Filmmaker Quentin Tarantino finally spoke out publicly for the first time since police departments in New York, Los Angeles and elsewhere called for a boycott of his new film after he appeared at a rally against police brutality last month in New York. He insisted that he never implied that he thinks all cops are murderers.
“All cops are not murderers,” the Pulp Fiction director told the Los Angeles Times. “I never said that. I never even implied that.”
Tarantino went on to say that he believes that police departments are trying to take attention away from the issue of police brutality. He said that their message is “very clear.”
“It’s to shut me down. It’s to discredit me. It is to intimidate me,” Tarantino told the Times. “It is to shut my mouth, and even more important than that, it is to send a message out to any other prominent person that might feel the need to join that side of the argument."
Tarantino said that he is not intimidated and does not hate police officers.
“Frankly, it feels lousy to have a bunch of police mouthpieces call me a cop hater. I'm not a cop hater,” he said. “That is a misrepresentation. That is slanderous. That is not how I feel.”
Police departments in New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, New Jersey, Chicago and elsewhere all said they plan on boycotting Tarantino’s new movie, The Hateful Eight.
The subject will likely come up again when Tarantino appears on HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher on Friday night.