Brad Pitt, on the moment he completely lost his temper with Clint Eastwood's son

It’s hard to imagine the calm and collected Brad Pitt of countless seamless interviews ever losing his cool.

But his temper boiled over to near violence on the set of aptly named World War Two movie Fury – as did, less surprisingly, Shia LaBeouf's – after co-star Scott Eastwood spat in the back of the tank they called “Home”.

“We were driving down the road, I’m in the turret, Shia is at the other turret, and Scott is on the back, spitting juice,” Pitt told British GQ.

“Shia saw it and felt the same – he’s disrespecting our home. So Shia had the same reaction I did and started having some words.

“I had to get in after the cameras were rolling and explain it to Scotty,” Pitt said of his attempt to patch things up.

“The funny thing is, when we got home at the end of the day and read the script, it said Scotty’s character is ‘chewing tobacco and spitting it on the back of the tank.’ He was just doing as instructed in the script! So we were the knobs in the end….”

Elsewhere in the interview, Pitt was full of praise for the controversy-courting, walking performance art piece Shia LaBeouf.

“Oh, I love this boy,” he said.

“He’s one of the best actors I’ve ever seen. He’s full-on commitment, man. He’s living it like no one else, let me tell you. I’ve been fortunate to work with a lot of great actors. He’s one of the best I’ve seen.”

And that should mean a lot to LaBeouf – last seen running 144 laps around a museum in Amsterdam. Pitt is particularly selective when it comes to who he chooses to work with.

“I’m actually very snobbish about directors,” he said.

“I have to say no all the time. ‘No’ is the most powerful word in our business. You’ve got to protect yourself … To leave home, it’s got to be worth leaving. It’s got to be worth it.”

Fury premieres in the UK on 19 October at the London BFI Film Festival.