Pulp Fiction Cinematic Analysis

A detailed Summary of Pulp Fiction Cinematic Analysis

Pulp Fiction, a film directed by Quentin Tarantino was released in 1994. The film won the Academy award for Best Original Screenplay and the Palme d'Or at Cannes. The film is three days in the lives of two Los Angeles gangsters, Vincent Vega played by John Travolta and Jules Winfield played by Samuel L. Jackson, their stories and some of the stories of the people that they deal with during those two days.

Some critics denounced Pulp Fiction for its violence, yet the film is not about the killings that happen in it. Pulp Fiction is about its characters in potentially comic situations. Tarantino uses these characters and their situations to achieve a hipness, a "...funky, American sort of pop masterpiece." This hipness is a laid back nonchalant attitude mixed with some vanity and a sense of loyalty all with a modern flair. The hipness is all part of the gangster mystique, which American movie audiences love so much, and on top of that Tarantino even adds the haunting shiekness of upper-scale drugs, such as heroin and cocaine. Tarantino absolutely harps on the wonderful dichotomy that gangsters present to get this hipness across to the audience. The gangsters are shown both at their coolest and at their worst, having money and

Pulp Fiction, a film directed by Quentin Tarantino was released in 1994. The film won the Academy award for Best Original Screenplay and the Palme d'Or at Cannes. The film is three days in the lives of two Los Angeles gangsters, Vincent Vega played by John Travolta and Jules Winfield played by Samuel L. Jackson, their stories and some of the stories of the people that they deal with during those two days.

All the hipness that Tarantino puts into this film serves itself and one other purpose: because everything about the film is so hip and laid back the viewer finds traditionally grotesque and disgusting things, funny. Jules' treatment of the low lives in the beginning of the film is not necessarily funny, but because Samuel L. Jackson plays his character so "cool" one just has to laugh when he turns around and says "ah-Well allow me to retort." At one point Tarantino pokes fun at himself when he has Jimmy (the character that plays) lend Vincent and Jules some clothes of his after washing blood off of the two gangsters. Once they've changed clothes, Jimmy tells the two that they look like dorks, and Jules replies with a swift, "They're you damn clothes, fool." Another moment when one feels bad about laughing but simply has to because the film has set up the audience to see the humor in the situation is when Vincent shoots Marvin in the back of Jules' car. Normally when someone gets his head blown off the reaction is of disgust and sadness. But one has to laugh as Jackson and Travolta do such a great job of reacting to the problem. The two begin to bicker and argue over why Marvin was shot, neither one is concerned with Marvin himself. The hipness with which they are not even worried about the person in the back seat, but instead are more concerned about the dirty car and how they are going to get out of this problem makes the scene funny.

At times the long static shots become boring. For instance, when Butch (the aging prize fighter played by Bruce Willis) is being told by Marsellus Wallace (the crime boss played by Ving Rhames) that he must lose his next fight in the fifth round, Tarantino does nothing with the camera except leave it on Butch's face for over a minute. This is very boring but does serve a purpose. Traditionally shots that stay on a character's face are meant to get the viewer to concentrate on that character and think about what that character is feeling or thinking. Here the audience sees a traditionally type cast heroic actor being told what to do and being paid off to do it. Tarantino leaves the camera on him so that the audience is forced to consider how powerful Wallace is and how washed up Butch is. With modern movies being so overly produced and cut, this is actually a pretty rare technique in film today; but, Tarantino uses seems to allude to many things of films past, this just being one of them.

At times the long static shots become boring. For instance, when Butch (the aging prize fighter played by Bruce Willis) is being told by Marsellus Wallace (the crime boss played by Ving Rhames) that he must lose his next fight in the fifth round, Tarantino does nothing with the camera except leave it on Butch's face for over a minute. This is very boring but does serve a purpose. Traditionally shots that stay on a character's face are meant to get the viewer to concentrate on that character and think about what that character is feeling or thinking. Here the audience sees a traditionally type cast heroic actor being told what to do and being paid off to do it. Tarantino leaves the camera on him so that the audience is forced to consider how powerful Wallace is and how washed up Butch is. With modern movies being so overly produced and cut, this is actually a pretty rare technique in film today; but, Tarantino uses seems to allude to many things of films past, this just being one of them.

At times the long static shots become boring. For instance, when Butch (the aging prize fighter played by Bruce

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Approximate Word count = 13639
Approximate Pages = 55 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Movies