Quentin Tarantino movie theory suggests Leonardo DiCaprio plays Rick Dalton in Django Unchained

It completely changes the way you watch the film

A meta theory suggests that Quentin Tarantino film Django Unchained is actually a film within a film.

A few Reddit users have previously wondered whether the 2012 western film, starring Jamie Foxx and Christoph Waltz, is actually a film that was made and released in the same world as the director’s most recent film, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which is available to stream on Netflix.

This would mean that, in the world of the film, villainous character Calvin Candie is not actually played by Leonardo DiCaprio, but the actor’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood character Rick Dalton.

The theory suggests that Django Unchained would have been another release to star Dalton alongside his other film and television projects, including Lancer, Operazione Dyn-o-mite! and The Fourteen Fists of McCluskey.

In Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Dalton plays the villain in Lancer, who actually has some similarities to Candie, so it’s no stretch to assume Dalton could have been cast in that role.

The theory states: “We have no clue as of today what happened to Dalton after Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Tarantino said that after 1969 he was a pretty big name.”

Is Calvin Candie a character played by ‘Once Upon a Tim in Hollywood’s Rick Dalton? (Columbia Pictures)

In 2019, it was announced that Tarantino was developing a sequel to Django Unchained.

The project will be an adaptation of a comic book miniseries he wrote that shows what Jamie Foxx’s lead character got up to years after events seen in the 2012 film.

Earlier this month, Tarantino released a novelisation of Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, featuring Dalton and Brad Pitt’s stuntman character, Cliff Booth.

Find our ranking of the director's 20 greatest characters here.