Most directors, no matter how prolific or well-regarded by their peers they eventually become, rarely achieve rock-star celebrity status. Even today’s most respected auteurs are only seldom regarded outside of die-hard film-lover circles and the requisite awards show circus that comes at the end of the year. Quentin Tarantino, however, is unlike any living director today, bar maybe Scorsese, Fincher, and a handful of others.
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In the early 1990s, Tarantino changed all of that with a little movie called “Pulp Fiction” (though “Reservoir Dogs” paved the way). A talky, non-linear, convention-breaking L.A. mosaic and hangout movie, “Pulp Fiction” was a genuine paradigm shift: one of the most influential movies of the decade, perhaps of all time. Audiences had never seen anything like it before: the brash amorality, the dialogue so indelible you wanted to quote it to your friends, the shocking bursts of violence, the hypodermic needle scene, etc. It remains one of the touchstones of the ’90s, and also perhaps Quentin Tarantino’s unofficial arrival as one of the most important directors of his generation.
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Tarantino’s filmography since then has been an eclectic and electric thing to witness and savor: he’s put his own strange, loving spin on his favorite movie genres (Westerns, WWII movies, claustrophobic single-location thrillers) and given us some genuine masterpieces, as well as some efforts that fall just a bit short of that lofty status. Even when a Q.T. movie fails to achieve perfection, it’s never uninteresting – and it is most certainly never boring– and it’s always an event that Hollywood and the industry braces for.
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Before the release of his star-studded new Tinseltown epic and ode to moviemaking, “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood,” starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pitt, and Margot Robbie (our review from Cannes, here), here’s a retrospective look at the highs and lows of Quentin Tarantino’s massive, unassailable filmography.
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“Reservoir Dogs”
This is where it all began folks: the ironic pop-music needle drops, the jarring moments of ultraviolence, the deliciously loquacious criminal dialogue… all of it. “Reservoir Dogs” is one of the great movies of the 90’s: a damn-near-perfect amalgam of black comedy, splatter-movie gore, effortless cool, and career-best performances from the likes of Harvey Keitel and Tim Roth. Quentin Tarantino’s directorial debut was a film that demanded he be noticed, though his sophomore follow-up, “Pulp Fiction,” was a bonafide cultural sensation that took the moviegoing world by storm (more on that one in a moment). The thieves in “Reservoir Dogs” aren’t tortured, stoic professionals like the characters in a Michael Mann movie. They’re veritable chatterboxes: crooks with color-coded names given to waxing rhapsodic about everything from Silver Surfer comics to Madonna lyrics. They’re also a vicious bunch, and they’ll blow you to bits if you stand in their way. This is particularly true of Michael Madsen’s sinister Mr. Blonde, responsible for the notorious ear-severing scene that even those who haven’t seen this movie have probably watched somewhere on YouTube. From its iconic opening scene, in which Steve Buscemi’s acerbic Mr. Pink defends his right not to tip servers, to its blood-soaked, apocalyptic finish, “Reservoir Dogs” is one hell of a ride. The film is boosted in no small regard by lived-in, ineffaceable supporting turns from the likes of the late Chris Penn, cult movie legend Laurence Tierney, and revered crime novelist Eddie Bunker, not to mention characteristically note-perfect soundtrack cues like “Little Green Bag” by the George Baker Selection, and a grotesque, immortal use of “Stuck in the Middle with You” by Stealer’s Wheel. [A].
“Pulp Fiction”
It’s become somewhat popular among pop culture contrarians to dismiss the success of “Pulp Fiction” as a mostly generational phenomenon. Anytime a film is this popular, this brilliant, this influential, there are bound to be legions of movie lovers who resent its very existence. And yet, even twenty-five years after its premiere, there’s no denying that “Pulp Fiction” belongs on a very short list (along with “Goodfellas,” “Fargo,” “Boogie Nights,” and “Trainspotting”) as one of the all-time great ’90s movies. The film is an explosive and exuberant ride: a cocktail of perversity, profanity, and unabashed cinephilia. It’s hard to say anything about a movie that’s been written to death in nearly every corner of the filmgoing world, but we’ll say this: even if you disagree that “Pulp Fiction” is Mr. Tarantino’s finest hour, it’s undoubtedly the movie he’ll be remembered for when we consider his legacy in the decades to come. The film contains career-best performances from pretty much everyone in its cast: Samuel L. Jackson as a jheri-curled, philosophical hitman, John Travolta as his mumbly, heroin-addicted partner, and Bruce Willis as a pugilist who throws a big fight, certainly, but also Eric Stoltz as a chatty smack dealer, Uma Thurman as a vampy gangster’s moll, and Harvey Keitel as a dapper criminal fixer known as The Wolf. The film’s alchemy of self-aware gallows humor and sickening violence would prove to be one of the most influential recipes of the 1990s, inspiring an onslaught of inferior knockoffs that continued well into the early-to-mid 2000s. While it’s understandable that some may begrudge the film for how easy it became to copy, there’s no underplaying just how visionary this bold new style seemed at the time. After all, if it wasn’t for “Pulp Fiction” – well, we probably wouldn’t be sharing this list with you, now would we? [A]