10 Django Unchained Lessons Tarantino Must Learn For New Western

7. Stay Out Of The Movie, Quentin!

Tarantino Django Cameo 2 There's something incredibly obnoxious and almost self-fulfilling about every one of Tarantino's movie cameos - I'm not talking about the ones where he briefly appears in somebody else's movie, but those in which he suddenly appears in his own pictures for the sum of 2 to 10 minutes. QT, we love you, but you gotta stop with the cameos. I don't know what it is about Tarantino's cameos that don't gel for this movie-goer (Alfred Hitchcock or Martin Scorsese doing little cameos never bothers me, for example), but I suspect it's all to do with the immersion. Tarantino's movies are some of the most immersive out there - when he pulls you into his world, you fall into a sort of hypnotic trance and there's no going back until you're giving permission to breathe when the credits start to roll. You're not thinking about the fact that you got dumped the night before, or that you forget to pick your kid up from school - you're thinking about the movie and only the movie. You're in the zone. When Tarantino pops up, though, the illusion is shattered and the curtain comes down, because you know it's going to be awkward to watch. The juxtaposition between Tarantino and, say, Jamie Foxx, is cringe-worthy. No more cameos, QT.
Contributor

Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.