Can you separate the art from the artist? And in the case of films, can you watch something that includes scenes that are disturbing and/or offensive? These are questions that film fans have to come to terms with nowadays. With #MeToo and Time’s Up highlighting Hollywood’s history of abuse and gender inequality, it’s impossible to be ignorant of issues that have run rampant with filmmakers and studios. And one of the filmmakers that has recently been called into question due to his art is Quentin Tarantino.
While there hasn’t been any sort of Harvey Weinstein-level allegations thrown at Tarantino, he has had a couple of not-so-great stories come up recently, including the controversy surrounding his “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” with some critics saying that the film doesn’t do a great job with its portrayal of women. However, according to one of Tarantino’s former co-stars Antonio Banderas (both appeared in “Desperado”), film fans should be able to choose to watch or ignore a film for any reason, but we shouldn’t be looking to censor or suppress the artist in any way.
“I think an artist should be free,” he said, in an interview with The Independent. “Then people should be free to agree or disagree. You have the freedom to continue watching his movies or not.”
Banderas elaborated and said that if you aren’t a fan of Tarantino’s art, “[you can say] ‘I will never go and see a movie from Tarantino again’. Or ‘I love his movies and I’m gonna go and see them again’. I think we should respect that freedom.”
Ultimately, for the actor, he feels that censorship isn’t the answer. Banderas said, “There are sometimes things in art that, I have to tell you, they bother me… but I will never, never, never censor them.”
You can watch Banderas’ latest film, “Pain and Glory,” when it arrives in theaters on October 4.