Quentin Tarantino’s Cinema of Vibes

If you’ve ever listened to Quentin Tarantino talk—while on a late-night couch, say, or when he’s visiting a podcast—you will recognize the tone and cadence of the writing in Cinema Speculation. The book feels less typed out than dictated, as if he finally has the captive audience he’s always yearned for and he’s got a lot of things to get off his chest. I mean this in the best way possible, as Quentin Tarantino is one of the most interesting filmmakers on the planet. He’s an inveterate raconteur, less conversationalist than lecturer, one whose head is overflowing with trivia about which Los Angeles dives were playing which cut-rate exploitation pictures at what point in his childhood. And much of the book’s early going is concerned with those dives and those exploitation flicks, as well as the cineaste’s own earned bravado.