Matt Damon's Early Western Flop Found A Fan In Quentin Tarantino

There are few interview subjects more candid, unpredictable, and downright entertaining than Quentin Tarantino. As far as filmmakers go, he exists on a saltily rarified plane with trash-talker supreme Orson Welles. He can be dishy, prickly and outrageously cocky, but as arguably the most influential filmmaker of his generation, he's at least earned the right to sound off on all things cinematic. And while I don't always agree with him (there were passages of his book "Cinema Speculation" that made me see red, particularly his dismissal of Peter Yates' "The Friends of Eddie Coyle"), I appreciate that his opinions are coming from a fiercely sincere and deeply knowledgeable place.

While I enjoy Tarantino's brashness, I think he's at his very best when he goes to the mat for underappreciated film artists. Soon after he broke through with "Reservoir Dogs" in 1992 and established himself as an outspoken cinephile, he championed the films of Brian De Palma. This was not exactly an opportune time to sing the director's praises, as he'd just hit the skids commercially and critically with the trio of "Casualties of War," "Bonfire of the Vanities," and "Raising Cain." For the vocal contingent of mainstream reviewers who'd long dissed De Palma as a Hitchcock rip-off artist, this felt like sweet vindication. For those of us who'd been enraptured by De Palma's sui generis pure cinema, wherein the filmmaker was clearly working ecstatic variations on familiar themes as so many great classical musical composers have done for centuries, aside from "Bonfire" he was actually operating at the height of his powers ("Casualties of War" is the best American film about the Vietnam War ever made).

So it was exciting to see a young bomb-thrower like Tarantino call BS on the ignorant De Palma hatred, and not just stick up for the filmmaker but call him "the greatest director of his generation." Mind you, this is a generation that includes Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, and Francis Ford Coppola. Also mind you: Tarantino is 100% correct.

There are many other instances of Tarantino talking up a living filmmaking legend when they needed a boost, and, aside from his kind words for De Palma, I don't think he's ever been more righteously spot-on than the time he preached the gospel of Walter Hill.

In a 2003 interview with The Buffalo News timed to the release of "Kill Bill, Vol. 1," Tarantino asked if there were mainstream American filmmakers that we ought to be "taking more seriously than we do." After noting that three of his enormously talented peers (David Fincher, Paul Thomas Anderson and Robert Rodriguez) were getting the love they deserved, he zeroed in on Hill.

Per Tarantino:

"A mainstream director who had his day as far as recognition but I think has been ignored lately and doesn't deserve it is Walter Hill. I think in the last 10 years he's had a big resurgence in creativity. I think he lost his way for a while in the '80s. 'Johnny Handsome' I thought was a return to form ... But I thought with ['Geronimo: An American Legend'] he went to a really fantastic place. Everybody talked about how boring it was. But I didn't. I thought he made a really great classic Western and America just wasn't worthy of the privilege."

Hill's 1993 Western epic about the Apache Wars and the lead-up to Geronimo's surrender in 1886 was positioned as a major awards contender that year, and had a good deal going for it. The genre was hot again thanks to Best Picture winners "Dances with Wolves" and "Unforgiven," which coincided with a renewed interest in the atrocities visited upon the United States' indigenous population as the country savagely chased its manifest destiny. Though Hill was not a commercially bankable director at this point in his career, he was considered a top-tier craftsman. He was also widely respected, which helped him round up a killer cast that included Wes Studi in the title role, and, as his U.S. military rivals, Gene Hackman, Robert Duvall, Jason Patric, and a drenched-behind-the-ears up-and-comer named Matt Damon.

In classic Hill fashion, "Geronimo: An American Legend" is tough and terse. Though the exposition-hating director has to deal with more backstory than he's probably ever worked into one movie, he does so elegantly. This is Hill at his character-defined-by-action best (and a reminder that Patric had/has the stuff to be an all-time great), an unsentimental saga directed with assurance.

Tarantino also spoke out in defense of Hill's "Wild Bill," an elegiac Western classic from 1995 that deserves way more love (and is a must-see if you're a "Deadwood" fan). Alas, Hill's first-rate oaters received mixed reviews. Both films had their supporters, but their ardor could not overcome the meh-ness of their colleagues' reactions. "Geronimo: An American Legend" holds a 50% Fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes, while "Wild Bill" lags a little behind at 46% fresh, which I feel is an accurate reflection of how they were reviewed at the time of their release.

Interestingly, Tarantino didn't mention Hill's immensely satisfying prison boxing flick "Undisputed" from 2002 in that interview, because that's a film that is still very much in need of a critical reappraisal. I'd also say that Hill turned in yet another cut-to-the-bone Western delight three years ago with "Dead for a Dollar" (starring Christoph Waltz, Willem Dafoe, and Rachel Brosnahan). Hill's still got it at 83. Let's get our guy back in the saddle, Mr. Tarantino!