The horror sequel Quentin Tarantino called “terrible”
Horror hasn’t been a genre Quentin Tarantino has dabbled in all that much beyond Death Proof, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t a huge fan of the genre.
As somebody famed for their voracious appetite when it comes to cinema, Tarantino devours as many movies as he can, with several of his biggest influences hailing from the halls of terror. As well as singing the praises of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Jaws, and The Exorcist for being “perfect”, Mario Brava has been a huge influence over his entire career.
For a more modern example, though, look no further than Yeon Sang-ho’s Train to Busan. The South Korean zombie thriller became a global sensation when it was released in the summer of 2016, leaving Tarantino so impressed that he couldn’t stop singing its praises to anyone willing to listen.
“I love Train to Busan, I actually showed it to a couple of friends in Tel-Aviv who had never seen it before,” Tarantino explained on Eli Roth’s History of Horror podcast. “And one of them was like, ‘I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a horror film this intense.'”
“Just that image of the father carrying that little girl running with, like, seemingly a thousand infected people chasing him, like right on his ass,” he continued. “That’s just complete adrenaline. When Train to Busan came out, I was like, ‘There’s no way I can watch another zombie movie or infected people movie, I just can’t do it anymore.'”
Train to Busan proved so popular – winning rave reviews from critics and audiences alike in the process of recouping its budget a dozen times over at the global box office – that the standalone sequel Peninsula was announced. Despite Sang-ho returning to co-write and direct what he clarified was “not a continuation of the story” but one that “happens in the same universe,” Tarantino wasn’t anywhere near as enthused.
“It’s terrible. I mean, terrible,” he said of Peninsula. “And it looks like it cost five times what Train to Busan cost. It’s terrible. Not only that, not only is it terrible, he’s trying to make Mad Max: Fury Road, but a bad bad Mad Max: Fury Road, so it’s Mad Max: Train to Busan.”
That’s quite the step down in admiration, then, but Tarantino was hardly alone in thinking the second chapter in the nascent franchise was vastly inferior to its predecessor. A remake of Train to Busan was announced with an exciting director at the helm in Indonesia’s Timo Tjahjanto, but after being awarded an April 2023 release date, it was removed from the calendar altogether and has yet to resurface.
Based on Tarantino’s perception of the sequel relative to the original, he’s probably glad another Train to Busan story has fallen through the cracks and back into development hell.
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