn's minimum wage salary. on film. on film. There's right on film. Yes, they're shooting this one on film. And so they're just shooting it little by little over time. I guess a lot of the scenes, they end up improvising or they take a nugget of what was in the script. And they, they come up with something new. So at the time, Clinton's acting teacher was Alan Garfield, who's in a lot of great films like the stunt man, and, you know, things like Beverly Hills Cop to all kinds of stuff. And so he gets Alan Garfield to do a scene. He gets Brenda Hillhouse, who is one of his acting teachers from his first acting school to come and do this scene with Alan Garfield, and Brenda and people will remember from from dusk till dawn, she's the one that they kidnap. And Richie kind of gets a little creepy with her. And you know, when George Clooney Seth comes back, there's blood everywhere. And that's what's left. Oh, yeah. Also in his er episode, and she's the mother of little bush, in the famous Christopher Walken. I had a watch in my ass thing. Yeah. And so anyway, he gets these, this is a one of the most telling representative scenes of how they had to shoot with no budget. So they needed for this scene, there's a bakery, but they they don't have a bakery. So they shoot it in video archives when nobody's around. So then it becomes a video store slash bakery. Which No, that doesn't make any sense. But it's funny, because you know, and I've worked on micro films, I've worked on some some shitty promo movies. And, you know, this is a thing you have to you know, adapt, improvise, make these things work. And not only that, but

they made Allen Garfield's character named Bill Smith, after William Smith, the great actor, who was one of when he was sitting on one of our movies, but he was one acquaintance favorite actors. So it becomes a Bill Smith video store slash bakery. And you don't they do this scene and again, kind of representative. So Alan Garfield brings his dog he's an acquaintance quote that he tells me for the book was, he's one of those guys. He's one of those bring your puppy around, you know, those guys. And, and Clinton says it very respectfully because he loved Alan Garfield, but the dog gets into the case and eats the cake. While they're they're doing the dialogue scene, then when they need the cake, the cakes eaten by the dog. And I mean, it's just a kind of a comedy of errors.

Alex Ferrari 7:51
Now, you you interviewed you, you and you actually interviewed Quinn for part of this book? Yeah.

Andy Rausch 7:56
Yeah. I had tried to interview Quentin for years. I met him in 1999 it when he used to do the film festivals in Austin, at Rick Linklaters. Yeah, thing. They were the first Alamo Drafthouse. And I was working on my first book was supposed to be about printing. And I think I kind of scared Quentin away at that time, because Jamie Bernard was writing the intro. And Quinn had a falling out with Jamie Bernard, who wrote his first biography. So I kind of think what happened was, he associated me with her, and he didn't want to be involved. He was very nice. But all of a sudden, people were calling back saying, I'm not supposed to talk to you. And so I knew kind of what was going on. I kept working on the book on and off. did more books. I mean, I've got 46 books out this year, I think and God bless you. Life otherwise, but so anyway, and I was gonna do this book on all acquaintance films, because at the time I started, there were two biographies. It was one by winsley Clark's and there was the one by Jamie Barnard but I wanted to do a kind of a companion to the film's which is funny now to think because I started that in 1997 when all there was was, you know, that he directed was Reservoir Dogs Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, then you know, it's also going into True Romance Natural Born Killers, God Natural Born Killers that and, um, and, you know, from dusk till dawn and True Romance. So anyway, I worked on this book on and off for a million years, I picked up this book called Quentin Tarantino FAQ. Well, is the same book. So I ended up just throwing that book out. And I couldn't be interviews I had done with a lot of cool people like Monte Hellman and Roger Avery. Tom savini. I went ahead and I put it out a few years ago. That was my first book on Tarantino. So that's called conversations on Quentin Tarantino. Right that came out in the night. 2015 2016 Now we kept trudging forward and and it all came together, man.

Alex Ferrari 10:08
So Alright, so you're so they're starting to shoot this thing. And for my understanding the lore is that they shot this over like a year or something like that or

Andy Rausch 10:17
more. It was several years, I don't remember specifically,

Alex Ferrari 10:21
I was a while, it was like, on the weekends, whenever I'm whenever they can, like, grab enough money to buy some film stock or some short ends to go shoot this thing.

Andy Rausch 10:29
Right? Well, then people's hair would change, it would become longer, shorter, longer, you know, you know, all of these different things. You know, the lead actress, she moved away, and then they had to have her come, she was teaching, they had to have her come back.

Alex Ferrari 10:47
So it didn't I mean, I've heard this story 1000 times from so many filmmakers that I've interviewed over the years, but hearing it the kwinter and team have started like, it's so it's so much it's so much fun. Because, you know, in so many ways, you know, quitting is arguably one of these mythical filmmakers. He's, he's one of you know, he's he's one of the most interesting filmmakers of his generation, let alone and all the film history. So he's almost at that kind of like mount Hollywood or a guard on Mount Hollywood. But to know that he started like us mortals. It's interesting, too, it's always interesting to see how they got started, because most people just think he just showed up with Reservoir Dogs and exploded and that was the end of it. But it took a while to get there. Now, when he was putting this all together, they basically were financing this through Quinn's minimum wage job at a video store.

Andy Rausch 11:40
Right. And I think some of the other people would occasionally chip in money. But it was pretty much just with his minimum wage job. And who it was to save up for a month or two to be able to rent the camera for a night, then they'd shoot for 24 hours straight in or whatever they could write, you know, when on short ends and

Alex Ferrari 11:59
right, and how did they edit this over? they edited this on flatbed?

Andy Rausch 12:03
Well, that's part of the problem. You know, so Quentin waits a long time to edit it, because they had to. Yeah, they had to hire somebody to edit. So they hire somebody to help edit at one point, but that didn't really work out. Well. Quinn ends up renting a flat bed, and finding out eventually that the movie wasn't what he thought it was. And that's kind of the we'll get there, I'm sure. But that's sort of the story of where the movie ends up being. I wanted to say two things about this book. One, I thought it was important because I wanted to show the evolution of him as a filmmaker, people think, as you said that you just somebody that's that gifted just evolves from the you know, they're they just pop out of the womb, and they're fully formed. And that's not the case, you know, with anybody I had seen. There was a lot of talk about Stanley Kubrick's first film, your desire. Yeah. Right. And, you know, in Stanley tried to suppress that coming out later on. But it's important because again, it's a documentation of his, like, it doesn't take away from the things he did later on. It only helps us to see his evolution as an artist. And so there was a time I tried to get Quentin for this book. Couldn't get him, I made my last plugin. I said, I think you probably want to suppress this, but you shouldn't. And here's why. yada, yada, yada. But I was interesting. When I interviewed him, he said, No, I don't want to suppress this, like Quentin still loves this movie. He knows it's problematic. But he loves it. And he still has most of it. The other thing I wanted to get to was, is that what this book is really about, because people think well, how can a whole book just be about this movie? And that's true. So what this book actually is, is it in three parts. The first part is sort of the biggest thing we've seen on Clinton's life. And all of those people in his sphere, leading up to my best friend's birthday, it's called I think it's been a while since I wrote it, I think it's it's something like the players come together. And what it is, it's, again, the most detailed look at video archives, all of that, Roger Avery. And you know, I interviewed all of these people for the book, including Avery whom I've interviewed several times, and, and it's a really cool book, but it shows how they all met, and then you know how they get to a place where they're going to make movies. Then the second part is them making movies. So it starts out with all of the little movies they work on, and how they get to my best friend's birthday. And then kind of just a blow by blow of as best anybody can reassemble. What that shoot was like, as told by Greg Hammond, Quentin Tarantino, Roger Avery, and all of the cast that was still alive that I could find and then The third part looks at the existing script. And it kind of with some running commentary, and it kind of shows us what that movie might have been. Now it's important to point out the script that is floating around everybody always thinks when they find it Oh, I found the script you know and but this script that's floating around is not actually the script. It's the closest back silmo assembly there is but what it actually is is when later on when Craig Hammond option the screenplay to Don Murphy, which is a whole other math that a lot of us probably know parts of this book details

Alex Ferrari 15:36
that well, what what was that? So the option this script to somebody else?

Andy Rausch 15:41
Well, what happened was Don Murphy who was quaintance enemy, who is the producer of Natural Born Killers, they had had that big falling out over Natural Born Killers. He is the guy that Quinten quote unquote, bitch slapped in a restaurant, and again ended up in a big lawsuit. So So Don Murphy,

Alex Ferrari 16:00
Murphy, bitch slap Quinn, when bitch slap, don't Murphy, that makes more sense,

Andy Rausch 16:04
I've got everybody's consensuses is that the main reason Don Murphy wanted to option this script was the piske went north. So he goes to Clinton's old writing partner who loves Clinton to this day and never wanted to screw Clinton over. But he went to him and he dangled money over his head and rock and and Craig thought this was going to be great for everybody. He thought it was gonna be great for him and Quinn, and it really didn't work out that way. Quintin blew up, and, you know, he got into a fight and, and that's documented in the book, too. But I'm in everybody's words. But at that time, what Craig did was essentially take all of the things that they improvised and wrote them into script form also. So it becomes this script that is sort of a kind of a weird bastardization of all of the forms of script that had existed and also the improvised scenes, and with Craig actually writing little things to kind of link some of the scenes together that there was no link for, because there were things that they ended up shooting that weren't in the original script. So it's kind of a, it's interesting to imagine what might have been, but we don't fully know what might have been

Alex Ferrari 17:15
so so then, but then eventually, obviously, done, Murphy did. So

Andy Rausch 17:18
Tom Murphy did get the rights to this to the script. He did. And there was a time when I knew Don a little and I'd asked him about the script. And he pretty much just admitted, I don't remember what his words are. And I don't want to get sued, because he is a TGS. Guy. But he basically admitted to the effect that that was why he optioned it, he had said that it was never going to get made. And I think it was known from the beginning, it wasn't really going to get made.

Alex Ferrari 17:46
So so then just on the in the, in the, in the in the timeline here, when my best friend's birth, my best friend's birthday is being shot, Quinn wrote True Romance and Natural Born Killers during this time.

Andy Rausch 17:59
Right. And those were originally one screenplay called the open road, which was something like a 600 page 500 page script. And what it was was you had the characters, most of those are kind of similar thematically, right, like True Romance and Natural Born Killers. We have the man and the woman some kind of criminal on the run. Okay. So in the original, the open road script. He has Clarence in Alabama, from True Romance, your story, but in the middle of they're doing these things. Also writing a screenplay, and that screenplay is Natural Born Killers. So it would go back and forth between as I'm told I've not seen that right. I have no idea if it you never really even know if these things really exist. You get bits and pieces of different people's stories, but that's what it's supposed to be so so

Alex Ferrari 18:55
then Natural Born Killers A True Romance were four together which I've never heard before. And by the way, I'm interested in seeing that movie. Look to see this eight hour miniseries. That would be so but then he broke those apart and sold those separately and he got some money for those if I'm if from what I said like it was the most money he'd probably ever seen at that point.

Andy Rausch 19:18
Right. And I would still contend True Romance is one of his. It's one of my favorites of His love, even though you know, he would have done different things than Tony Scott did. I still think it's brilliant in its way. And you know, when I said thumbs down to Natural Born Killers, it's only because I think Quinn's original script for Natural Born Killers is great. But the thing that Oliver Stone made is kind of a mess. There are people that love it love aspects of it. I think it's a huge mess. It's a big experimental student film with, you know, several million dollar budget. But

Alex Ferrari 19:51
yeah, no, exactly. I Well, I would have been very interested to see the Quinn natural born killer script, originally but what Oliver did was with Oliver But with but with that said, to romance when they released the like 10 disc, you know, Master collection of Quinn's work, they included romance as part of his filmography. That's how much love he has for that film. And he actually does a commentary track on entre romance talking about what he just loved what Tony did. And I mean, the scene between walking in and hopper. I mean, this is probably one of the best scenes in movie history. It's amazing. It's amazing. Yeah, it's it's remarkable. I mean, it was absolutely remarkable. So you're so he's making so during his selling the scripts, so he's trying to get into Hollywood, and trying to make a name for himself. And he knows where he wants to go. But he's trying he's, he's struggling. When When did he actually how old was he? When he actually finally did reservoir? Because he wasn't a young guy at I mean, young,

Andy Rausch 20:56
in his 30s. I don't remember exactly. But he was his early 30s. He and I'm, I don't even want to say I'm 48. So he's 28. And you know, and so by that time, he's in his 30s. And I mean, God bless him good for him that, you know, he made that breakthrough. You know, it's funny another thing to talk about real quick. Is that true romance went through a couple of hands too, before it got made because Samuel had died a was originally at the producer was going to make it as a low budget film. And at one time Oh, what is this thing? I can't think of his name the the director of like maniac and maniac cop. William Lustig was going to direct it. At one point, I tried to get Lustig to talk for the book, but I and I get it, he doesn't want to talk about it. I'm sure. That would have been interesting. Cuz that would have been a whole other level of low budget. And, you know, what that movie would have been?

Alex Ferrari 21:54
Yeah, it's just, it's always very, it's kind of like, Oh, it's like going back to Kubrick's and like, oh, would have been interesting to see his Holocaust film. It would have been interesting to see his Napoleon. Like, you know, you see these amazing artists, you're like, Oh, those are the paintings that never got painted. kind of thing. And now, so what so with with going back to my best friend's birthday, so it's taken him a few years to get this thing together. He's edited it together now. Where what happened to her there was a fire, that part of it was lost. What was that story about?

Andy Rausch 22:31
Okay, so the story up until this book has always been that there was a fire that lab fire that destroyed significant parts of the film. Now, as I'm proud of myself, I find out in this book that is not true. And even get Quentin to admit it. Okay, so what basically, there was some stuff destroyed, but it was so minimal that it didn't change the course of the film. What actually kind of kills the film, is it takes quite a long time. He's starting to, when he's editing it, he sees what he's a god. You know, and he talks about it at length in the book. It's not what he thought it was gonna be, he thought it was gonna be like, she's got to have it. Or one of these, you know, Richard Linklater kind of movie, this low budget, indie thing, and, and it's kind of a mess. And he's heartbroken and he's devastated. And he says that the writers of the Autobot of the biographies kind of came up with the story, that there was a lab fire but other people involved with the movie say that he told them there was a fire, kind of, I think maybe to just calm everybody down, get them off of the the truth of the matter is it went on for so long, he's starting to get some success. I don't blame him for eventually, you know, shelving it because even at its best, this movie would have never stacked up, it would have never fit on a shelf alongside, you know, True Romance, Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, those movies, the script is brilliant. There are scenes of brilliance that are written by both, you know, Craig and Quentin together, each of them separate. There are some brilliant moments in that script. The dialogue is amazing. But what was being put on film wasn't. But when learned from it, he learned how to direct actors. He learned these things. And there's a line that Quentin says in the book, I'm gonna screw it up, but I will get to the eventual heart of it. Quentin says very proudly of himself, and rightfully so. He says, I'm proud of myself, and I'm proud of this movie, because you know what, everyone else who would have made this movie and seen what it was, after all these years, would have given up and I didn't go, I didn't give up. I kept going, and I let that fuel me instead of sitting around mourning the loss of this movie and, and he's right, you know, he's absolutely right.

Alex Ferrari 24:52
Yeah, I mean, because I mean, it's I look, I mean, I've been a filmmaker for 20 odd years, I completely I completely feel I completely like sometimes you look at stuff You're just like, Oh, this is it's this is not what was in my mind. I didn't get I didn't get the crew that I needed. I didn't have the skill set, my tools were not prepared. When I when I had Richard on Richard Linklater on the show, he said one of the best lines I've ever heard about filmmaking, he says, eventually, hopefully, your skill set will catch up to your ideas. And I was like, oh, and he also said, everything is going to take twice as long and twice, it's going to be twice as hard to both those are great, great, great lines. But it's absolutely true. Because when you come out as a filmmaker, you're just like, all these ideas. And yeah, we'll get a techno crane here. We'll swing the camera there. We'll do this Scorsese shot here and but you don't have the skill set, you don't have the tools and quit. And at that point in his life, he was basically a video store clerk, honing his skills, honing, what he had learned and in taken in all throughout his life,

Andy Rausch 25:57
what and one thing that's cool about this movie, is that not only did he not go to film school, none of the people involved in this movie went to film school, as they all say, this was their film school. And I want to tell you how significant this movie is, when you think of it like this dream. You know, three movie directors come out of this little shitty movie. You get Quentin, obviously, Roger Avery goes on, Craig Hammond goes on, he should have had a bigger career. But either way, he goes on he makes Boogie boy. And he writes some action movies and stuff. I mean, three people go on to become professional filmmakers out of a $5,000 movie, shot over several years in people's houses.

Alex Ferrari 26:39
It's it's no, it's it's insane. And now I have to ask now, there is an existing version of this floating around the internet. How did that think get out? And what is that?

Andy Rausch 26:49
Well, there are only a it's not the whole movie, obviously. 30 minutes. It's funny. There's two different versions one has, there's an extra scene with Quentin crag talking a kind of a heartfelt scene. And it's in some of them, and it's not in others. This was the exact version that they were showing around at one time to be there. You know, kind of like a real demo. Yeah, who's got it up. And they were they were showing it around trying to get jobs. I've heard some speculation that, you know, it might have been Russell Bosler, or not Russell, but Rand. They're brothers, Rand vossler, who ended up being the associate producer on Natural Born Killers and worked on some other stuff. But I'm really don't know. I mean, I know that. Rand has a lot of this stuff at his house. I don't know. He took pictures of the of the film reels to prove to me that it existed and send it to me.

Alex Ferrari 27:53
He has the film we

Andy Rausch 27:55
Quinten holds no no grudge against whoever did release it. I think he's kind of happy about it.

Alex Ferrari 28:01
Where are you? I mean, because look at that. At the point he is in his like way, even when it was released, he had already done Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. And Jackie, I'm like, you're growing up. You

Andy Rausch 28:10
have nothing to be embarrassed about by that point.

Alex Ferrari 28:13
Yeah. I mean, when when you make Pulp Fiction, you're pretty much you got a pass for life. As far as like other stuff that you might have done. That's not particularly great, because you are you are who you are. But so then I have to ask who owns the rights to this thing? Because people are putting it out there. I've seen it for sale. In some places, obviously bootleg versions,

Andy Rausch 28:33
it's definitely Quentin owns the rights. But I don't know, I don't think anybody's actually, you know, claimed it or anything. Quinn does say that he wants to maybe one of these days. Who knows Quintin comes up with a lot of ideas of things he wants to do and make and they often don't get made. And I get it, you know, he's got big ideas. But he talked about sometimes he thinks he'd like to have somebody edit this together, just for him to just have a version of the whole movie, edited together. And, and, oh, I'm just gonna tell you this. It's great story where he talks about I don't, he didn't say who the filmmaker was. But he says he shows this famous filmmaker early on. After Reservoir Dogs, he shows him the footage of my best friend's birthday. And the guy says what you should do and it's a foreign filmmaker. And he says what you should do is you take this, and you go out in a boat, and you wrap this film up in some kind of cement and you throw it as far as you can into the ocean. And, and I mean, it's funny, but Quintin is still proud of it. And he talks about how proud he is of certain scenes, especially the one with Alan Garfield, which was why I highlighted that one. But

Alex Ferrari 29:45
yeah, and I mean, this is a perfect candidate for Criterion Collection one day, like it's a perfect candidate for relief through criteria. Perfect as an extra on

Andy Rausch 29:55
one of those movies. I'd love to see that, you know, let me know the criteria has come out and you have All kinds of extras that'd be perfect.

Alex Ferrari 30:02
Right? And it also needs to be properly remastered, properly edited, properly mixed all of these things. So so so the full movie exists in reels at this point.

Andy Rausch 30:14
I think it's something like 98% 95% enough that you can put something together.

Alex Ferrari 30:21
But it's not. But it's never been cut together in a way. It's so basically there's a lot. So basically, the only thing that we've seen online is a demo reel that was cut together to kind of try to get gigs for quitting and the other filmmakers. And that's why that exists. But the raw footage of that film sits in Quentin's vault somewhere where he could eventually if he feels so inclined to

Andy Rausch 30:46
become interesting is a bit. I'm not sure how this works out, because I believe Quentin has footage, but then ran vossler has, I believe all of the footage, so it's really confusing as to and they don't talk anymore. They most of these people had some sort of falling out at some point. And I mean, it just it happens. But yeah,

Alex Ferrari 31:07
egos get involved.

Andy Rausch 31:08
I know, you know, and egos all of it. But you know, somebody is curious. I don't really know. You know, if there's two sets of the I don't know, that's really

Alex Ferrari 31:19
that's never talked about that when you talk to them?

Andy Rausch 31:22
Not really, you know, well, you know, it was great was, when I talked to Quentin, he was in the editing room of once upon a time in Hollywood, took a break, he calls, and we talked for an hour and a half, and it's great. And I save it for the end because I don't want to make you mad. Because, you know, I mean, I, I need this. So I get to the end. And I say so. You know, I asked him about the fire and I tell him somebody showed me a photo and stuff and and he says, you know, well, you know, and and he kind of tells me then he hadn't we we end the call. He calls me five minutes later and he goes, Okay, let me tell you and he says, you know, the biographers made up that story. I didn't, you know, and so I mean, I do love it, you know, he's concerned about, about the image stuff, but twins got to know he's well beyond that. No, it doesn't matter. He's secured his place no matter what.

Alex Ferrari 32:14
Oh, in cinema history. Yeah, there's nothing if you don't like him. He's a legend. No, yeah, you could either. You could either love them or hate them. But you can't, you cannot say that he's not a filmmaker. He cannot say that he's not an epic filmmaker, and that there's massive people who love his work around the world. He's probably the one that I mean, other than I think he probably is more recognizable in certain generations than Spielberg is now. But he's up there with Hitchcock and Spielberg and Scorsese. And

Andy Rausch 32:43
in fact, the people that don't know movies know his name, they might not know what he's done. But if you say Quentin Tarantino, they go, Ah, you know, and yeah, like Spielberg and Scorsese. They know these names.

Alex Ferrari 32:53
Yes. Like Hitchcock or Spielberg, you know, you know, even my mother who's probably seen maybe one or two of Spielberg movies knows who Spielberg is, right. You know, things like that. And it's Same thing for Tarantino. Like I've heard that name, he's, he's something he's done something that's fat. That's absolutely fascinating. It's really great to kind of just see the origin. And I'm assuming the book goes in much greater detail in this. But now how the relationship with Roger Roger Avery, how was that? That form? Because from my understanding, and I know, this is a different movie, but when he came into Pulp Fiction, Roger obviously is the CO writer of pulp fiction, but he he technically gets story credit, but not screenplay credit, I think. And, again, this is what I heard, because, you know, we're all filmmakers are like gossip queens. We're like a knitting circle. That quit and asked him Can I get the screenplay credit? You get the story credit, but if we win something, and that's why he's up there with the with the Oscar, what do you know about that? And how was and how did that relationship build up? Start? Did it start in my best friend's birthday?

Andy Rausch 33:57
Okay. Okay, so first, they worked at my best friend's bar, sorry, they worked at video archives together. I believe Roger worked at another video store previously, and one of the owners of, of video archives. I'm trying to remember exactly how that works. It seemed like somebody's father owned it or something, I don't know. But he had worked at the other one and ends up coming to this video store and, and he talks him into interviewing Quentin, or, you know, to giving Clinton the job. And they talk about the interview in there, where it's basically like, he looks at him and says, You got the job and you know, so they become friends there. So they're making these movies, all these guys hanging out at video archives. They become friends. These two are super tight. Then when they make what so much so they're so tight and their voices at one time are so much in sync. You know that Roger Avery was the one that was brought in to rewrite the end of truth. romance when Tony Scott decided he wanted to make those characters live because they are at least Clarence dies in the integrity, no script, you know, he decides to make them live. Quinn refuses to write that scene. So they bring in Roger Avery. And you know, because they, at that time are in sync, I believe Avery gets brought in to write a scene for Natural Born Killers. They got cut, it was the one with the the big twin brother. muscle man, you know, so anyway, they're working on all these things together. This is where I'm gonna get in trouble. Okay, because there's a lot of talk about what they you know, Roger didn't deserve the credit in this and that, if you see Rogers script, what was it when demonium rains, okay, see a script for pandemonium rains. It's almost word for word verbatim for the second act of natural born air of pulp fiction, which is the bush stuff, all of the pawn shop stuff gets almost verbatim the same stuff. Okay. So I mean, he absolutely deserves the CO writing credit, he deserves the story credit. I like Clinton's mom a lot. Um, you know, we were friends. She's actually the one that kind of set me up Quinn. But, you know, she was telling me, oh, Roger, you know, he doesn't deserve the credit. And, look, it's what my mom would say if I was, you know, sure. But look, I'm not saying anything bad about either of them. They're both brilliant. They're both they're fantastic filmmakers. I, they did finally make up last year. Okay, on that I did an article for Diablo League, where Roger says we just connected last week. And so they are friends again. I don't know if they'll work again. But they're friends. They were meeting up and stuff. And you know, I'm there. But again, there's no reason for either of them to be mad at each other. And there's no reason for anybody to be mad at me for telling it because the truth of the matter is, they're both brilliant. They both had a hand in it. I love the movie. I love both of their contributions, if they do, right, or at least at one time, could write seamlessly, you know, kind of in the same voice.

Alex Ferrari 37:10
Which is, which is very interesting, because what was the rules of it? It was rules of attraction, right? Yeah. Which was, which is a brilliant film. I love rules of attraction. And even though he was good, too,

Andy Rausch 37:23
yeah. Oh, yeah. Can't

Alex Ferrari 37:25
leave Oh, forgot about that one. Yeah. But But Roger Rogers dialogue is it's fantastic. Quinn's dialogue is something so specific, and it is more stylistic. It weaves itself in a way that it's so that's why you could see that in my best friend Nicole. It has a cadence to it. It's, it's, it is really a remarkable, like, even in my best friend's birthday, you can start seeing sparks of that. There are scenes of that you just going Oh, there it is. I don't know what this other stuff is. But there's the quittin that you can start seeing it coming out. in it. It is there was just nobody. It's like It's like listening to us working or Kaufman. You know, their dialogue in the way they write their movies are just so specific. Yes. Specific to them. It is an hour. Mamet. Exactly,

Andy Rausch 38:20
yeah, yeah. You started listening to the best mom to me in my, in my best friends. But there's so many of these movies to keep together here. But um, the best time there's a monologue in my best friend's birthday. That is just brilliant, where and I think it's just as good as his later stuff. We're Quentin's giving this, this long thing about how many it's absurd, and it's so funny and weird. And he's talking about it. Four years old, he got depressed, and he was thinking about suicide. And he's like, four years old. It's ridiculous. And I think he was depressed because he found out Eddie Cochran died. It's just this ridiculous thing. But he gives this long monologue about how he turned on the television. And there was a good episode of Partridge Family on and the episode of The Partridge Family made him happy and he decided not to kill himself. And it's, it's absurd, but it's just the writing is brilliant. It's already got the pop culture references from his early work. I mean, we noticed he's gotten away from that some Well, I say that but then once upon a time in Hollywood just takes us right back to that it's all pop culture but

Alex Ferrari 39:28
Well, I mean, like when you're when you're I mean, you can't do as much pop culture in Django Unchained in glorious back door historical films, but when he's in modern times, or even not even modern times, like still once upon a time in Hollywood was what the 60s right. So but you could still do pop culture within its its thing, right? I mean, yeah, it's, I mean it What can we say that hasn't been said about Quentin Tarantino and about his work. It's It's remarkable. That's why I wanted to kind of dig into the weeds about this book and about his film because there is So much misinformation out there. And there's not really a lot of people a lot of information about the film because no one has taken the time to go deep into it like you have. This is the reference for this film,

Andy Rausch 40:10
I will say I'm incredibly proud of this. And I'm not I'm not somebody who's generally proud of their work. But I always in that way I should be, but I'm, you know, but I always wanted to write about Quentin. But he didn't want to do something that had already been done 10 times. One thing was was that, you know, in all of the other books, the biographies and stuff, it's like, two paragraphs, right about that movie. That's it, maybe two paragraphs. Right. Right. Right. And so I thought it was really fun to talk about that, but also to have him have them talk about some of the other early movie stuff. And that was kind of fun, too, because I'd never heard much of anything about at all about those, you know. So that was pretty neat. You know, and I am excited to be able to contribute to it and, and I think Quentin thought it was something special. And

Alex Ferrari 41:00
yeah, Quinn likes, likes the book. He likes the book, right? Yeah. Yeah, cuz he got it. Yeah, I saw that. He gave it a nice little quote, as well.

Andy Rausch 41:09
The one thing I will say I messed up something, I made his mother Connie kind of unhappy. And it was a mix up, I took a piece of information, like a little biographical detail, because I didn't want to reach out and bother people all the time. And I assumed things in other people's books are going to be right. And, again, not enough, but I I took this little thing about his family having these interesting hobbies. And one of them was like, a carrier pigeons or something, and archery, and come to find out those were before Quentin was born. And so they got it wrong in the other book, too. But, you know,

Alex Ferrari 41:49
now, all in all, I

Andy Rausch 41:50
think it's pretty, you know, it's pretty good. And it shows us a real picture of who Quentin was. There's a lot in it about acting school, when they were at the James best acting school when they he and Craig met, and we're taking acting classes. And we have, you know, two of their acting teachers in it talking about Quinn's acting and how Quinn started writing his own scenes for them to act out. That was the beginning of, of when the writer and they said he would go to the movies. And he would take a little bitty flashlight with him and a pad and he would try to write the monologues down so they could do them. And this is how this started. He would try to write these monologues down out of these movies. So they could, you know, act them out in their scenes for acting class, but he couldn't write fast enough. So they would start as a monologue from a movie and he would just start making up shit. And it would become this really bastardized kind of cool monologue. But like when it was a Paddy Chayefsky one from Marty, but it just ends up with all kinds of wild shit. And several people say, you know, it was even better than Marty, which I mean. I mean, it's just crazy. And that's what inspires him to become a writer, which is fascinating. Now with quit, why

Alex Ferrari 43:07
did what was his fascination with being an actor? Because he, I mean, I've seen it's very well documented, he wanted to be an actor, you That was his, he thought that was his way in. And he did get that little spot and Golden Girls, which was the same person, as the person. What did did he ever talk to you a little bit about that? In your travels?

Andy Rausch 43:28
didn't really go much into it. But I mean, we did talk about the acting class. And

but you know, I think I don't know. You know, I think at the time, he thought that's what he could do. He maybe wanted to be an actor and a director. I don't think he I don't think he just knew he could be a writer. And I think the doors really opened up because of his writing. And, you know, once he found that he was on fire, and I will say this, everybody says, you know, he's a bad actor, and blah, blah, blah. And I know at times his acting can be questionable, but I don't give a fuck what anybody says. He's brilliant. And from dusk till dawn. He's perfect. And I've heard people make shitty remarks. I don't remember who it was. Somebody said, Oh, well, he's, he's, he's perfect when he plays a crazy manner. You know, if somebody's trying to diss him, I don't remember. But the thing is, he can really act. The thing is, if you look at his own movies, I and I contend that a lot of times, He's the worst thing in his own movies, his acting, but I think a lot of that comes from him taking away him trying to direct and act at the same time. Generally, when he's at he's directing other people's performances. He can look at them objectively, but you can't really look at yourself objectively that goes out the window. And I think that's why you see him get better performances and other people's things than it gives in his own. Yeah, it's not that those are always perfect, either. But

Alex Ferrari 44:48
yeah, and I think I saw I saw a video where he was pitching. It was like a small little video I think he did forgot what it was for, but he was pitching the Muppets a movie idea or something like that. And I was like, wow, that That's actually brilliant the way he, I mean, he's playing himself, but, but it was quite brilliant about it know his, I mean look at when you because I know a lot of people, you know say why did he cast himself in Pulp Fiction. I mean, arguably He's the worst actor in that group. I'm like you've got Sam Jackson, john travolta, Harvey Keitel. Tough,

Andy Rausch 45:21
tougher, most people are going to be the worst person in that room. I mean, what I would have liked to see was at one time Tony Scott and him were going to make a version of Elmore Leonard's killshot. And he was going to have he was going it was going to be him and De Niro. And if you read the novel, they're interesting characters, because De Niro is a hitman. Now, he would have been like an Indian Hitman, which would be kind of interesting. And it named rainbird. And then Tarantino would have been this guy named Richie Nix. And I really think he could have played that role. really well. The project went by the wayside, and we'll never know. But I think that would have been really cool.

Alex Ferrari 46:00
Is there anything in early includes early times that he was starting to write or just never kind of like scripts that he went that didn't get it or projects that you heard that he wanted to do and couldn't get done early, like early stuff?

Andy Rausch 46:16
There were like little westerns, and there was something about Elvis and there were, you know, things that he wrote. It was a really neat, I used to have it a long time ago, and I lost it in a flood. But there was, he had written a treatment early on before any was like, he was his version of a john woo movie. And it was like, about these guys robbing this hotel, like in Hong Kong, and then it ends up with all these, these big Mexican standoffs and stuff. And it was made a lot of stuff like that, you know, like little odds and ends. In the book, Linda Kay, who was one of the actresses in the movie, and also has these really two tiny parts in Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. In one of them, she's shot woman and Pulp Fiction. She's shot woman, like she's the one that gets shot. When in the middle of the street when Oh, the one that Yeah, I'm just trying to shoot Bruce Willis. Yeah. And the other one, she's shocked woman. And she's the one that I think they steal her car I can't read. He's one of the things after the robbery. And But anyway, she tells a story about when she was typing up Quinten scripts early on. And she talks about this very Hitchcockian scene, which the way she describes it is brilliant, that when they come up with any he didn't want to, he didn't know how to show this violence or make it look real. And so there is there's people arguing in the camera turns slowly, and you can hear this record playing. And I'm going to screw this up a little bit. And it just goes in this big 360. And you hear this a couple screaming at each other and fighting. And then it stops. And then you just hear the the middle of the record goes. And when it comes back around, there's just blood everywhere. And I mean, it's a lot neater the way she describes it, because you can get a visual picture of it. So I mean, I think that he always had cool ideas from the get go

Alex Ferrari 48:13
was like Reservoir Dogs when he just pans off the air cutting scene. Oh, right. Right. Yeah, he just pants off of that. And then he's like, no, that's that's the shot. Yeah, instead of actually seeing it. It's much more disturbing if we don't see it. But that's Hitchcock. That was his that was cocking a tool. It's It's It's pretty remarkable. You know, talking about quitting in his early his early works. And I you know, obviously I'm a fan. And I'm very grateful that you actually sat down and how long did it take you to write this thing,

Andy Rausch 48:42
man, I'm grateful. Man, I'd been trying to get an interview since the 90s with him, and he did some fact checking for the first book that fell apart before he found out Jamie was involved in disappeared. But you know, so it took a long time to get that. And then once we did get it, I couldn't get a specific time. Then I got to talk because he was editing he was wrapped up in this editing. So he sets a time and I wait and he doesn't call. So then the next day I go on a date and it's my first date with the woman I ended up marrying becomes my wife now. We're on our first date. I'm on. How does it work? No. The first night we go to this Italian restaurant. I've got my phone turned off because I don't think anybody I sure don't think Quentin's calling. We didn't set anything up Quintin calls like three or four times which is great for him for persistence and not giving up. And he was very nice. He's like the squinter Tino I thought we were, you know, did you want to talk and then I'm thinking it's never gonna happen now. So, still trying to set something up. We go on another date the next night. We lived in separate towns, I'm on the highway, it's nighttime. And Quintin goals and I'm in the car and I'm like, man, I, I'm so sorry. I really would like to record this and he's like, Oh, it's okay. And I'm thinking this is not going to happen, I've just fucked this up, it's just not gonna happen. And then any says I might call you later. So when I get there, me and my date are just sitting there all night just kind of waiting for Quentin to call, and then he doesn't call. And then finally it happens. And it was just like holy shit, you know, and, and it was the interview that you would want to have with Quentin. You know, cuz sometimes they can go bad. Sometimes people make him mad, and yada, yada. So you can be unhappy. He was the perfect interview. And people said, afterward when you're going to interview him again. There's no need to interview him again. I have the one perfect interview. And I found it sometimes. I mean, I've interviewed four or 500 famous people in my life. And I found that when you really enjoy somebody's work, and you have a shitty experience with them, you never look at that stuff the same way you never enjoyed the same right? Right guarantee knows work means so much to me, then I don't really want to risk any kind of bad thing. You hit you hit anything. He was very giving. I'm the biggest fan. I love his work. I don't care. I love his work. I also write nor fiction, and he's been the biggest influence him and Elmore Leonard. Brian, I love his work.

Alex Ferrari 51:15
Yeah, you hit you hit, you hit the ball, you hit you hit the home, run the first time up the bat with him, and I'm not gonna I'm not gonna take another swing. I'm good. I'm good. I'm gonna, I'm retiring from that. Right, I completely get it. Now, where can where can people find out more about you? And and the work you're doing? Where can I get the book?

Andy Rausch 51:35
The book is available of the easiest place always to get it as Amazon. You know, I have to say it's through bear manner media, which a lot of those you're not going to generally find those in the bookstores. The film book. genre has really changed in the 25 years that I've been riding. It's used to be they were everywhere, you know, and my earliest books were with Kensington and Chronicle Books, and they were everywhere. I'd go into, you know, Walmart, hey, here's my book, and it was awesome. And that doesn't really happen anymore. And so people think I'll just read on the internet, and even if it's wrong, that's all I need to know about that movie. And so, you know, I but bear manner media is great. It just they're one of the you know, these, the ones that are left are mostly smaller publishers. Amazon is always a good place, or the bear Manor media website. I don't know what the address is. We'll put it in the show notes, all books with them on everybody from Ed Wood. Quinta, Stephen King.

Alex Ferrari 52:35
That's all

Andy Rausch 52:36
I'm really proud of this book. And I hope people will go out and read it, not because of me, but just because it's a good story. You know, it's a good story. And Quinn Quinn, as usual, has a story to tell,

Alex Ferrari 52:47
as he as he always does. Now, I'm going to ask you probably the most the most difficult question you've ever had about quitting. Three of your favorite Quinn films.

Andy Rausch 52:59
Pulp Fiction is always going to be my favorite. It's the one that I saw first, and it just knocked me on my ass off, guess get going to see it over and over in the theater. I would take everyone I could get to go see it. Like you got to see this movie. And everyone around me was sick of hearing about it sick of seeing it. But anything was every time you'd see it with a different audience, the experience would be different. Because it's funny when you're with an audience, there are certain scenes where everybody laugh, and sometimes nobody laughs that same scene. So that's my number one. I got to tell you number two, I think is I didn't. I got I was really disappointed when Jackie Brown first came out because it wasn't what we expected. But man, I've come to love that movie. I think it is a masterpiece. I think it's because it's more quiet. It's more. It's just not what we expected. I think it holds up. I think it looks better with every passing year. I think the performances are fucking amazing. And they're wrong. More and more people contend that say that it might actually be his best movie. And that may be true Pope will always be my favorite But no, I mean, and then third religion. And really true romantic Jackie Brown. They're they're neck and neck.

Alex Ferrari 54:09
Yeah, that's it. And for people who are Yeah, cuz you and I are similar vintage. So people don't understand. You know, I saw Paul multiple times in the theater. I was in film school and Paul came out so can you imagine I was like down the street from my film school. I went to the theater and I remember seeing the first time and I remember falling literally falling out of my chair. laughing with some of the things he because the stuff that was being said on screen. It was it was a nuclear bomb going off in cinema. It really it really was. I mean, it was just so undeniable. I've never experienced I mean, I'd imagine it'd be I'd imagine it'd be watching Clockwork Orange in the 70s or 2001. In the 60s like that, you know, like it's undeniable what you're seeing in front of you. And it just doesn't. I don't think it's happened since Pulp Fiction, maybe people could argue that there's been other films, but

Andy Rausch 55:07
I don't remember anything in that way. I mean, all of a sudden you had all these people imitating it. And it really odd the rise of indie film really was when

Alex Ferrari 55:18
it was I mean, and I, when I was talking to Richard about that, I asked him about that. And he's like, Look, the independent film movement as we know, it started pretty much with slacker, you know, slacker and 91. And in the end, it was all about the 90s Sundance films, and that's when the market changed. And that was VHS and started making it, you know, a feasible option to make money with these things. What reservoir showed up and then mariachi and clerks and brothers, Macmillan and all those others every month, there was a new guy. It was a new filmmaker that popped up. But Pulp Fiction was the first indie that was a blockbuster. I mean, it was a blockbuster. And it was

Andy Rausch 55:59
they released it twice. Because if you remember when it got nominated for an Oscar, they brought it back out.

Alex Ferrari 56:04
Oh, and they kept kept making money and money was a 7 million. I mean, it wasn't gonna say it's more. It was like a seven or $8 million film. So it wasn't a huge budget. It was essentially an indie budget as as a Studio code because it was released by by Miramax. But it made hundreds of millions of dollars. And you're right like the the rip offs that came off of PIP fiction. There were so many of those movies everyone was trying to write like when but nobody could write. No one can no one can write like him. There's so many rip off. It launched. It mean, it was in the Zeitgeist almost immediately like it just like, I just remember before Pulp Fiction. After puppet. It's kind of like there's certain movies that changed cinema. And I felt like the matrix when the matrix came out, it just completely changed action movies forever, is like before the matrix and like, so many people rip that off. So many people try to imitate it. And pulp was that as well. And there's there's like Star Wars is like that there's certain movies that come along that just do that.

Andy Rausch 57:03
If it hadn't been printed in Pulp Fiction, I would have never written about film. I mean, I liked movies, like everybody, and I was still watching the big tentpole shitty movies and thinking they were just as good as everything else. You know, I would, I didn't start learning about them studying about film, you know, really finding a passion for a film until that movie. I walked out of that movie stunned, I went on opening night. If I'm not wrong, it was like, What September? I don't know, like ninth or something. 1994 maybe it's 20, something like that. And I walked down and I was just stunned. I couldn't believe this thing I just seen and I knew something had changed inside of me, not only on this screen, but inside of me. And I and I just I thought I want to write about film. And that was that was finding film books right after that. That was, you know, when I thought man, I want to write about film.

Alex Ferrari 58:00
And I'll leave you with a little story that I know about quitting that I heard firsthand from someone. I don't know if you know this, and I do know the director Sheldon lected. Who Lynch children back in the day. Yeah. So yeah, the Bloodsport he wrote he wrote Bloodsport and directed Lionheart and, and stuff well, he knows he knew when he was. He was about I think from from Argentina. He either introduced them to Lawrence or they, they knew someone who knows it, but he knew Quinn, somehow, like Scott Spiegel and Lauren Stein,

Andy Rausch 58:32
someone evil and Sheldon were in the same circle and

Alex Ferrari 58:34
right and that there was something there, right but but he told me a quitting story. And you might know this story, but he's the he was he was working on. Was it Lionheart? I don't know if it was a Lionheart or Rambo, but he was working on a pre production in an office. And right next to him, he walked in the room and quit and was there and quit and goes, Oh, my God, it Sheldon liked it. And he's like, holy cow. It Sheldon and then he suspended Of course, quitting because he has that encyclopedic knowledge of film, started nailing all his old films and stuff like that. And apparently quitting was he was a telemarketer on selling. He was up selling video stores around the country to buy more copies of certain films that were coming out that week. Like a you need five copies instead of three of, of, you know, sell to the killer bimbos. I mean, seriously, you do need and that was the end, I was like, wow, quitting was with cold calling, you know, video stores trying to upsell videos.

Andy Rausch 59:35
I gotta tell you for now and forever. Probably one of the greatest experiences of my life talking film was at that Film Festival and in 99, I had a few minutes to just talk to Quentin about. We talked about gangster movies. There was a movie called he had a movie on there called the debt collector, and or the death collector. That's it the death collector and it was an early movie with Joe Kashi and Frank Vincent before they had done Scorsese movies, and we got to talk for a few minutes. And he was just really nice and let his guard down and day you're talking about movies. It's amazing. And, and also I asked him about I just seen the apple, which is that famous movie that canon put out. There was supposed to be so bad and and he was it was awful. But I asked him about it. And Quinn said, Oh, yeah, that was one of the only movies I've ever walked out of. So it was something that associating Quentin walked out and Wow,

Alex Ferrari 1:00:33
he was everything. He watches everything.

Andy Rausch 1:00:37
Right. And for the record, if you ever talked to Guillermo del Toro, he's just like, Quinn. I mean, it's infectious. They both no evidence cyclopedic knowledge. No, I'd love to see those two guys talk about them. I think that would be amazing. I wouldn't even have to talk. I just sit back and watch that like a movie.

Alex Ferrari 1:00:52
No. When I was talking to Richard, it was the same thing. Richard has an encyclopedic knowledge of films. He was throwing out stuff that I'd either heard of in film school, or I'd just never heard of, and some film, I was like, What is going on? I thought I was a cinephile to a certain extent. But there are a whole other level and I'm like, Oh, I think Richard is probably up and up in the same levels as as Quintin is, but I didn't I I've met midway again, a couple times. But I've never had the chance to really sit down and talk to him. But I've heard that he has an encyclopedic knowledge of film as well. It's insane. But man, thank you so much for being on the show. Andy, I appreciate it, brother. Thank you for writing the book. And and being the historian that we needed for this film. So at least now there's a record a true record of what I

Andy Rausch 1:01:40
just said, you know, I'm editing a third book on when,

Alex Ferrari 1:01:42
okay, what's, what's going on.

Andy Rausch 1:01:44
It's called Pope cinema. And it's going to be a collection of essays by different writers on different aspects of Quentin's films. And I'm doing that with Kieran Fisher, who's a really talented writer from Australia.

Alex Ferrari 1:02:01
Nice, very cool. Well, we'll keep an eye out for that man. But thank you, Andy, again, so much. I appreciate you and in all 46 plus books that you've written about cinema so thank you.

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Edward Burns

Writer/Director/Actor
(Brothers McMullin, She's the One)

Richard Linklater

Oscar® Nominated Writer/Director
(Boyhood, School of Rock)

Eric Roth
HIGHLIGHT-GUESTS-SML-THE DANIELS-circle

Oscar® Winning Screenwriter
(Forrest Gump, Dune)

Oscar® Winning Writers/Directors
(Everything, Everywhere, All At Once)

HIGHLIGHT GUESTS SML - EDGAR WRIGHT
Jason Blum

Writer/Director
(Shaun of the Dead, Baby Driver)

Oscar® Nominated Producer
(Get Out, Whiplash)

Chris Moore sml
HIGHLIGHT GUESTS SML - ALBERT HUGHES

Oscar® Nominated Producer
(Good Will Hunting, American Pie)

Writer/Director
(Menace II Society, Book of Eli)

HIGHLIGHT GUESTS SML - EDWARD ZWICK
Marta Kauffman sml

Oscar® Winning Writer/Director
(Last Samurai, Blood Diamond)

Emmy® Winning Writer & Showrunner
(Friends, Grace and Frankie)

Free Training of The Week

FREE LOWER - GIL

How to Direct Big Action Sequences on a Micro-Budget

By Gil Bettman

Join veteran director Gil Bettman as he shares the secrets to directing big budget action on a micro budget.