Jean-Pierre Jeunet: Joss Whedon Movies Are for ‘Morons’ and ‘American Geeks’

Jean-Pierre Jeunet is having the final word in his long-running feud with Joss Whedon.

After Whedon criticized Jeunet’s directorship for the 1997 film “Alien: Resurrection,” which Whedon wrote the script for, Jeunet slammed Whedon’s work as being only “for morons,” which, according to Jeunet, is most of the MCU fandom. Whedon previously said that “Alien: Resurrection” did everything “wrong” when it came to casting, scoring, and more, deeming it “almost unwatchable” (per Joss Whedon’s biography).

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“I know Joss Whedon said some bad things about me,” Oscar nominee Jeunet recently told The Independent. “I don’t care. I know if Joss Whedon had made the film himself, it probably would have been a big success. He’s very good at making films for American geeks, something for morons.”

The “Amélie” director continued, “Because he’s very good at making Marvel films. I hate this kind of movie. It’s so silly, so stupid.”

“Alien: Resurrection” grossed $161 million worldwide against a budget of $70 million, with Jeunet suffering poor reviews at the time for his American studio debut. (He has not made a movie in Hollywood since.)

Whedon said in a past interview that, with “Alien: Resurrection,” “They said the lines… mostly… but they said them all wrong. And they cast it wrong. And they designed it wrong. And they scored it wrong. They did everything wrong that they could possibly do. It wasn’t so much that they’d changed the script – it’s that they just executed it in such a ghastly fashion as to render it almost unwatchable.”

Whedon directed the first two “Avengers” films in the MCU, 2012’s “Avengers Assemble” and 2015’s “Avengers: Age of Ultron.” Whedon also took over “Justice League” after Zack Snyder stepped down. Since then, Whedon has faced toxic workplace allegations from “Justice League” stars Gal Gadot and Ray Fisher, as well as former “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” actresses.

The quality of Marvel movies has also been a debate in recent years, with auteurs like Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola calling the MCU akin to “theme parks” on the big screen. “Alien” director Ridley Scott said superhero films are “boring as shit” and shared his take on what “superhero movies” really are.

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