What's the X Factor that drives people like Quentin Tarantino, and why do we care?

What did we all do before DVDs?? I just watched the second instalment of "Making of Kill Bill", the part two version. As ever, it was visually amazing, and well worth the price of the disc just to see the King of Movie Geeks, talking about his day-job.

Tarantino is the man, in my opinion. Not because he's always great, nor because his opinions "matter" necessarily. And not because of his obsessive-compulsive habits of referring to his all-time favourite movies in virtually every sequence of his film. Tarantino is cool simply because he lives and breathes his craft, and he's clearly having an incredibly good time doing it.

Don't get me wrong, I'm sure every director enjoys what they're doing. But Tarantino doesn't bullshit in self-serious "arty" language about the emotional weight of his characters, or doesn't jerk about the room moralising about why "this story really matters and I just had to bring it to the world", as if making a film somehow equates to feeding the people of the Sudan.

Quentin just fuckin loves films. He's an addict, and he can pop off like a sky-rocket talking about it in his thousand-miles-an-hour style. In fact, he can actually sky-rocket about some of his earlier sky-rocketing sessions with similarly crazed movie freaks. Which is almost disturbing.

A good example is RZA from the Wu Tang Clan, who wrote the score for KB 1. RZA's similarly obsessed with Kung Fu films, to the extent that Quentin says this duel developed between the two when they met, over who could out-do the other with kung fu trivia or the ownership of rare collectibles. Sort of like a sort of film geek's version of the awesome Uma Thurman vs Lucy Liu finale fight in Kill Bill 1. Alhough I must say, unlikely to be quite as exciting to watch.

It's a weird pleasure to get an insight into an obsessive, and prodigious, personality. What's cool about QT is that he's in it for the ride. Shooting the shit about films is a pastime that super-rich directors should not lose sight of, and the fact that Quentin's got his own weblog (www.qtdiary.blogspot.com) is indicative. Of course some of the more jaded in the world have instantly accused the site of being a hoax. Come on, now. You've got to love these conspiracy theorists, but they're a bit of a dark bunch.

Tarantino's geek-dom is explored perfectly in the "Making Of Kill Bill 1 & 2, and he delights in sharing some of his personal moments in making the film. Such as the time he's in a shop in Tokyo and hears the crazed Japanese surfer-chick noise of the 5-6-7-8-9's playing on the stereo. Three hours before flying out, he decides "I've simply got to get this", so he tries to buy the shop's copy from the counter clerk, who insists she can't sell it.

Heh, so here's Quentin, he-who-can-move-mountains in Tokyo, Beijing and Los Angeles to make his two-part epic, stooping to speaking over the phone to the manager of the store about why he can't just go down to Tower Records like every other punter and buy the disc, and why he simply must buy this copy.

Later he admits to us that the urgency at the time was basically because "I knew that if I didn't do it now, then I'd never follow up on it".

Hilarious. So gratifying to know that even the big-shot directors have that perenial problem with follow-up.

Now, speaking of which, what was it that I was supposed to be doing today?? – LC.