Quentin Tarantino says his most ambitious film flopped because ‘people had no idea what the f***’ was happening

Director admits he misjudged how many people would care about Death Proof and Planet Terror double feature

Quentin Tarantino has reflected upon the failure of one his most divisive films.

The director spoke to Empire about his career, specifically dedicating time to Grindhouse, the double bill feature he put together with Robert Rodriguez in 2007.

Comprised of Planet Terror and Tarantino’s Death Proof, Grindhouse pays homage to the exploitation films that would be shown in cinemas one after the other in the 1970s.

The film flopped in the US and the double bill was split and released as two separate films in other countries.

Tarantino has now admitted that he and Rodriguez misjudged what audiences wanted to see, stating: ”They had no idea what the f*** they were watching.”

He continued: “With Grindhouse, I think me and Robert just felt that people had a little more of a concept of the history of double features and exploitation movies. No, they didn’t. At all. It meant nothing to them, alright, what we were doing. So that was a case of being a little too cool for school.”

Despite being released as a standalone film in numerous countries around the world, Death Proof sits just ahead of Reservoir Dogs as one of the director’s least successful films.

It made $31m (£25m) internationally, which is a paltry amount when compared with his most successful film, 2012’s Django Unchained ($425m/£342m).