Chris Hemsworth said he found it “super depressing” when top filmmakers Quentin Tarantino and Martin Scorsese made brutal comments about his movie career.
The Australian actor, 39, gave a rare, candid interview with British GQ ahead of the release of the upcoming Netflix sequel, Extraction 2, in which the topic of Marvel’s cinema dominance came up.
Last year, Tarantino made headlines when he declared Hemsworth “wasn’t a movie star”, as he hit out at the changing landscape of the big screen in which franchises are the money-maker, as opposed to the glory days when it was the actors who got bums on seats.
“Part of the Marvel-isation of Hollywood is … you have all these actors who have become famous playing these characters. But they’re not movie stars. Right? Captain America is the star. Or Thor is the star,” Tarantino said in November.
Scorsese, for his part, first lashed Marvel in a 2019 interview with Empire, saying he didn’t think the superhero films represented “cinema”, and that they were diluting raw human stories. He has repeatedly doubled down on this claim since.
“I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema,” Scorsese said. “Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.”
When asked about their comments during his interview, Hemsworth sounded somewhat defeated, declaring both Tarantino and Scorsese were “heroes” of his.
“That’s super depressing when I hear that,” Hemsworth said. “There goes two of my heroes I won’t work with. I guess they’re not a fan of me.”
Despite that, he said he was “thankful” he’s formed a key part of a blockbuster behemoth that has “kept people in cinemas”.
“Now, whether or not those films were to the detriment of other films, I don’t know … I don’t love when we start scrutinising each other when there’s so much fragility in the business and in this space of the arts as it is,” Hemsworth said.
“I say that less to the directors who made those comments, who are all, by the way, still my heroes, and in a heartbeat I would leap to work with any of them. But I say it more to the broader opinion around that topic.”
Elsewhere, Hemsworth also addressed the lukewarm response to his latest Marvel movie, the Taika Waititi-directed Thor: Love and Thunder, which came out last year.
While it made a killing at the global box office (around $1.1 billion), many reviewers felt it was a step down from its previous offering, 2017’s Ragnarok.
And Hemsworth said it wasn’t just movie buffs leading the criticism, with his friends’ kids giving him grief for it.
“It’s a bunch of eight-year-olds critiquing my film. ‘We thought this one had too much humour, the action was cool but the VFX weren’t as good,’” he said.
“I cringe and laugh equally at it.”
He added, “I think we just had too much fun. It just became too silly … It’s always hard being in the centre of it and having any real perspective.
“I love the process, it’s always a ride. But you just don’t know how people are going to respond.”
You can read Chris Hemsworth’s full interview in GQ magazine.