Rating:  -
Pulp Fiction is the ultimate playground for the mind of Quentin Tarrantino. The movie is a blindingly repressed spewage of pop culture, brilliant setup, drug excrement, softcore porn, and a magnificent mixture of philosophy, religion and violence. The movie's mood almost has us as tied to a chair as Ving Rhames and Bruce Willis are in the excruciatingly painful gimp sequence. Thus retrained, we are blasted on a whirlwind tour of the hippest of the hip. So hip, in fact, that we want to blow our brains out after it is over. Samuel Jackson gives the performance that will undoubtedly mark his career. It is a performance that is disturbed, hysterical, deadly, funny, compassionate, smart and scared (yes, scared.) He's a quote dynamo and is given more great things to say then possibly any character in movie history. Travolta is slick, slimy and stupidly sharp in his role. He's one of the few guys who comes off as an actor in this movie and not a lost soul in the new wave beat generation of the mid-90's. The cast is a who's who of the best cult actors of the mid-90's and Tarrantino gets them to deliver stunning performances. And why not? The dialogue is possibly the best written verbage for any film ever made and is a Holy Grail for fans of offbeat and subculture cinema. From "the holiest of holies" to "correctamundo", the movie is the masterpiece for a guy so immersed in pop culture that he needs an oar to navigate it all. Roth is dynamic in a relatively small part and Ammanda Plummer is like a shrieking little wicked witch. Uma Thurman is a thinking man's dream. She's vulnerable, demonstrative, and most of all, playful. The dancing sequence is priceless and needs no further discussion. Eric Stoltz is like that cool guy that everyone knew in high school that no one really paid much attention to but everyone liked. Bruce Willis is also in his zone as Butch the boxer. Willis has a nice blend of sensitivity and brutality. Any more or less probably would not have worked. The movie also rips on all cultures virutally equally with a burst of fresh air. The movie is more sympathetic towards blacks and not at all towards Southerners but that is par for the course in the civil rights revival in the 1990's. Shooting a movie of this length out of sequence was a tremendous gamble but the dialogue holds it together and it is, doubtlessly, brilliantly creative. The movie's weakness, like other Tarrantino movies, is it's obsession with believing that the drug subculture is somehow right about life and most other facets are somehow less then right or flat out wrong. Tarrantino evolved this idea slightly by the end of the movie and continued it in one of the best B-movies ever made, From Dusk Till Dawn. However, Tarrantino's glorification of radicalism gets old at times and falls flat by the end of the movie due to it's length. All in all, this movie is an all time classic for cinema junkies and pop culture nuts and will pop like champagne in circles away from the power players and the mainstream.
Rating:  -
After watching the abysmal 'Plump Fiction' I had to revisit the original modern masterpiece! 'Pulp Fiction' is responsible for giving new life to a few actors careers and having completely set a new standard for modern films. The film is filled with rich dialogue and performances.
A neat 3 story line ingeniously woven into an unforgettable movie. John Travolta and Samuel Jackson became instant box office gold from their portrayals of two hit men in this film and Travolta's career went from almost nonexistent to top dog. Eric Stoltz portrayal of a stoner drug dealer is pitch perfect as is Rosanna Arquette as his wife. Bruce Willis as Butch the boxer is also in top form and Uma Thurman has never been better. The smaller character roles by Roth, Plummer, Keitel, Walken and Rhames are equally impressive and there isn't a false note in this ultra entertaining rollercoaster ride of a movie.
Tarantino's sly use of tired story lines that he turns upside down is nothing short of genius! It's a film that needs to be seen several times to be fully understood. If you haven't seen it you have missed one of the best films of the last 20 years.
The two discs set sports an excellent transfer and has a ton of great extras including commentary, on screen facts, excellent deleted scenes explained on screen by Tarantino, trailers, TV spots, Siskel & Ebert show devoted to Tarantino, Charlie Rose show devoted to Tarantino, on the set documentary, feature-ette, montages and the list goes on and on!
Rating: -
Pulp Fiction has to be one my favorite movies of all time. It has a little something for everybody - and best of all, it's a great movie. It's a little over the top with the language and violence, but it's done in a very entertaining way. I have watched all of Quentin Tarantino's movies and this one still remains my favorite. It's just a really good movie.
Rating:  -
how did such a horrible movie get such high reviews ?? another sick flick labeled black comedy or something like that with no redeeming value, a terrible plot and really dumb ending. they call this entertainment ??
Rating: -
This is still the movie that represents Tarantino at his height, the one that combines his love for all things movies into 2 hours of pure fun. Everything works perfectly in a way that things rarely come together: the choice of actors, music, dialogue.... it all works perfectly.
|