George Clooney Tells Quentin Tarantino To 'F*** Off'

George Clooney is not happy with legendary film director Quentin Tarantino.

Tarantino was apparently asked recently to name some current movie stars, and named Clooney's frequent co-star Brad Pitt as one of them. But not George Clooney himself. And the 63-year-old actor was not pleased about it. 

In a cover story with Pitt for GQ, Clooney went off on Tarantino for essentially ignoring his entire film career.

"Quentin said some sh*t about me recently, so I’m a little irritated by him," Clooney said. "He did some interview where he was naming movie stars, and he was talking about [Brad Pitt], and somebody else, and then this guy goes, ‘Well, what about George?’ He goes, he’s not a movie star. And then he literally said something like, ‘Name me a movie since the millennium.’ And I was like, ‘Since the millennium? That’s kind of my whole f****** career.' So now I’m like, all right, dude f*** off. I don’t mind giving him s***."

Clooney did admit that there are fewer movie stars in today's entertainment industry, because of the collapse of the Hollywood studio system.

"Well, they haven’t developed stars the way the studio system used to," Clooney said. "We kind of were at the very end of that, where you could work at a studio and do three or four films, and there was some plan to it. And I don’t think that’s necessarily the case anymore. So it’s harder for you to sell somebody something on the back of a star."

Brad Pitt and George Clooney on the set of "Wolfs." (Photo by MEGA/GC Images via Getty Images)

George Clooney's Right, Quentin Tarantino's Wrong

When people think of "movie stars," they think of someone who's capable of being the lead actor in a big-budget Hollywood production. That's George Clooney. And particularly coming from Tarantino, it's an odd criticism.

Yes, Clooney isn't the lead in high dollar action movies like Tom Cruise or the face of Marvel like Robert Downey Jr., but he's frequently the star of films that, in theory, would be more appealing to Tarantino. 

Brad Pitt has had a more successful career, but his build and personality lends itself to different roles. Pitt starred in "Troy" as Achilles, something Clooney couldn't have done convincingly. But Clooney also has an edge to him that Pitt doesn't always display. Clooney also turned to directing, including the 2023 release "The Boys in the Boat."

Going after his career since the year 2000 is also an odd choice; Clooney starred in "Ocean's Eleven," "Three Kings," "The Perfect Storm," "O Brother, Where Art Thou," "Good Night and Good Luck," "Michael Clayton," "Gravity" and "The Descendants," movies that had varying levels of commercial and critical success.

At 63-years-old, he's well past his peak of playing the leading man, as it were, but he's still someone that people know and recognize. And that's one of the most important parts of being a movie star.