Quentin Tarantino has slammed Disney for strong-arming ArcLight Cinemas to push the 70mm film "The Hateful Eight" aside to make way for JJ Abrams' new movie, "Star Wars: The Force Awakens," Deadline reported.
Tarantino appeared on Howard Stern's "SiriusXM" radio show on Wednesday and had a few choice words for Disney, claiming that it is going out of its way to screw things up for his film.
He also said that ArcLight told Disney that they would play his film starting on Christmas day, but Disney threatened to pull "Force Awakens" from all theater locations if the film will not stay in that one theater on that day.
"It was real bad news and it f---ing pissed me off," the "Pulp Fiction" director told Stern, according to Variety. He added that Disney's move was "vindictive" and "mean." "It's extortion," he said.
When Stern said that "Force Awakens" director Abrams would "fix" the problem if he gets the chance to listen to the interview, Tarantino said that he hoped that it would happen. He clarified that his anger is aimed towards the studio, not at Abrams nor at the film itself.
"As far as I'm concerned, and let all the entertainment reporters call up Disney as of now and ask for their comments about their extortionist practices," he said, according to Hit Flix. "They didn't need to be this vindictive. There's a few movies coming out around the same time... none of us are any serious competition to 'Star Wars.'"
