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| Pulp Fiction (1994) |
I feel like I've been saying this a lot lately, but this is one of the most unique films I've ever seen. That might simply stem from my lack of familiarity with Tarantino, but if this is the style that continues throughout his other movies, I won't be complaining. I hear a lot of complaints about how his films can be 'needlessly violent', and I can see how people might think that. This isn't necessarily an action-heavy movie, but there's a lot of violence in here. Does it get a little gratuitous at times? Sure, but it's intentionally so. Because when people complain about the needless violence, I think they're missing the point. Yeah, it can get a little heavy at times, but there's an awful lot of levity here as well. Even the most over-the-top violent moment in the entire movie is played for laughs, as far as I'm concerned. The movie can be really funny when it wants to be, and it does so without really cracking jokes are throwing out quips left, right and centre. The humour comes from the over-the-top violent situations and how the characters respond to them. I've seen this style of humour done before, but never this well.
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| John Travolta as Vincent and Samuel L. Jackson as Jules |
Because the writing is just so f***ing clever. Putting the plot structure aside for a moment, I love just how the characters will interact with one another, and there are so many pointless non-sequiturs that really go on for longer than they need to. In practically any other movie, I'd be saying they could have cut some of this out as it was pointless and didn't contribute much to the story overall but, again, that's part of why it works so well here. The non-sequiturs don't necessarly give us a deep dive into the mindset of the characters, but they add a sense of realism that a film like this needs. This is just how people talk, and it's only when thinking about it now that I realise this is the sort of thing I try to do in my writing as well. I tend to have my characters go off on tangents that don't matter much to the story at hand before returning to the plot proper. I tend to play it up more in my writing and make these tangents ridiculous in nature (in one of my latest scripts, there's almost 2 pages solely devoted to an argument discussing the rules of 'I Spy'), whereas Tarantino's are more grounded, so to speak. The banter isn't played for laughs, it's just... real. The movie is over 2 and a half hours long, and I couldn't tell you which scenes I'd remove to make it shorter. That's a damn impressive feat.
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| Uma Thurman as Mia |
Okay, getting back to the structure now, because this is also one of the great things about this movie. The film is episodic, in that it's split into several different stories that focus on different characters throughout, with Marsellus Wallace and his operations being the thread that ties it all together. All of these stories are great on their own, though putting them all in one movie was definitely the right way to go, rather than trying to make one of them it's own movie. The plots themselves are intriguing enough individually, though there are the occasional conveniences that feel like the movie writing itself out of a corner. Some of these I'm willing to overlook. Others, not so much, but overall it's all fairly well thought through. Adding to this is the fact that the movie is non-linear. It's 'episodes' jump around chronologically, and it's somewhat circular but not really. I'd heard about this aspect of the movie and expected it to be clunky and confusing, but that couldn't be further from the truth. It's in all honesty the only way to tell this narrative. If this movie were presented chronologically, it just wouldn't be right, as the final act would focus on a completely separate character than we've been following the entire time. Doing it this way was the smart move, and it even excuses the occasional moment when a character reaches their chronological end rather anti-climatically. The fact that we see more of them afterwards softens the blow somewhat. Not entirely, but somewhat.
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| Amanda Plummer as Honey Bunny and Tim Roth as Pumpkin |
And the cast... the cast... what a brilliant ensemble. John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson are in the forefront, and they're both great, and work off each other beautifully, but of the two, Jackson is the obvious standout. Every time he's on screen, every time he's talking, every time he's delivering one of his big speeches, he commands the screen, and he's easily the standout performer here. Uma Thurman was great in her use, as well. The only thing I'd seen her in prior to this was Batman & Robin, and it was great to finally see what she's like when she's acting. This performance has completely turned me around on Uma Thurman as an actor, and after the travesty that was the last performance she gave, that's saying an awful lot. Harvey Keitel comes in towards the end, and, like Jackson, steals the show. He's just such a presence, and he's got this almost aura about him that almost exudes authority, which is exactly what his character needed. I could talk about this cast until the cows came home, and how I didn't recognise Steve Buscemi until I saw his name in the credits, or how there were so many one-or-two scene characters that I loved, but the last person I want to talk about is Bruce Willis. He gets a huge spotlight in the second act, and rightfully so. For the section of the movie the least connected with the rest of the plot, Willis did a fantastic job keeping me invested. He's just such a likeable actor; he's one of those actors who's just hard to hate. He's honestly one of my favourite actors, and I haven't seen him in all that much. From what I have seen, he can do no wrong, and this is no exception.
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| Bruce Willis as Butch |
Guys, long story short, there's very little to dislike about Pulp Fiction (1994). I'm certainly looking forward to watching the rest of Tarantino's library after this, and who knows? It might not take me that long to catch up. 9.5/10.
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