Pulp Fiction Never Ceases To Amaze Me

If you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to ask for a glass of milk. But if you give a man with Asperger's a film camera, you never can tell what exactly might happen next. Perhaps it's inappropriate conjecture for me to surmise what exactly goes on in Quentin Tarantino's mind, but as someone sitting somewhere on the spectrum, you know it when you see it, and Pulp Fiction is it. I've watched this movie a couple of times now, and I've no doubt I'll come back for thirds at some point. This movie is strange. Its fixations on hyper-focused humor are eccentric. The only predictable thing about it is that it will be unpredictable. But despite its eccentricity in both dialogue and narrative, Pulp Fiction sticks the landing like a hyperactive yet hyper-skilled gymnast with a master's in English. It's the closest a movie can get to being its own self-contained anthology without crossing that line, yet mercifully focused enough to keep a firm grip on all the story threads it hangs. Hanging on the ends of those strands are a couple of weirdly amusing hitmen, a ruthless gangster and his mysterious wife, a boxer struggling to hold a tumultuous relationship together, and a pair of star-struck lovers trying to rob a diner. You'll never guess what all these people have in common, and what amazes me is that Pulp Fiction actually knows the answer to its own question, tying them all of the threads together at the end in majestic, disgusting, violent, yet surprising fashion.

I don't think I've ever met a film major who didn't like Quentin Tarantino, and one common theme between all of his movies is their intelligent and subtly unhinged dialogue. In the case of Pulp Fiction, long-winded anecdotes and similes are the name of the game. Tarantino has a way with words, and his quippy and dry dialogue is both amusing and insightful, hilariously understated and thoughtful. The many stories every character in this movie serenades us with add that much more history to them in a highly economical way. I always wanted to hear more of their tall tales, and Tarantino and his pen were always happy to oblige me - always.

Pulp Fiction is an eccentric movie, and its weird factor is attractive in the way that a baby with a flamethrower might be. That isn't to say it isn't a careful movie, given its immaculate eye for detail. For instance, in the opening credits of the movie, the song played in the background is Miserlou by Dick Dale - the "surfer song," if you will. However, once the credit for Karyn Rachtman - the music supervisor of this movie - appears, the music changes to Jungle Boogie by Kool and the Gang. In another scene, the hitman Vincent talks business with a hippie-aspirational drug dealer in the man's office. The camera angles don't cut back and forth between the two men like we'd see in a normal movie. Instead, we see the dealer's face reflected in a mirror at the bottom right of the frame for the entire conversation while Vincent faces in the camera's general direction. Small things like this that you won't find in other movies make every second of Pulp Fiction an unpredictable treat to watch.

Every single character in this movie is a showstopper in their own way, but Samuel L. Jackson's performance as the hitman Jules is a rightful standout. Jackson fluctuates between eccentricity, menace, and even comedy on a dime. His range as an actor is amazing, and his chemistry with his partner, Vincent, is pure gold. My memory may not be great, yet the self-referential memory of Pulp Fiction is truly a treat to be experienced. It constantly references and calls back to old jokes and anecdotes it told earlier, and I was continually surprised by this movie's excellent memory. For as much praise as I've heaped on it, I've yet to talk about my favorite aspect of Pulp Fiction, which would be its impeccable plotting. The way this movie is structured is highly unfamiliar, about the furthest thing from a linear point-a-to-point-b story as there ever has been.

It tells four different stories about four distinct groups of people from four different walks of life who are all thrown into a dangerous situation together. This is a high-wire act, and Pulp Fiction nails it. I respect its willingness to take chances and be itself, because it dances on that wire, too. The way this movie ties up all of its loose ends in its final third is unlike anything I've ever seen before; the bigger picture pops like a nonlinear Van Gogh painting made of candy and blood. Pulp Fiction is one of the most carefully-plotted and well-executed movies I've ever had the privilege of watching. The a-ha! moments are plentiful enough to impress, smart enough to shock, yet sparing enough to remain amazing. This movie is borderline unnecessary in all the different ways it shows off, as if it were flexing the skill of Tarantino and co-writer Roger Avery in the best ways possible. Pulp Fiction feels undeniably self-indulgent, but also as if it deserves to be.

This movie has so many moving parts, and it's easy to rewatch it and realize that it doesn't play out exactly how you remembered it. Pulp Fiction could be the single most precisely-tuned movie I've ever seen. It shamelessly pillages ideas from other, lesser movies, and sticks all the pieces back together to make an unmistakably strange, intoxicatingly grandiose, yet undeniably intelligent final product with enough showmanship to adorn the wall of every first-year film student in America. It's populated by boisterous and lively characters played magnetically by a more-than-capable cast, players plastered on the game Tarantino plays with every cinematic convention you could think of, twisting them to fit his startling and innovative vision. Its eccentricity doesn't just make Pulp Fiction its own animal compared to other movies: it practically needs its own wing of the zoo. It's strange. It's funny. It's brainy. It's also violent, talky, and excessive. I think it's incredible that a movie like this could mentally beat me to a pulp and then get me to praise it, but nevertheless, that's what I'm trying to explain to you. In this movie, someone's brain gets splattered all over the back seat of a car via an unfortunate accident, but Tarantino's brain is working just fine.

Pulp Fiction - 10/10

Ezekiel 25:16-17