What will Tarantino say? Harvey Weinstein vows to STOP producing violent films as part of his battle against the NRA 

• Mega-producer revealed his plans to make a film to help battle the gun industry and the NRA
• Said it will not be a documentary and will be big' like Mr Smith Goes To Washington
  
• 'I don't think we need guns in this country. And I hate it'
• Senator Ted Cruz called Weinstein a hypocrite, citing Quentin Tarantino's extremely bloody Kill Bill films he had produced 
  

By MEGHAN KENEALLY and SNEJANA FARBEROV

Published: 02:19 EST, 18 January 2014 | Updated: 16:55 EST, 26 February 2014

Hollywood heavyweight Harvey Weinstein has produced some of the most violent films to hit the silver screen in the last 30 years, but he says that’s all in the past now.

Speaking to CNN's Piers Morgan on Friday, Weinstein pledged to choose projects that 'aren’t violent or as violent as they used to be' as he gears up to make a film that takes aim at the National Rifle Association.

Since announcing the as yet untitled project starring screen legend Meryl Streep this week, Weinstein has come under sharp criticism from gun rights advocates.

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Big change: Hollywood heavyweight Harvey Weinstein, who has produced such bloody films as Pulp Fiction and Gangs of New York, announced on the Piers Morgan Show that he will stay away from excessively violent projects

Country singer and right-wing activist Ted Nugent compared Weinstein, who is Jewish and a Democrat, to a Nazi propagandist and called him 'brain-dead’ for his anti-gun position.   

Weinstein told Morgan he was inspired to take on a project carrying a strong anti-gun message in the wake of the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut that claimed the lives of 20 children and six adults.

Republican Senator Ted Cruz wasted no time calling the head of the studio that produced so many of Quentin Tarantino's blood-soaked blockbusters, including Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction and Django Unchained, a hypocrite. 

The Texas lawmaker singled out Tarantino's 2003 film Kill Bill, also produced by the Weinstein Company,  calling the final sword fight ‘one of the most epically violent scenes,’ Politico reported.

‘But you don’t see people wanting to ban knives,’ Cruz said Thursday on Fox News’s On the Record with Greta Van Susteren.

Intent on proving that he has the courage of his convictions, Mr Weinstein made a pledge Friday night on the Piers Morgan Show to stay away from excessive gun violence in his films going forward.

blood brothers: Eisenstein is a long-time collaborator of Quentin Tarantino, and over the years he has produced such uber-violent cult classics as Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs

‘Well, I think they have a point. You have to look in the mirror, too,’ Weinstein said. ‘The change starts here, it has already.’

When asked by the interviewer to expand on his pledge, the movie mogul clarified that he is not going to 'make some crazy action movie just to blow people up and exploit people.'

The mega-producer mentioned his plan to make an the anti-gun film with Streep during an interview with radio host Howard Stern.

'I shouldn’t say this, but I’ll tell it to you, Howard. I’m going to make a movie with Meryl Streep, and we’re going to take this head-on,' he said Wednesday.

In cahoots: Harvey Weinstein said that he and Meryl Streep, his frequent star, will be working on a movie that lampoons the NRA and the gun industry

'They’re going to wish they weren’t alive after I’m done with them,' he said of the gun industry.

He said that it will not be a documentary but a 'big movie like a "Mr Smith Goes to Washington,"' he said without giving away any plot details.

Weinstein, 61, made it clear that his motive is political as he is openly against the use of guns.

'I don’t think we need guns in this country. And I hate it. I think the NRA is a disaster area,' he said.

He said that his intention is to make the movie such a condemnation of the use of guns in America that the ammunition industry would take a noticeable hit afterwards.

Weinstein said that people will be leaving the movie theater thinking 'Gun stocks — I don’t want to be involved in that stuff'. 

Democrat: Weinstein- seen in 2006 with President Obama, the late Senator Frank Lautenberg, and Senator chuck Schumer- held a fundraiser for President Obama in 2012

'It’s going to be like crash and burn.'

The topic came up when Stern asked about his plans to direct a film based on a book about the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto during the Holocaust, but used it as a basis to explain his feelings on guns.

'It's not a Holocaust story as much as it is Jews with guns. It's my whole philosophy. It's the idea that when injustice is that great you can't just march into the camps,' he said.

'I never want to have a gun... This is when you're marching a half a million people into Auschwitz. I'd find a gun if that was happening to my people.'

Less obvious: Meryl Streep has not been politically active like Weinstein, but was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Obama in 2010

The Miramax founder has never been shy about his left-leaning political allegiances as he hosted a $2.5million fundraiser for President Obama at his Westport, Connecticut home in August 2012.

He also spoke about gun control that summer in the led up to the 2012 election, telling the Huffington Post: ‘If we don’t get gun-control laws in this country, we are full of beans. To have the National Rifle Association rule the United States of America is pathetic.’

Though Meryl Streep has kept her political beliefs much more closely guarded, she has not remained as tight-lipped in her adoration of Mr Weinstein.

During her 2012 Golden Globes acceptance speech for her portrayal of Margaret Thatcher, Streep jokingly called Weinstein ‘God, the punisher’.