Star Trek: Quentin Tarantino Reportedly Drops Out of Directing Movie

It sounds like Quentin Tarantino has moved on from his Star Trek movie pitch. Deadline reports that Tarantino has dropped out of directing the film. While promoting Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, Tarantino said he was considering not directing the Star Trek movie. “I think I’m steering away from Star Trek, but I haven’t had an official conversation with those guys yet,” Tarantino said. “In a strange way, it seems like this movie, Hollywood, would be my last. So, I’ve kind of taken the pressure off myself to make that last big voilà kind of statement. I mean to such a degree there was a moment when I was writing and went, ‘Should I do this now? Should I do something else? Is this the 10th one?’ No, no, don’t stop the planets from aligning, what are you, Galactus? If the Earth is saying do it, do it. Not that it was an argument, but a little thought, like, ‘Well, if I’m gonna go out like Max Ophüls style, Lola Montez, this is it, and if It’s not good, then all my other work is trash, alright.’ This would have been the one. But in a weird way, it actually kind of freed me up. I mean, I have no idea what the story of the next one’s going to be. I don’t even have a clue.”

Later, he confirmed that Paramount would likely move ahead with the film without him. “I think they might make that movie, but I just don’t think I’m going to direct it,” Tarantino said. “It’s a good idea. They should definitely do it, and I’ll be happy to come in and give them some notes on the first rough cut.”

Tarantino pitched his idea to J.J. Abrams, who directed Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness. Abrams brought the idea to Paramount, who put it into development. Mark L. Smith wrote the film’s script.

Tarantino described his movie as being something like Pulp Fiction in space. This Deadline report suggests that a classic Star Trek episode inspires the film: The Original Series episode “A Piece of the Action,” where Kirk, Spock and the rest of the Enterprise crew discover a planet that developed around stories about Earth gangsters from the prohibition era, creating an entire gangster planet.

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