Pulp Fiction
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| Pulp Fiction | |
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| File:Pulp Fiction cover.jpg Theatrical poster for Pulp Fiction | |
| Directed by | Quentin Tarantino |
| Written by | Quentin Tarantino Roger Avary |
| Produced by | Lawrence Bender |
| Starring | John Travolta Samuel L. Jackson Bruce Willis Uma Thurman Ving Rhames Harvey Keitel Tim Roth Amanda Plummer Maria de Medeiros Eric Stoltz Rosanna Arquette Christopher Walken Quentin Tarantino |
| Cinematography | Andrzej Sekula |
| Edited by | Sally Menke |
| Distributed by | Miramax Films |
Release dates | October 14, 1994 (USA) |
Running time | 154 min. (168 min. deluxe edition) |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $8 million |
Pulp Fiction is an Oscar winning 1994 film directed by Quentin Tarantino, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Roger Avary. It was released to great critical and public acclaim and is widely considered a watershed in American film history, and as the instigator of an ascendant independent film movement in the United States. The film's idiosyncratic characteristics include fragmented storyline, eclectic dialogue, ironic and campy influences, unorthodox camerawork, and numerous pop culture references. Tarantino and Avary won Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and the film was nominated for seven Oscars in total, including Best Picture. It also won the best picture at the Cannes Film Festival.
The film, in keeping with most other Tarantino works, runs in nonlinear order, a storytelling technique which became highly trendy among independent filmmakers during the 1990s, in large part due to the popularity of Pulp Fiction.
The film's title refers to the pulp magazines popular during the mid–20th century, known for their strongly graphic nature.
The screenplay is available as a paperback [1].
Some say, the success of Pulp Fiction spurred studios to release a slew of "copycat" films that tried to duplicate the film's formula of witty and offbeat dialogue, an elliptical/non-chronological plot and unconventional storyline, and gritty subject matter. Most of these films fared poorly at the box office and were dismissed by critics as inferior and derivative, though the raver film Go did receive critical acclaim, as did Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels; the latter being a particularly successful transplant of Pulp Fiction's basic structure into the underworld of London.
The unconventional attitude of the movie, in particular its lack of a standard chronological structure, has often led the film to be cited as an example of a postmodernist film.
The film had a significant impact on the lives of its cast members. It revived the fortunes of John Travolta who was going through a career slump at the time, and Bruce Willis solidified his career as a leading man. It got Uma Thurman onto the Hollywood A-list and led to more work for character actors such as Ving Rhames and Harvey Keitel. Eric Stoltz also profited. The actor who gained the most from Pulp Fiction was Samuel L. Jackson, who wowed critics and audiences in a part Quentin Tarantino wrote especially for him. Once relegated to supporting roles, Jackson soon became one of the world's most popular film stars.
Taglines
- Girls like me don't make invitations like this to just anyone!
- You won't know the facts until you've seen the fiction.
- From the creators of True Romance & Reservoir Dogs
- Three stories about one story.
- I don't smile for pictures.
- Just because you are a character doesn't mean you have character.
- Hamburgers! The cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast.
Plot
Template:Spoiler Using many elements of a black comedy with many stylistic and pop culture touches, Pulp Fiction weaves through the intersecting storylines of Los Angeles gangsters, fringe characters, petty thieves and a mysterious attaché case. Following Quentin Tarantino's more traditional crime movie, Reservoir Dogs, the storyline is chopped up, rearranged and shown out of sequence.
There are four main storylines in Pulp Fiction: Vincent and Jules; Mia Wallace; Butch Coolidge; and Pumpkin and Honey Bunny. All four are intertwined, although Vincent is the only one of these six characters to meet all of the five others during the film.
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The order of events as shown in the film:
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The Diner (first part)
Pumpkin (Tim Roth) and Honey Bunny (Amanda Plummer) discuss robbing restaurants instead of liquor stores, their normal target, due to lack of awareness in restaurants. They decide to rob the one they are currently in and pull out revolvers. Pumpkin jumps up and screams "Everybody be cool, this is a robbery!" Honey Bunny grabs a revolver and screams "Any of you fucking pricks move, and I'll execute every motherfucking last one of you!"
The title credits play.
Vincent & Jules
Hitmen Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) and Vincent Vega (John Travolta) head to a Los Angeles apartment to retrieve a briefcase that was involved in a failed deal for their boss, gangster Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames). They also have to kill Brett (Frank Whaley), the one who was supposed to have set up the deal, and his cohorts. The briefcase is a classic MacGuffin, whose contents are never revealed except indirectly as a glowing, gold light.
After a long and bizarre conversation led by the scripture-spouting Jules (Ezekiel 25:17, 'The path of the righteous man'), the pair shoot and kill Brett and one of his accomplices and ignore Jules' informant, Marvin (Phil LaMarr), who happened to be there with the gang.
Mia Wallace and Vincent
At Marsellus Wallace's request, Vincent Vega shows his wife Mia (Uma Thurman) a good time while Marsellus is out of town. Vincent shows up at Mia's house and while waiting for her to get ready, she plays "Son of a Preacher Man", by Dusty Springfield on the sound system. They head to the fictional restaurant Jack Rabbit Slim's, a slick 1950s-themed restaurant with lookalikes of the decade's top pop culture icons as staff (e.g., television impresario Ed Sullivan as the maître d', and servers such as singer Buddy Holly and actresses Marilyn Monroe and Mamie Van Doren), an option for patrons to eat at a booth or a classic car refitted as a booth, and the famous "Five-Dollar Milkshake".
Vincent and Mia make small talk, wherein she recounts her experience as an actress in a failed television pilot, "Fox Force Five". The show followed the exploits of an all-female team of secret agents, each having a particular specialty. Mia's character, Raven McCoy, was raised by circus performers and, according to the show, was "...the deadliest woman in the world with a knife." She also knew a zillion old jokes her grandfather, an old vaudevillian, taught her, though she initially refuses to share with Vincent the joke Raven tells in the pilot out of fear of being embarrassed.
In Mia's words, the rest of the troupe had other formidable abilities:
- "Fox, as in we're a bunch of foxy chicks. Force, as in we're a force to be reckoned with. Five, as in there's one... two... three... four... five of us. There was a blonde one, Sommerset O'Neal from that show "Baton Rouge", she was the leader. A Japanese one, a black one, a French one and a brunette one, me. We all had special skills. Sommerset had a photographic memory, the Japanese fox was a kung fu master, the black girl was a demolition expert, the French fox's specialty was sex..."
(Tarantino has acknowledged the similarity between Fox Force Five and the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (DiVAS) in Kill Bill.)
Mia then demands that Vincent dance with her in the Jack Rabbit Slim's twist contest and they dance to Chuck Berry's "You Never Can Tell". When they return to the Wallace house, she is seen carrying the trophy. While listening to Urge Overkill's version of Neil Diamond's "Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon", Mia overdoses after snorting heroin. She had found the heroin in the pocket of Vince's coat, which she was wearing, and believed it to be cocaine. A fearful Vincent rushes her over to small-time drug dealer Lance, (Eric Stoltz) who had previously sold him the heroin. Lance helps Vincent ready the shot and Lance's dysfunctional wife Jody (Rosanna Arquette) watches. Vincent stabs Mia with the syringe full of adrenaline. She wakes up with a howl and when asked to say something, says "something". Jody remarks "That was fucking trippy".
Upon arriving back at the Wallace residence, Mia finally reveals her corny joke: "So there's Papa Tomato, Momma Tomato and Baby Tomato walking along the street. Baby Tomato starts lagging behind, and Papa Tomato starts getting really angry. So, he turns around and squishes Baby Tomato and says, 'Ketchup.' "
In their last conversation, they agree not to tell Marsellus of the overdosing incident, both fearing what he might do to either of them.
The Gold Watch
Aging prizefighter Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis) accepts a large sum of money from Marsellus, agreeing to "take a dive" (deliberately lose a fight) by allowing himself to be knocked out in the fifth round of his upcoming match. However, Butch double-crosses Marsellus, instead betting the money he received from Marsellus on himself (with, due to the fight's being fixed, presumably very favorable odds) and winning the bout, accidentally killing his opponent in the process. Although now flush with cash, Butch must quickly leave town, as a vengeful Marsellus is hot on his trail.
There is a flashback at the beginning of the "The Gold Watch" storyline (Butch's story), in which the child Butch Coolidge (Chandler Lindauer) receives his watch from a war buddy of his father's (Christopher Walken), who kept the watch in his rectum for two years to hide it from the Vietcong due to his father's death in a Vietnam War prison camp. This gold watch, which has been passed down from father to son since his great-grandfather fought in World War I, is of great sentimental value to Butch.
Butch is compelled to return to his apartment to retrieve the wristwatch after he discovers his girlfriend Fabienne (Maria de Medeiros) has forgotten to pack it. He is worried that most likely Marsellus is there looking for him. When Butch enters, the coast is clear. Butch quickly gets the watch and is ready to leave. Satisfied no-one awaits to kill him, Butch grabs a sack of toaster pastries in his kitchen and puts them in the toaster on the counter. While waiting for the pastries to pop out, Butch finally notices a silenced MAC-10 submachine gun on the kitchen counter. Butch is shocked and picks up the gun. Upon hearing his toilet flush in the bathroom next to the kitchen, he readies himself in time to encounter Vincent Vega coming out of the bathroom. They both freeze in shock. Butch concentrates intensely on Vincent, and when the toaster pastries pop up with a ring, the shock causes Butch to fire the gun at Vincent, causing him to fall back into the bathroom dead.
While driving back to the motel from the apartment complex, Butch sees Marsellus crossing the street in front of him, they recognize each other. Through the windshield Marsellus sees Butch and yells "motherfucker!", Butch accelerates into him. He then collides with another car and rolls into a small parking lot. A group of ladies help Marsellus back to his feet. In his POV, he sees Butch running away from the scene. He takes out his gun; the ladies run away. Butch runs down the sidewalk with an injured leg, while Marsellus limps on his trail, firing stray bullets. Butch punches Marsellus repeatedly, while they enter a pawnshop. Butch takes Marsellus gun and is about to execute him, when the pawnshop owner, Maynard, turns a shotgun on the two. Maynard picks up the phone and dials his partner Zed. Maynard tells Zed, "The spider just caught a couple of flies!". He knocks out Butch, while Marsellus is already knocked out.
Marsellus and Butch wake up to find that they have been tied up to chairs with red ball gags strapped in their mouths. Maynard and Zed turn out to be sexual predators and rapists. Living in a hole in the floor is The Gimp, their sexual slave. The Gimp, dressed in leather and leashed to the ceiling laughs at Butch while Zed and Maynard take Marsellus into the back room and rape him. Butch escapes his bonds and punches out the gimp, hanging him on his leash. He quickly runs back upstairs and is faced with the choice of saving himself or aiding Marsellus. Knowing Marsellus wanted him dead, he could easily have left Marsellus in the hands of the odd-ball assailants. Instead, he makes a choice to release Marsellus, risking that he might fail or that Marsellus might not accept his peace offering.
Butch looks around the shop, finding a variety of weapons, and finally a katana on high shelf. He goes downstairs and opens the door; Zed is raping Marsellus on a small wooden horse, while Maynard watches with glee in his eyes. Butch slashes Maynard across his entire chest and then, while stunned, stabs him through the torso, killing him dead on the floor. Zed retreats from Marsellus and sees Butch. Butch is about to kill Zed when Marsellus gets Maynard's shotgun and shoots Zed in the groin/thigh. Butch asks "What now?" and awaits Marsellus' reply. Marsellus, who originally intended to hunt Butch down and exact his revenge for the botched boxing fix, now must realize that Butch has both saved his life and submitted to him: he decides that Butch is free as long as he never tells anyone about the incident of his rape, and never returns to Los Angeles. Butch agrees, and quickly leaves town on Zed's chopper with Fabienne.
The Bonnie Situation
We return to Vincent and Jules' story. We learn that during Jules' bible passage to Bret, there was another man of the gang in the bathroom. After Vincent and Jules shoot Bret, the man bursts out of the bathroom and shoots at Vincent and Jules with a large revolver. The bullets strike all around and between them, missing them, so they kill the man; later Jules discusses how it was a miracle that they did not get shot.
They take Marvin with them in the back seat of their car. During a conversation, Vincent asks Marvin's opinion and carelessly aims his gun at him. The gun goes off, making a huge bloody mess in the car and on Vincent and Jules. Jules calls Jimmy (Quentin Tarantino), who lets them use his garage. Jimmy's wife Bonnie will be coming home soon from work, so they call Marsellus, who arranges for Mr. Wolf (Harvey Keitel), to help. After cleaning the car, hiding the body in the trunk, and disposing of their bloody clothes, Jules and Vincent have no choice but to wear "dorky" T-shirts. Mr. Wolf takes the car to a junkyard.
Vincent and Jules decide to go out to breakfast....
The Diner (second part)
The two men eat at a diner for breakfast. Jules has a spiritual awakening and states he will be leaving Marsellus Walace. Vincent does not like the idea, and goes to the bathroom. A pair of young petty thieves, Pumpkin and Honey Bunny, jump up with revolvers and scream obscenities. Pumpkin shouts "Everybody be cool this is a robbery!" Honey Bunny screams "Any one of you fucking pricks move, and I'll execute every one of you motherfuckers!" They demand all of the patrons' money and valuables. Pumpkin demands that Jules hands over the case from Bret, Jules holds him at gunpoint in a Mexican standoff. Honeybunny jumps on a table and screams "You let him go! You let him go! Let go of him, Im goin' to kill you, you'll fuckin die!" Jules convinces her to be quiet. Vincent emerges from the restroom with gun drawn and pointed at Yolanda; in this standoff, not everyone will die, because no one has a gun pointed at Vincent. Jules explains his ambivalence toward his life of crime, takes his wallet back from Ringo (sans the cash inside because Jules "bought Ringo's life"), and lets the pair go free.
Vincent suggests that they should leave now, they put their guns in their pants, and walk out of the diner.
The end credits roll.
Plot devices
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The boxing double-cross
This is most likely in homage to the 1929 Dashiell Hammett crime novel, Red Harvest, wherein the story's protagonist exerts pressure on organized crime by blackmailing a boxer into "unfixing" a fixed fight. Indeed, such early Twentieth Century crime novels were Tarantino's inspiration for the movie. [citation needed]
Toilet motif
Tarantino uses the toilet or bathroom as a plot device. When Jules and Vincent are shooting Brett & his companions, a fourth man is hiding by the toilet, waiting to fire. When Mia comes back from 'powdering' her nose at Jackrabbit Slim's, their quiet dinner turns into them competing in a dance contest and they start being more and more attracted to each other. When Vincent goes to the toilet, things are about to change drastically. A fun and romantic evening out with Mia turns into a nightmare when Mia mistakes Vincent's heroin as cocaine and overdoses. Vincent goes to the toilet on a quiet morning during a stake-out at Butch’s apartment and upon exiting the bathroom he finds Butch is there pointing a MAC-10 at him and he is soon shot dead. After Vincent and Jules wipe their hands in Jimmie's bathroom after a wash to remove blood stains, Vincent's towel is saturated with blood whereas Jules' isn't. Vincent and Jules’ breakfast and ethical conversation in the diner turns into an armed robbery while Vincent is in the bathroom.
The mysterious briefcase
The only indisputable observations about the stolen attaché case recovered by Jules and Vincent are that its latch lock combination is "666", the "number of the Beast" as given in the Biblical Book of Revelation, and that the contents of the case either glow or are highly reflective. Whenever asked, director Tarantino has replied that there is no explanation for the case's contents: it is simply a MacGuffin. Originally, the Pulp Fiction case was to contain diamonds (stolen in the film Reservoir Dogs), but this was seen as too mundane. For filming purposes, the briefcase contained an orange lightbulb with a battery. Many theories have been proposed for the contents of the briefcase, Tarantino's disclaimer notwithstanding.
A popular Internet theory, especially around the release date, was that it contains Elvis's famous gold jumpsuit, as it would be a valuable gold object, light and instantly recognizable, and would fit in with the frequent nods to 1950s nostalgia found throughout the film. Supporting this initially was Mia's cryptic reference to Vincent as an "Elvis man", however the video release made it clear this was actually a reference to a deleted scene between the two characters. As a true MacGuffin, though, what the suitcase contains is not important; it may even be empty. What makes it important is how desperately Marsellus and everyone who encounters it seems to desire it, but more importantly, Jules and Vincent's willingness to kill and risk their own lives to get it for Marsellus. This provides a striking demonstration of how strong their loyalty is. A new theory gaining prominence is that the briefcase contains a golden gun[citation needed]. The roots of this rumor come from the 1966 Spaghetti Western "Ringo and his Golden Pistol", Jules calling Tim Roth's character "Ringo" and Quentin Tarantino's love of Italian Westerns. Two other theories are that the briefcase contains the Holy Grail[citation needed], glowing miraculously or that it contains Marsellus' soul (see the band-aid).
The band-aid
In the bar scene where Marsellus is talking with Butch, we mostly see his neck with a large band-aid on it. It could be the spot where the Devil removed Marsellus' soul - when this theory first achieved prominence, in order to lend credence to it the originator claimed that the Bible states that the Devil would take the soul from the back of the head, but this is not mentioned anywhere in the Bible [1]. The band-aid has no specific purpose in the movie and the audience never sees why it’s there or how Marsellus got it. The band-aid is gone when we see Marsellus looking for Butch after the boxing match; this is the first time we see Marsellus after the briefcase has been retrieved. The main reason for the band-aid theory is the fact it’s so prominent when we see him for the first time and that it’s gone when Marsellus gets the briefcase back. However, the actor who plays Marsellus, Ving Rhames, has since said that the reason for the band-aid is simply that he had a cut on his neck. The band-aid was put on Marsellus' neck to cover a scar during filming because of the fact that he was often filmed facing away from the camera. This is confirmed in the trivia track of the 2-disc collector's edition DVD.
The Number of the Beast
We see that the combination is "666", the "Number of the Beast" as given in the Biblical Book of Revelation. The code is also featured quite prominently, and many fans of the movie see the specific number as a clue that the briefcase belongs to Satan. It is speculated [citation needed]that further evidence for the significance of the "Number of the Beast" is found in the name of Mia Wallace's failed pilot "Fox Force Five." Since the letter f is the sixth letter in the English alphabet, a simple code in which each letter stood for the number of that letter's place in the alphabet would give the abbreviation of "Fox Force Five" (FFF) as "666". Other interesting numbers placed in the movie include 420, which some, but not all, clocks in the gun shop are set to. Also, the first time we see Marcellus Wallace, we see he has a band-aid in his neck. According to christian belief, a human soul can only be sucked through the neck[citation needed]. This may or may not imply that the briefcase belongs to Satan, and contains the soul of Marcellus Wallace.
The divine intervention
The fourth man fails to kill or even hit Jules and Vincent at point blank with a high-caliber handgun. Jules interprets this as a miracle and is therefore redeemed; Vincent takes some time to listen to that fact. The question is why God would protect two gangsters who just killed two people. The popular answer which fits in the band-aid theory is that the four young men in the apartment were actually associates of the Devil, and therefore Jules and Vincent were doing God’s work.
Brett’s death
When Brett is shot by Jules and Vincent, we see a strange yellow glow coming from the direction of his (out of screen) body. This could be the glow of his soul exiting his body, the same as the glow of Marsellus’ soul inside the briefcase. There is no similar glow during any other of the deaths in the movie, though.
However, it can be argued that these "glows" are merely the muzzle flashes of Vincent and Jules' pistols, which were inserted during the editing process but were poorly synchronized.
Ringo’s reaction
When Ringo (Pumpkin) finally sees the contents of the briefcase, he asks whether it’s what he thinks it is. If the case contained mere gold or diamonds or anything of recognizable value, he wouldn’t be asking that question. This sequence was also key to the "Elvis jumpsuit" theory; something which most people would recognize, but need to ask about its authenticity. In addition, Jules first tells Ringo that it contains his "boss's dirty laundry", hinting it may contain clothing. Jules may have meant a metaphorical meaning for "dirty laundry" as being part of a very secret and sensitive deal, such as a deal with the devil. At any rate, the object in the case is something rare or unusual.
Vincent’s staring
When Vincent finds the case in the lower right cupboard in the kitchen, he seems to stare at its contents. His level of amazement is nowhere near that of Ringo’s, but he still fails to react when Jules asks him: "Vincent, we happy?" Only after Jules asks the same question again, in a louder voice, does Vincent seem to 'snap out of it' and responds "yeah, we happy".
Trivia
Jules' Bible passage
As explained by Jules in the final scene in the diner, he recites a passage from the Bible — Ezekiel 25:17 — each time he kills someone. The passage reads as follows:
- The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.
This is, in fact, not an actual passage from the Bible, but a collage of several passages. Ezekiel 25:17 in the King James Version reads:
- And I will execute great vengeance upon thee with furious rebukes; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall lay my vengeance upon them.
This is actually a typically obscure reference to Karate Kiba / Chiba the Bodyguard, a 1976 film starring Sonny Chiba (whom Tarantino has hailed as "the greatest actor to ever work in martial arts films" and has worked with in the making of Kill Bill), which opens with a nearly identical misquote, likewise attributed to Ezekiel 25:17:
- The path of the righteous man and defender is beset on all sides by the iniquity of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper, and the finder of lost children. And I will execute great vengeance upon them with furious anger, who poison and destroy my brothers; and they shall know that I am Chiba the Bodyguard when I lay my love upon them! (Ezekiel 25:17)
Connections to Reservoir Dogs
In Tarantino's 1992 mainstream directorial debut Reservoir Dogs, Michael Madsen plays a character named "Vic Vega," whom Tarantino has said is brother to Travolta's "Vincent Vega". There have been many rumors in the past years about a Tarantino movie called The Vega Brothers, starring these two actors.
There are some who think that the briefcase contains the diamonds from Reservoir Dogs. Tarantino, however, confirms that Reservoir Dogs is meant to end with Mr. Pink's capture by the police. At the end of Reservoir Dogs, during the scene in which Mr. White whispers a few words to Mr. Orange, one can hear Mr. Pink being caught by the police after picking up the bag of diamonds.
Template:Weasel-section Steve Buscemi is later seen playing a waiter in Jack Rabbit Slim's. The fact that Buscemi is playing a waiter is ironic, since in Reservoir Dogs his character, Mr. Pink, doesn't believe in tipping waiters. Even more so when Vincent says that "[He] doesn't seem to be much of a waiter".
On the radio in Reservoir Dogs, a commercial for Jack Rabbit Slim's can be heard in a car.
Also, in a deleted scene from Reservoir Dogs, Nice-Guy Eddie is telling Mr. White and Mr. Pink that he called Bonnie, a nurse that he knows, to take care of Mr. Orange. In Pulp Fiction, Jimmie's wife, Bonnie, is a nurse. She is also African-American, which the guys in the car imply her to be. At one point, Mr. White even refers to what they're talking about as the "Bonnie Situation", which was the title of the last chapter of Pulp Fiction.
Soundtrack
References and footnotes
External links
- Crime films
- Cult films
- Independent films
- American films
- Anthology films
- Films directed by Quentin Tarantino
- 1994 films
- Palme d'Or winners
- Films featuring a Best Actor Academy Award nominated performance
- Best Picture Academy Award nominees
- Films featuring a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award nominated performance