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Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 06:37
by Sneelock
If you’re on social media I’m sure you’ve heard about Maureen Dowd’s Uma Thurman interview. While nobody is going to be surprised about the Harvey Weinstein parts the Tarantino parts are pretty unsettling. She accuses him of insisting she do a dangerous stunt that put her in the hospital. She also describes him spitting at her and strangling her with a chain as part of his directing methods.

So, whattaya think?

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 08:41
by Sneelock
Sorry, had my hands full and was typing with my penis.
Here’s that interview ( if the paywall will let you read it)

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/03/opin ... angry.html

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 13:51
by Goat Boy
In the pursuit of their vision directors can push things over the line. Maybe he genuinely never thought it was particularly dangerous, maybe he thought it was worth the risk anyway just to get the right shot. I suspect the latter. Clearly Uma was uncomfortable with it and you’d like to think that would be enough to get a stunt driver involved but obviously he “persuaded” her. Consent was given but it’s the kind of consent that makes you uncomfortable. From what Hawke said his contrition appeared genuine however Uma still has to live with a dodgy neck.

As for the spitting and chains thing. I’m reminded of that scene in Marathon Man where Hoffman runs around the block or something prior to a scene so he’s sweating and out of breath and Olivier just said something like, “try acting dear boy”. Was it necessary to spit on her? Of course not. I’m sure Uma could have just tried acting without the prior run through.

It’s a very murky area when you get into this relationship between actors and directors and what the latter does to get the requisite performance and what the actor acquiesces to in pursuit (and under pressure) of the directors vision. It naturally lends itself to exploitation.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 18:13
by Sneelock
I realize that we are dealing entirely with one account of things but it seems to me that the charges are pretty major. sure, directors as vintage as Ford and as current as Lars Von Trier have reputations for being abusive but emotionally abusive.

Otto Preminger was famous for screaming temper tantrums but, so far as I know, he never strangled anybody. Hitchcock made people throw live birds at Tippi Hedren's head. we're getting warmer. I guess David O. Russel might have had some trouble for slapping somebody but it seems to me that this behavior (if he admits to it) is extreme and needs to be explained or he gets put in the monster box right along with Weinstein.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 18:33
by Goat Boy
Well emotionally abusive isn't necessarily less harmful. I could maybe see the car incident as a risk that backfired so not malicious but certainly selfish and reckless and something that had the potential to do physical harm. He rolled the dice there and he shouldn't have done but people often roll the dice thinking something bad is unlikely to happen.

Obviously we don't know how hard he strangled her but considering she mentioned it I would assume it wasn't just play acting. The spitting thing is disgusting. Did he want her to feel degraded? Humiliated? Because that would make the acting better? Like I said, let her act. That's what she's good at. Of course this casts a shadow over the other incident too.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 18:35
by Sneelock
Goat Boy wrote:Well emotionally abusive isn't necessarily less harmful.

oh yeah, no doubt about it.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 18:52
by sloopjohnc
I think directors/conductors and people in charge of artistic environments get away with a lot and it just enables them to keep on doing it.

I hate when people act like children in any professional situation.

I call BS. Especially when it's driving a car in a stunt situation. That's why you hire stunt people.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 05 Feb 2018, 21:09
by jimboo
Did she mention the obvious fetish he has for her feet?

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 06 Feb 2018, 10:15
by clive gash

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 06 Feb 2018, 12:15
by Dr Markus
In basterds, it was his hands that were genuinely choking Diane Kruger in one shot because the actor that was suppose to do the choking wasn't doing it "right".

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2018/02/05/revisiting-the-time-quentin-tarantino-insisted-on-choking-diane-kruger-during-inglourious-basterds/?utm_term=.0293843cec7a

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 06 Feb 2018, 15:33
by sloopjohnc
The Great Defector wrote:In basterds, it was his hands that were genuinely choking Diane Kruger in one shot because the actor that was suppose to do the choking wasn't doing it "right".

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2018/02/05/revisiting-the-time-quentin-tarantino-insisted-on-choking-diane-kruger-during-inglourious-basterds/?utm_term=.0293843cec7a


:lol:

That's nuts.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 06 Feb 2018, 20:55
by Matt Wilson
It's too bad that all of these women who are coming forth now didn't feel like they could do so in the '90s. Had this process been started then, then other women could have been spared these encounters with assholes like Weinstein.

Had Uma gotten herself a strong attorney twenty years ago then maybe others would have jumped on board.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 06 Feb 2018, 23:48
by Jimbly

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 00:28
by bobzilla77
Uma's stories don't sound that different from other stories I've heard from men on the set being subjected to danger/ sufferring because the director wanted it. I don;t see it as sexual opportunism like the accusations against Weinstein.

I'm not into his comments abour Polanski at all. But not shocking. I was surprised, at the time I saw the doc Wanted & Desired, how common the myth was, that the 13 year old was his secret girlfriend. Everyone thinks they know what went down, and it was just some forbidden love that was judged and misunderstood by the puritans of the 1970s.

In case this condition persists - she says in her deposition that he drugged and raped her while she tried to fight him off. You could make an argument for why the girl's testimony is not believable, but people aren;t doing that, they're just asserting "it was consensual! Consensual! Consensual!!!!!!!" Subtext, the girl is lying and the great man is innocent.

I think people didn't WANT to know too much about it, didn't want to be put in the position of denouncing a great man whose pictures were so artful and brought joy to so many.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 09:59
by copehead
sloopjohnc wrote:I think directors/conductors and people in charge of artistic environments get away with a lot and it just enables them to keep on doing it.

I hate when people act like children in any professional situation.

I call BS. Especially when it's driving a car in a stunt situation. That's why you hire stunt people.


It was driving a car on a dirt track from what I can gather from her interview.

It she can't drive very well/at all surely she should have said something more.

It seemed rather odd as he wasn't asking her to jump a chasm or anything, seems a bit whiney, you can understand why a director would want the star to actually drive the car so it is obviously her in it if it isn't something that he would consider dangerous.

I would wait to hear his side, it is possible he is an enormous preening dickhead who made her do something dangerous, it is impossible to tell from her description, it is also possible she is a bit of a flake who likes to complain and hurt herself doing something simple and hasn't forgotten about it and thinks now is the time to make a fuss about it.

In the list of things coming out of the Hollywood metoo scandal surely actress crashes car she didn't want to drive isn't a priority. That is a bit too much me too.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 11:01
by Jimbly
read the interview with Tarantino, He admits he was at fault.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 11:22
by copehead
Jeemo wrote:read the interview with Tarantino, He admits he was at fault.


Well that is good of him and perhaps more than you'd expect from such a notoriously prickly person, but still being nagged to drive a car that you didn't want to and which you subsequently crashed seems like small potatoes. But I suppose it is part of a pattern of overbearing and borderline creepy behaviour by him towards women.

Director is another one of those professions where you must start to feel like god after a while. especially if you are a successful one, everyone does exactly what you say all the time, can't be healthy unless you are well grounded.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 11:30
by copehead
Read it, sounds like Uma Thurman has a drivers license but can't actually drive.
You can see why she had to be in the car for the shot rather than a stunt double from the director's point of view.
And it seems like there was a break down in understanding about what she was capable of.
A person with a driver's license should be able to drive down a single track road at 35mph without crashing into a tree, Tarantino should be more attuned to what his actors are capable of and Uma Thurman shouldn't pretend she can drive because if that is what happens on a film set she could be deadly on a public road.

In short they all sound like idiots.

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 14:47
by Geezee
Copehead wrote:Read it, sounds like Uma Thurman has a drivers license but can't actually drive.
You can see why she had to be in the car for the shot rather than a stunt double from the director's point of view.
And it seems like there was a break down in understanding about what she was capable of.
A person with a driver's license should be able to drive down a single track road at 35mph without crashing into a tree, Tarantino should be more attuned to what his actors are capable of and Uma Thurman shouldn't pretend she can drive because if that is what happens on a film set she could be deadly on a public road.

In short they all sound like idiots.


The actual video is embedded in the article - have you not seen it?
It's not just whether or not she can drive a single track road - the car itself looks like it's falling apart. It looks ugly from the start.
I generally believe in his good intentions on this one - that he really didn't think anything could or would happen. But as Uma plainly makes clear - she put up with a tonne of crp in the interests of their artistic collaboration, and as soon as she called the "safe word" she wasn't listened to.
However, Tarantino's comments on Polanski are unforgiveable and as shocking as Whoopi Goldberg's. The hypocrisy around this really is incredible. I don't read the Guardian much these days, but I felt that this was a very good and well-reasoned article (and again quite incredible that even at the height of me-too Hollywood is still defending Polanski).

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/j ... ars-on-run

Re: Uma Thurman’s Tarantino Bombshells

Posted: 07 Feb 2018, 17:39
by sloopjohnc
Geezee wrote:
Copehead wrote:Read it, sounds like Uma Thurman has a drivers license but can't actually drive.
You can see why she had to be in the car for the shot rather than a stunt double from the director's point of view.
And it seems like there was a break down in understanding about what she was capable of.
A person with a driver's license should be able to drive down a single track road at 35mph without crashing into a tree, Tarantino should be more attuned to what his actors are capable of and Uma Thurman shouldn't pretend she can drive because if that is what happens on a film set she could be deadly on a public road.

In short they all sound like idiots.


The actual video is embedded in the article - have you not seen it?
It's not just whether or not she can drive a single track road - the car itself looks like it's falling apart. It looks ugly from the start.
I generally believe in his good intentions on this one - that he really didn't think anything could or would happen. But as Uma plainly makes clear - she put up with a tonne of crp in the interests of their artistic collaboration, and as soon as she called the "safe word" she wasn't listened to.
However, Tarantino's comments on Polanski are unforgiveable and as shocking as Whoopi Goldberg's. The hypocrisy around this really is incredible. I don't read the Guardian much these days, but I felt that this was a very good and well-reasoned article (and again quite incredible that even at the height of me-too Hollywood is still defending Polanski).

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/j ... ars-on-run


Interesting article with Polanski's victim.

http://quillette.com/2018/01/31/nobodys ... ha-geimer/