A review by Azzam Abdur-Rahman
Few films change cinema. Few films become a part of the cultural zeitgeist as much as this film would become. Pulp Fiction is endlessly quotable and one of those movies that once you see it, changes the way you look at dialog. It changes the way you look at story telling, and the way you see how a movie can come together. Tarantino, on his second film, finds a way to out do the incredible Reservoir Dogs. He takes everything we love about Reservoir Dogs … the pop culture references, the witty dialog, the burst of tactile violence … and turns them all up to 100. And he does this al the while he’s deciding to double down on the idea of telling a non-liner story. To talk about Pulp Fiction is to talk about how much the 90’s changed American cinema for ever. It is to talk about a cultural touchstone.
Pulp Fiction saved careers. I know it’s a fact now, but at the time John Travolta’s career was all but dead. Short of the Look Whose Talking films his career was filled with trash like Perfect and The Experts. He had no way out of this series of failures when Tarantino comes out of the ether with a role that he wrote for Michael Madson. Suddenly Travolta is an Oscar-nominated actor surrounded by some of the best actors of a generation in a film. Pulp Fiction saved that man from becoming a joke into the 90’s. It gave Bruce Willis a second life as well … a man who took a massive paycut to grow into someone who had real acting clout instead of just being the guy who did some action movies and a sitcom.
This film would make Tarantino the director who saves careers, a fact that would follow him onto future films. But Pulp Fiction changed the language of cinema completely. After its release, witty, pop culture laden dialog became the standard. Weaving narratives became standard for high-brow crime film. Films like Go would try to copy the wild storytelling, but no one will ever be as a great as Tarantino at creating immense tension with every line …those moments leading to bursts of straight up violence. Pulp Fiction did this masterfully. The lead-up in the opening to the Diner sets this standard. Once you feel acclimated to the tone, suddenly, bang, the actor is on top of a table brandishing a gun and threatening everyone. It is a wild sense of uncertainity that Tarantino brought to cinema.
Pulp Fiction is the reason many people went to film school. The reason many film nerds listened to the words and works of Tarantino as if they were gospel. Pulp Fiction is more than just a movie, it is a watershed moment in cinema that cannot be unseen, undone or undermined. Few films save careers and few films create new narrative languages, but most of all ... few films have the power that this one did!
Few films change cinema. Few films become a part of the cultural zeitgeist as much as this film would become. Pulp Fiction is endlessly quotable and one of those movies that once you see it, changes the way you look at dialog. It changes the way you look at story telling, and the way you see how a movie can come together. Tarantino, on his second film, finds a way to out do the incredible Reservoir Dogs. He takes everything we love about Reservoir Dogs … the pop culture references, the witty dialog, the burst of tactile violence … and turns them all up to 100. And he does this al the while he’s deciding to double down on the idea of telling a non-liner story. To talk about Pulp Fiction is to talk about how much the 90’s changed American cinema for ever. It is to talk about a cultural touchstone.
Pulp Fiction saved careers. I know it’s a fact now, but at the time John Travolta’s career was all but dead. Short of the Look Whose Talking films his career was filled with trash like Perfect and The Experts. He had no way out of this series of failures when Tarantino comes out of the ether with a role that he wrote for Michael Madson. Suddenly Travolta is an Oscar-nominated actor surrounded by some of the best actors of a generation in a film. Pulp Fiction saved that man from becoming a joke into the 90’s. It gave Bruce Willis a second life as well … a man who took a massive paycut to grow into someone who had real acting clout instead of just being the guy who did some action movies and a sitcom.
This film would make Tarantino the director who saves careers, a fact that would follow him onto future films. But Pulp Fiction changed the language of cinema completely. After its release, witty, pop culture laden dialog became the standard. Weaving narratives became standard for high-brow crime film. Films like Go would try to copy the wild storytelling, but no one will ever be as a great as Tarantino at creating immense tension with every line …those moments leading to bursts of straight up violence. Pulp Fiction did this masterfully. The lead-up in the opening to the Diner sets this standard. Once you feel acclimated to the tone, suddenly, bang, the actor is on top of a table brandishing a gun and threatening everyone. It is a wild sense of uncertainity that Tarantino brought to cinema.
Pulp Fiction is the reason many people went to film school. The reason many film nerds listened to the words and works of Tarantino as if they were gospel. Pulp Fiction is more than just a movie, it is a watershed moment in cinema that cannot be unseen, undone or undermined. Few films save careers and few films create new narrative languages, but most of all ... few films have the power that this one did!
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