Wes Craven is synonymous with the horror genre. The legend wrote and directed such classics as The Last House on the LeftThe Hills Have EyesNightmare on Elm Street and directed Scream. This man is a cornerstone of violence and gore. So it’s shocking to hear Quentin Tarantino say that Craven walked out of Reservoir Dogs because of the torture scene.

Apparently that was the case as Tarantino and some of the actors had a panel in NYC to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the movie. Tarantino even brought his own personal 35mm copy of the movie which has to be priceless among film buffs.

One thing Tarantino talked about was the memorable torture scene where at one point, Michael Madsen (Mr. Blonde) tied up and tortured a cop after a jewel heist went awry under the music of Stealers Wheel “Stuck in the Middle With You. To this day, I can’t listen to that song without thinking of that scene.

 

It’s a very pivotal scene in a great movie. And while it’s relatively tame now, not to mention the most violent part was off screen, it was a pretty gory and violent scene in 1992. Tarantino said he counted 33 people walking out of the movie during that scene at a film festival. And one of them included Craven.

There were some other tidbits about the film as well. One such thing mentioned was that the line of the cop telling Mr. Blonde he had a little kid was ad-libbed, which actually caused Madsen to stop and think that the scene was too much because he had a newborn son right before that. That’s why Madsen just plays a violent and insane jewel thief in the movies and not in real life because that would be a sane reaction to have. But like the actor he was, that subsided and the scene speaks for itself after 25 years.

[Uproxx]

About Phillip Bupp

Producer/editor of the Awful Announcing Podcast and Short and to the Point. News editor for The Comeback and Awful Announcing. Highlight consultant for Major League Soccer as well as a freelance writer for hire. Opinions are my own but feel free to agree with them.

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