It’s a given that the majority of Hollywood’s top stars are outspoken liberals. But this year, a few celebrities in particular made the media go ga-ga (and conservatives groan) over their pushy politics and their perpetual time in the spotlight.
Quentin Tarantino
By Jeffrey Meyer | November 18, 2015 | 2:21 PM EST
On Wednesday, the co-hosts of The View treated director Quentin Tarantino to a softball interview following his anti-cop remarks last month. The hosts happily provided him a platform to play the victim against those who condemned him calling cops “murderers” and to double-down on his attack on the policy.
By Brad Wilmouth | November 8, 2015 | 8:06 PM EST
Appearing as a guest on Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher, liberal film maker Quentin Tarantino joined host Maher in griping about police violence, and absurdly cited the happenings of 1970s police TV shows and the tendency of police characters to fight with criminals who attacked them rather than shoot them as evidence police officers are in modern times more likely to shoot criminal suspects than in days past.
By Matthew Balan | November 5, 2015 | 7:27 PM EST
Marc Lamont Hill doubled down on his theory about supposed white supremacy shaping police encounters with black people. During a segment on Wednesday's CNN Tonight, Hill disputed the Supreme Court's decades-old "objectively reasonable" standard on the use of police force, and emphasized that "everyday citizens have biases....oftentimes, we are shaped by white supremacy. We are shaped by fear of black bodies. So, just because a jury of people have (sic) the same irrational white supremacist fear of black people doesn't mean that it's okay to shoot them."
By Mark Finkelstein | November 4, 2015 | 9:27 PM EST
Would somebody please explain the First Amendment to Quentin Tarantino? The film director apparently thinks that freedom of speech is a one-way street: he gets to call cops "murderers," but they don't get to defend themselves.
Appearing on MSNBC show this evening, asked by Chris Hayes if he was surprised by the "vitriol" of police reaction to his speech at a recent rally in New York at which he called police "murderers," Quentin whined: "I was under the impression I was an American and that I had First amendment rights." Poor baby. Yeah, you do. So do the cops.
By Erin Aitcheson | November 2, 2015 | 12:52 PM EST
A friend who defends your crazy anti-police comments is a friend indeed. At the Hollywood Film Awards, Django Unchained star Jamie Foxx defended and encouraged his buddy Quentin Tarantino’s anti-cop remarks made at a police brutality rally in New York recently.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, while presenting an award for Tarantino’s upcoming film, Hateful Eight, Foxx said: "Keep telling the truth, keep speaking the truth and don't worry about none of the haters."
By Melissa Mullins | August 31, 2015 | 5:08 PM EDT
Quentin Tarantino is one of the most famous and successful writers and directors in Hollywood, his unconventional films often becoming cult classics – Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill Volumes 1, 2 and 3, Pulp Fiction, Natural Born Killers, etc. Although there’s no denying his talent and creatively, his politics are predictable cookie-cutter Hollywood liberalism, apparently. The director told an interviewer recently that Barack Obama is his "favorite president, hands down."
By Matt Philbin | August 24, 2015 | 10:13 AM EDT
Quentin Tarantino: Dumb as a post or incredibly dishonest? Both?
The “pornographer of violence” (Chuck Scarborough’s term) takes umbrage when asked about the impact of violent films and TV on society. “Obviously, I don't think one has to do with the other,” he once sputtered when pressed on the issue. “Obviously, the issue is gun control and mental health.”
Lefty Blogger Describes Scott Walker As a ‘Tarantino-Like Hero For the GOP’ and a ‘Republican Porn Star’
By Tom Johnson | February 8, 2015 | 9:40 PM EST Jon Perr of Daily Kos writes that Walker, like the Republican base, “believes his Democratic foes aren't just wrong, but unambiguously evil...He talks and fights tough, which for the right wing is not a means but an end in itself.”
By Randy Hall | January 24, 2013 | 8:51 PM EST
Several actors attending the Sundance Film Festival through Jan. 27 in Park City, Utah, have stated that Hollywood has played a part in the recent spate of gun violence through the production of violent films and video games. However, one actor has suggested an unusual solution to the problem.
Alexander Skarsgard, who fired all sorts of weapons at alien invaders in the "Battleship” movie and is a big player in the violent vampire series “True Blood,” said that it may be time to revisit the Second Amendment because the discussion about it “is ridiculous to me.”
By Noel Sheppard | January 16, 2013 | 9:53 AM EST
Former 2 Live Crew rapper turned music promoter and VH1 star Luther Campbell isn't pleased with Spike Lee's comments about filmmaker Quentin Tarantino and the new movie "Django Unchained."
Writing at his Miami NewTimes blog Tuesday, Campbell called Lee "Hollywood's resident house negro."
By Matthew Sheffield | December 20, 2012 | 1:33 PM EST
In an interview with a Canadian talk show, director Quentin Tarantino blasted America’s drug policies, saying that they are creating a system of “slavery through and through” at the behest of a prison “industry” which seeks to keep them in place solely to make money.
Tarantino’s comments came in response to a question from CBC host George Stroumboulopoulos who had asked him to put his latest film project, Django Unchained, a movie about a freed slave in the 19th century, into a contemporary American context. Tarantino warmed to the subject, apparently thinking that having directed the film gave him some sort of insight into race and America.