The year is 1992. You are a security employee at the most important film festival in the world in Cannes. It’s May on the south coast of France, which means you’re either basking in your off-the-peg suit under the Mediterranean sun or standing shivering in the rain. And then a guy with an outrageously prominent chin comes along and tries to push past you into the cinema. What are you doing?
On the other side of this slightly fictionalized story is Quentin Tarantino, now a recognized director maestro, then an unknown debutant. According to Tarantino’s recollection, it got violent.
Quentin Tarantino did everything he could to see Man Bites Dog again
Quentin Tarantino visited Cannes for the first time in 1992 to present Reservoir Dogs. As part of this, he attended a screening of the Belgian extreme mockumentry Man Bites Dog, as he explained at a press conference on the Croisette in 2004 (via The Independent). Tarantino was “absolutely thrilled”, so he did what a cineaste is supposed to do: he wanted to watch it again straight away. That’s where security comes into play.
More about the director:
At the second screening, word got around about the film’s qualities and Tarantino couldn’t get past the security staff. According to his own statement, he attacked the security guard. Tarantino reportedly had to be stopped by five menthat forced him to the ground. Unfortunately, we cannot verify whether the story happened like this. However, the later Pulp Fiction director knitted his own little legend out of it:
I wasn’t famous at the time, but the movie became famous because of that fight before the second screening of Man Bites Dog. That was me.
He concluded with the tongue-in-cheek conclusion (via The Guardian):
I can pretty much say that Man Bites Dog promotes violence. The cult film Man Bites Dog is streaming on Amazon
Tarantino doesn’t mention violence by accident. Man Bites Dog is about a serial killer who is accompanied by a film crew during his work. The satire, which comes as a fake documentary or mockumentary, deals with the complicity of the media in reporting, as the film team becomes increasingly involved in the brutal acts in order to keep the filming going.
The dramatic scenes of violence led to controversy. There were even calls to ban the film by Rémy Belvaux, André Bonzel and Benoît Poelvoorde. The film was only released uncut in Germany in 2013, as cutting reports reported at the time.
Today you can buy and rent Man Bites Dog on Amazon and other providers. In the meantime, we’re still waiting for someone to uncover the French security guard Tarantino took on back then. If he exists.
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