Nine movies into iconic writer-director Quentin Tarantino’s career, he’s only adapted one of them from previous source material. The term “original” applies pretty loosely when referring to a Tarantino movie, because the name Django was taken from an earlier spaghetti western and Pulp Fiction is constructed entirely from rejuvenating the most well-worn tropes found in the pages of the titular literary genre with a postmodern ‘90s sensibility. But, despite the many homages and “borrowed” elements found across Tarantino’s filmography, his movies are wholly unique and his voice is entirely his own.
While Tarantino’s only adaptation – Jackie Brown, based on the novel Rum Punch by Elmore Leonard – doesn’t showcase as many of his distinctive hallmarks as, say, Reservoir Dogs or Kill Bill, in many ways, that’s a good thing. Being beholden to existing source material, especially source material that he loved in its original form and wanted to honor, brought Tarantino back down to Earth. It gave him a kind of restraint in the writing process that resulted in arguably his most mature movie.
The characters in Jackie Brown feel real and relatable. Tarantino tells the complex crime plot as concisely on film – particularly in the split-screen sequences – as Leonard told it on the page. And to top it all off, Pam Grier, Robert Forster, and Samuel L. Jackson anchor the movie with incredible performances. It has a slow, cerebral pace, almost like a hangout movie. Tarantino gives each scene plenty of room to breathe, but instead of filling the empty spaces with mindless banter and pop culture references like the inconsequential conversations found in the second half of Death Proof, he uses these scenes to develop the characters and their relationship. Grier’s Jackie and Forster’s Max stand out as one of the most tangible, emotionally charged romances in the Tarantino universe.
Although his ambitious R-rated Star Trek reboot seems to have stalled in development, Tarantino should still make another adaptation of an existing story. Jackie Brown proved that the director can seamlessly blend his own voice with that of another writer (although that other writer being Elmore Leonard, one of Tarantino’s biggest influences, gave it a huge advantage) in retelling a story that was originally told in another medium. It would have to be source material that Tarantino loves as much as he loved Rum Punch, but he’s mentioned a few possibilities in the past.
Bret Easton Ellis told Vice that Tarantino has been seeking the rights to re-adapt his debut novel Less Than Zero. It first came to the screen in 1987, but that version was very unfaithful to the book. The novel doesn’t really follow much of a plot; it follows a bunch of aimless college students over their holiday break. The day-in-the-life middle act of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood showed how great a Tarantino hangout movie would be. His cinematic retelling of Less Than Zero could be his strongest movie yet.
Ever since Martin Scorsese declared that Marvel movies aren’t real cinema, there’s been an ongoing debate among the film buff community about the legitimacy of the superhero franchise. But directors like James Gunn and Taika Waititi who put their own authorial stamp on their Marvel movies can legitimize them as real cinema. Tarantino has mentioned a couple of Marvel comics he’d be interested in adapting.
After Reservoir Dogs hit theaters, he considered directing a Luke Cage movie, and even met with producer Ed Pressman, who owned the film rights to the character at the time. With the rights reverting back to Marvel Studios after the Netflix cancellation, Tarantino could direct an awesome, action-packed, blaxploitation-inspired, R-rated Luke Cage movie starring Mike Colter’s familiar incarnation of the character.
Tarantino also unsuccessfully pitched a Silver Surfer movie in the ‘90s. He actually wrote a whole Silver Surfer script that was rejected by the studio that owned the rights to the character at the time. Following Disney’s acquisition of 21st Century Fox (and with it, among many other things, the rights to the Silver Surfer), Marvel could dust off this script and, if Tarantino isn’t interested in directing it anymore, a different director could breathe life into it. The project could even be taken on by a close collaborator of Q.T.’s with blockbuster experience, like Robert Rodriguez or Eli Roth.
At various times, Tarantino has been interested in directing a movie based on The Man from U.N.C.L.E. TV series and a movie based on Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale, both of which have since been produced by different filmmakers. Q.T. was briefly attached to The Man from U.N.C.L.E. before he chose to do Jackie Brown, then the movie reboot languished in development hell for two decades before Guy Ritchie finally got it made and it promptly bombed at the box office. If Tarantino is still interested in the franchise, he could take a second stab at it. It’s uncommon for a franchise whose last bomb is still fresh in audiences’ minds to get a reboot so soon, but most studio executives (and moviegoers) will make an exception for Tarantino.
As for Casino Royale, Tarantino wanted to adapt the novel faithfully in a ‘60s setting with Pierce Brosnan playing Bond. Since the idea was to make Casino Royale a reboot that presented Bond’s origin story, keeping the same Bond from the last four movies wouldn’t really make sense, so Tarantino’s Bond movie never came to fruition. Whether Tarantino is still interested in making a Man from U.N.C.L.E. film or a Bond film, a ‘60s spy movie from the director of Inglourious Basterds sounds like a delight.
One novel that Tarantino has “wanted to adapt for a while,” either as a movie or a limited series, is Forty Lashes Less One, another Elmore Leonard novel. Since Jackie Brown is arguably the greatest adaptation of Leonard’s work, the idea of Tarantino tackling another one of his stories – and a western story, no less – sounds tantalizing. Tarantino has said that you need to direct three westerns to be considered a western director and he’s only got two under his belt (Django Unchained and The Hateful Eight), so Forty Lashes Less One could fill his quota.
Tarantino has said that he’ll retire after making 10 movies so he can leave behind a tight filmography (unlike many other filmmakers, who keep going until they’ve completely lost touch with their audience and their movies are no longer an event), and he’s currently on nine movies, so the next one could be his last. While these retirement plans are subject to change, that’s the idea.
Tarantino’s final movie should probably be original – or Kill Bill: Volume 3 – but maybe the idea of making a “final movie” at all might be too much pressure. It’s possible that Tarantino could tweak the rules and make it so that adaptations don’t count toward the whole 10-movie thing. Either way, it would be great to see Tarantino’s take on another artist’s work before he steps out of the director’s chair for good.