Tarantino’s criticisms often circulate as lists of movies he hates. To understand them, you have to separate a negative judgment after watching, a partial objection, and the decision not to watch a work: these are different situations and they produce different conclusions.
Natural Born Killers and a personal relationship with the screenplay
In his 2019 BAFTA conversation, Tarantino expressed his dislike for the film Natural Born Killers and distinguished that from his appreciation of his own screenplay. The difference is key: here he was not commenting on someone else’s work with the usual distance of a viewer, but on the transformation of material he had written.
The film released in 1994 was directed by Oliver Stone. Its visual style, with format changes, image saturation, and an insistent satire of the media spectacle, belongs to that production. The fact that Tarantino is the author of the original story does not make the result a film directed by him, nor does it mean they necessarily share the same choices.
The disagreement helps explain why it appears so often in these roundups. However, there is no need to add a story of personal enmity to explain the criticism. Nor does it allow every scene a viewer rejects to be identified as a specific Stone change without comparing the relevant versions of the text.
The Last Crusade: an unusual preference
In August 2022, during his appearance on ReelBlend, Tarantino said he preferred Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull to Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. CinemaBlend published the comment on August 12. His objection was aimed at the boredom he felt with the third installment and at the way the character played by Sean Connery worked.
It is an assessment of the 1989 film and its father-son dynamic. It does not show that he rejects all sequels or that he considers Spielberg’s entire career a failure. The same filmmaker can admire one of the director’s adventures and disagree with a sequel that other viewers prefer.
The Last Crusade shifts part of the interest from exploration to the family bond. For someone who enjoys that relationship, the interruptions and arguments may be one of its greatest attractions. For Tarantino, according to that comment, that mechanism did not produce the same result. The disagreement is critical and personal; it does not change the movie’s content or make the majority taste an obligation.
In addition, comparing two entries is not the same as providing an exhaustive ranking. A favorable remark about Kingdom of the Crystal Skull over The Last Crusade leaves other questions open: which scenes he appreciates, how much he likes it in absolute terms, or where he would place all the films in the series at another time.
Refusing to watch Dune or Toy Story 4 is not reviewing them
In October 2024, his conversation with Bret Easton Ellis about the new Dune adaptations was circulated. Tarantino explained that he had not seen them because he already knew a version of that story and did not feel the need to return to it. The same discussion included Ripley and Shogun. It is a statement about his choices as a viewer, not an analysis of scenes from works he said he had not seen.
Something similar happens with Toy Story 4. In his 2024 conversation with Bill Maher, he defended the ending of the previous trilogy and said he did not want to continue it. Presenting that refusal as a detailed critique of the fourth film would add a judgment his words do not contain. Preferring to keep an ending does not prove that a sequel lacks merit.
General opinions about remakes, franchises, or digital effects should also not automatically become verdicts against every title in those categories. A comment about an industry trend can coexist with exceptions. To include a film in a selection of works he rejects, you need a statement about that specific film, not just an association with the kind of cinema he criticizes.
The documented examples show different degrees of rejection: Natural Born Killers involves a break with the adaptation of his writing; The Last Crusade receives a viewing critique; Dune and Toy Story 4 appear as experiences he chose not to seek out. Keeping those differences in mind prevents a catchy list from attributing opinions to him that he never actually expressed.
See the selection of movies recommended by Tarantino.