“His vision was just to go hard”: Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Greatest Star Trek Film’ That Never Happened
Quentin Tarantino is one of the most eminent filmmakers of all time. The director is legendary for his use of stylized violence and profanity in his movies, alongside rich references to pop culture in such a way that he has managed to cut a genre out of it.
Although his heavy depiction of violence and use of slurs have also managed to ruffle the feathers of some critics, he has amassed a cult following, and many consider him one of the greatest filmmakers of his generation. He has been on the receiving end of the Palme d’Or, two Academy Awards, two BAFTAs, and four Golden Globes.
Quentin Tarantino was very close to translating his signature style into a Star Trek movie in 2017, but it did not materialize. It is probably one of the greatest missed opportunities in the history of Hollywood. The Revenant screenwriter Mark L. Smith was supposed to write the screenplay, and in a recent interview with Collider, he dubbed it “the greatest ‘Star Trek’ film.” that never got made.
The whole story behind Quentin Tarantino’s Star Trek movie and why it did not happen
The movie would have been based on Star Trek: The Original Series episode A Piece of the Action, in which the crew of the Enterprise discovers a planet with the habitat of 1920s gangster culture. However, Quentin Tarantino had plans to put his own spin on it by sending Kirk’s Enterprise back to 1920s or 1930s Chicago. He would have really been working on his strong suit, as this type of action-packed landscape is his home ground.
Also Read: Quentin Tarantino’s ‘Star Trek’ Idea Was Compared To MCU Films Despite Director’s Hatred For Marvel
Paramount and Star Trek producer J.J. Abrams even accepted Quentin Tarantino’s vision with open arms and were working with Mark L. Smith to produce a script that would perfectly encapsulate the magnum opus. Smith recently opened up to Collider in an interview about the whole process and how it never materialized:
“Quentin and I went back and forth, he was gonna do some stuff on it, and then he started worrying about the number, his kind of unofficial number of films. I remember we were talking, and he goes, ‘If I can just wrap my head around the idea that ‘Star Trek’ could be my last movie, the last thing I ever do. Is this how I want to end it?’ And I think that was the bump he could never get across, so the script is still sitting there on his desk.”
He also said that even though he loves the franchise and would love for it to happen, he does not see his dreams becoming reality anytime soon. He dubbed it the greatest Star Trek film that could have been made.
“I know he said a lot of nice things about it. I would love for it to happen. It’s just one of those things that I can’t ever see happening. But it would be the greatest ‘Star Trek’ film, not for my writing, but just for what Tarantino was gonna do with it. It was just a balls-out kind of thing.”
He continued.
“But I think his vision was just to go hard. It was a hard R. It was going to be some ‘Pulp Fiction’ violence,” Smith continued. “Not a lot of the language, we saved a couple things for just special characters to kind of drop that into the ‘Star Trek’ world, but it was just really the edginess and the kind of that Tarantino flair, man, that he was bringing to it. It would have been cool.”
Many speculated earlier that the reason why the movie did not end up happening was because of Star Trek CEO Rod Roddenberry, who gave an interview with Forbes where he said that although he loves Tarantino and his work, “if you create a Star Trek, that is just action; that is not Star Trek, in my opinion.”
Many theorized all these years that Roddenberry was the reason behind the biggest what-if in Star Trek. However, with Mark. L. Smith’s recent interview, it does not seem to be the case. He even said that it would have shaken up the franchise like Taika Waititi shook up Marvel with Thor: Ragnarok.
Will Quentin Tarantino direct Star Trek 4 in the future?
The news of Star Trek 4 can be traced back to as early as 2016, when Paramount Pictures, Skydance, and Bad Robot announced another installment ahead of the release of Star Trek: Beyond. Quentin Tarantino’s involvement was announced in 2017, and news reports mentioned that he wanted the film to have an R rating.
However, Quentin Tarantino himself is “steering away” from directing movies, as he told Consequence of Sound (via Indie Wire) in 2020, and therefore it is highly unlikely the audience would see him getting into a franchise movie at this stage in his life. Tarantino’s unmade Star Trek project would always draw a sigh of regret from fans all over the world.
The Movie Critic is potentially set to be Quentin Tarantino’s last film before he retires.
