Tarantino wrotePulp Fiction in 1992 and 1993, incorporating scenes that Avary originally wrote forTrue Romance (1993). Its plot occursout of chronological order. The film is alsoself-referential from its opening moments, beginning with atitle card that gives two dictionary definitions of "pulp". Considerable screen time is devoted to monologues and casual conversations with eclectic dialogue revealing each character's perspectives on several subjects, and the film features anironic combination of humor and strong violence.TriStar Pictures reportedly turned down the script as "too demented".Miramax Films co-chairmanHarvey Weinstein was enthralled, however, and the film became the first that Miramax Films fully financed.
Pulp Fiction is widely regarded as Tarantino'smagnum opus, with particular praise for its screenwriting.[4] The self-reflexivity, unconventional structure, and extensivehomage andpastiche have led critics to describe it as a touchstone ofpostmodern film. It is often considered a cultural watershed, influencing films and other media that adopted elements of its style. The cast was also widely praised, with Travolta, Thurman, and Jackson earning high acclaim. In 2008,Entertainment Weekly named it the best film since 1983[5] and it has appeared on many critics' lists of the greatest films ever made. In 2013,Pulp Fiction was selected for preservation in the United StatesNational Film Registry by theLibrary of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[6][7][8]
Plot
Narrative structure
Pulp Fiction's narrative is told out of chronological order and follows three main interrelated stories that each have a different protagonist: Vincent Vega, a hitman; Butch Coolidge, a prizefighter; and Jules Winnfield, Vincent's partner in crime.[9]
The film begins with a diner robbery staged by a couple, then begins to shift from one story line to another before returning to the diner for the conclusion. There are seven narrative sequences; the three primary story lines are preceded by intertitles:
"Prologue – The Diner" (i)
"Prelude to 'Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife'"
"Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife"
"Prelude to 'The Gold Watch'" (a – flashback, b – present)
"The Gold Watch"
"The Bonnie Situation"
"Epilogue – The Diner" (ii)
If the seven sequences were ordered chronologically, they would run: 4a, 2, 6, 1, 7, 3, 4b, 5. Sequences 1 and 7 partially overlap and are presented from different points of view, as do sequences 2 and 6. According to Philip Parker, the structural form is "an episodic narrative with circular events adding a beginning and end and allowing references to elements of each separate episode to be made throughout the narrative".[10] Other analysts describe the structure as a "circular narrative".[11][12]
Summary
"Prologue – The Diner"
A pair of thieves, Pumpkin and Honey Bunny, reminisce on their past robbery attempts as they eat breakfast in a diner. Pumpkin proposes they rob the diner at that moment because he believes the patrons and employees will be unprepared to stop them. Honey Bunny agrees, and they begin the robbery.
"Prelude to 'Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife"
Two hitmen, Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega, arrive at an apartment to retrieve a briefcase for their boss, influential local gangster Marsellus Wallace, from a business partner, Brett, and his friends. On the way, Vincent mentions that he had been tasked by Marsellus to take his wife,Mia Wallace, to dinner and asks Jules questions about Mia. After Vincent checks the contents of the briefcase, Jules shoots one of Brett's friends. Jules rebukes Brett over his attempt to double-cross Marsellus and recites what is portrayed as a passage from theBook of Ezekiel, before he and Vincent kill Brett.
"Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife"
Jules and Vincent give the briefcase to Marsellus, who bribes boxer Butch Coolidge tointentionally lose in his upcoming match. Vincent purchases heroin from his drug dealer, Lance. He shoots up and drives to meet Mia, having agreed to escort her while Marsellus is out of town for the night. They eat at a 1950s-themed restaurant and participate in atwist contest, then return home. While Vincent is in the bathroom, Mia finds his heroin, mistakes it for cocaine, and snorts it, resulting in anoverdose. Vincent rushes her to Lance's house, where Lance helps revive her by getting adrenaline for Vincent toinject into her heart. Vincent takes Mia home, and they agree never to tell Marsellus about the incident.
"The Gold Watch"
Butch double-crosses Marsellus by winning the bout, but accidentally kills his opponent in the process. He plans to flee with his girlfriend, Fabienne, but discovers she has forgotten to pack an heirloom: a gold watch which belonged to Butch's father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. Returning to his apartment to retrieve it, he notices agun on the kitchen counter and hears the toilet flush. Vincent exits the bathroom to find Butch pointing the gun at him. Butch shoots Vincent dead and departs.
While Butch is stopped at a traffic light, he sees Marsellus crossing the road. Butch rams his car into him and knocks him over, but is himself injured when his vehicle collides with another. Marsellus recovers, shoots at Butch and chases him into a pawnshop. Maynard, the shop owner, captures them at gunpoint and binds and gags them in the basement. Maynard and his accomplice, Zed, task theirgimpsex slave with watching Butch while they take Marsellus into another room and begin torape him. Butch breaks free and is about to escape, but decides to save Marsellus and arms himself with akatana from the pawnshop. He kills Maynard and frees Marsellus, who shoots Zed in the crotch with Maynard's shotgun. Marsellus tells Butch that he will call his crew to help him torture Zed to death. He further tells Butch that they are "cool" (even) and instructs him to tell no one about the incident and depart Los Angeles forever. Butch picks up Fabienne on Zed'schopper and they ride away.
"The Bonnie Situation"
In the apartment, after Jules and Vincent kill Brett, another man bursts out of the bathroom and fires at them. Every shot misses and they shoot him dead. Jules says that their survival was amiracle, which Vincent disputes, believing the man was just a lousy shot. While driving away with another one of Brett's friends, Marvin (who was actually a plant from Marsellus's organization), Vincent accidentally shoots him in the head when Jules drives over a bump in the road, covering Vincent, Jules, and the car interior in blood. They hide the car at the home of Jules's old friend and former business partner Jimmie, who demands they deal with the problem before his wife Bonnie comes home. Marsellus sends acleaner, Winston Wolfe, who directs Jules and Vincent to hide the body in the trunk, clean the car, dispose of their bloody clothes and take the car to a junkyard.
"Epilogue – The Diner"
At the diner from the film's prologue, Jules tells Vincent that he plans to retire from his life of crime, convinced that their survival at the apartment wasdivine intervention. While Vincent is in the bathroom, Pumpkin and Honey Bunny hold up the restaurant and demand Marsellus's briefcase. Pumpkin initially holds Jules at gunpoint, but Jules soon overpowers Pumpkin and holds him at gunpoint. Honey Bunny becomes hysterical and points her gun at Jules. Vincent returns with his gun aimed at her, but Jules defuses the situation. He recites the biblical passage, expresses ambivalence about his life of crime, and allows the robbers to take his cash and leave. Jules and Vincent leave the diner with the briefcase.
Jules' partner-in-crime, working for Marsellus Wallace. Tarantino cast Travolta inPulp Fiction becauseMichael Madsen, who had played Vic Vega inReservoir Dogs (1992), chose to appear inKevin Costner'sWyatt Earp instead. Madsen expressed regret over his decision.[13]Harvey Weinstein pushed forDaniel Day-Lewis in the part.[14] Travolta accepted a reduced rate; sources say either US$100,000 or US$140,000. The film's success and hisAcademy Award nomination for Best Actor revitalized his career.[15] Vincent is the brother of Vic Vega, also known as Mr. Blonde inReservoir Dogs, and in 2004, Tarantino discussed an idea for a movie starring Travolta and Madsen as the "Vega Brothers"; though the concept never came to fruition.[16]
Vincent's partner-in-crime, working for Marsellus Wallace. Jackson's first audition was overshadowed byPaul Calderón; Jackson had assumed the audition was merely a reading. Weinstein convinced him to audition a second time and his performance of the final diner scene won over Tarantino.[17][18] Jules was originally scripted with a giant afro,[19] but Tarantino'spersonal assistant mistakenly bought aJheri curled wig. Tarantino was enraged but Jackson persuaded him to keep it since the hairstyle had gained popularity through the rap groupN.W.A.[20] Film criticOwen Gleiberman took it as a "tacit comic statement about the ghettoization of [Black people] in movies".[21] Jackson received an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. Calderón appears in the film as Paul, a bartender at Marsellus's social club, as well as Marsellus's assistant. Tarantino wrote the role forLaurence Fishburne, who turned it down. According to Tarantino, Fishburne refused it because his team did not see it as a starring role;[22] Fishburne later said he turned it down because he felt the film glamorized heroin.[23]Eddie Murphy was also considered.[24]
Wallace's wife and an aspiring actress. Miramax favoredHolly Hunter orMeg Ryan for the role of Mia.Robin Wright,Jennifer Beals,Debra Winger,Marisa Tomei,Alfre Woodard andMeg Tilly were also considered but Tarantino wanted Thurman after their first meeting.[25][26][27] She dominated the film's promotional material, appearing on a bed with cigarette in hand. She was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. Despite being launched into the celebrityA-list, Thurman chose not to do any big-budget films untilBatman & Robin (1997) three years later.[28]
A "cleaner" who aids Jules and Vincent. Tarantino wrote the part of Wolfe for Keitel, who had starred inReservoir Dogs and was instrumental in its production. In Tarantino's words, "Harvey had been my favorite actor since I was 16 years old."[29] Keitel had played a similarly employed character inPoint of No Return (1993).[30]
A burglar and Yolanda's boyfriend. Roth had starred inReservoir Dogs alongside Keitel. He had used an American accent inReservoir Dogs but used his natural, London accent inPulp Fiction. Though Tarantino had written the part with Roth in mind, TriStar headMike Medavoy preferredJohnny Depp orChristian Slater.[31] Early in development, Tarantino had contemplated casting Roth as Vincent andGary Oldman as Jules, rewriting the characters as "two English guys".[32]
Ringo's girlfriend and partner in crime. Tarantino wrote the role of Yolanda for Plummer to partner her with Roth. Roth had introduced Tarantino to her, saying: "I want to work with Amanda in one of your films but she has to have a really big gun."[33]
A crime boss and employer of Jules and Vincent. Before Rhames was cast, the part of Wallace was initially offered toMax Julien andSid Haig, but both turned down the role.[35][36] According to Bender, Rhames gave "one of the best auditions I've ever seen".[26] His acclaimed performance led to him being cast in big-budget features such asMission Impossible (1996),Con Air (1997) andOut of Sight (1998).[37]
Vincent's drug dealer.[38] Tarantino initially wrote the role withJohn Cusack in mind.[39] Gary Oldman was the preferred choice among TriStar executives, based on his portrayal of drug-dealing pimp Drexl Spivey inTrue Romance (1993).[40][41]
Lance's wife.Pam Grier read for the role, but Tarantino did not believe audiences would find it plausible for Lance to yell at her.[42] Tarantino later cast Grier as the lead role forJackie Brown.Ellen DeGeneres also read for the part of Jody.[43] Rosanna's sisterAlexis (then known as Robert Arquette) also appears in the film, as a man emerging from a bathroom to shoot at and miss Vincent and Jules, who then kill him.
AUSAF veteran of theVietnam War who delivers a young Butch his father's prized gold watch. During Koons' monologue, which is interspersed with colorful descriptions of theViet Cong, he mentions a soldier called "Winocki".[b] Joe Winocki (John Garfield) is a character in the 1943 filmAir Force directed byHoward Hawks, one of Tarantino's favorite directors.[45] Tarantino played a character named Desmond Winocki in a guest appearance on an episode ofAll-American Girl titledPulp Sitcom.[46]
An aging boxer on the run from Marsellus after havingdouble-crossed him. The role was originally written forMatt Dillon, who turned it down.[47] Willis was already a star but most of his recent films had been critical and box-office disappointments. As related byPeter Bart, participating in the modestly budgeted film "meant lowering his salary and risking his star status but the strategy ... paid off royally:Pulp Fiction not only brought Willis new respect as an actor but also earned him several million dollars".[48][49][50] Willis' appearance and physical presence were crucial to Tarantino, "Bruce has the look of a 50s actor. I can't think of any other star that has that look".[51] Butch's look was modeled onAldo Ray inNightfall and his demeanor based onRalph Meeker's portrayal ofMike Hammer inRobert Aldrich'sKiss Me Deadly.[52] Chandler Lindauer plays a young Butch.
Secondary characters
Bronagh Gallagher plays Jody's friend Trudi who does little but smoke abong during the scene where Vincent revives Mia. According to author Jason Bailey, "Quentin thought it would be funny to have this casual observer who just happened to be there. All of this was born out of the experience of, when you go to someone's house to buy drugs, there are always people who are just there".[53]
Phil LaMarr portrays Marvin, an associate of Jules and Vincent. LaMarr auditioned for Tarantino after both had done a show for an improv group a few months prior.[54] He read for the roles of Jules Winnfield and Brett before being cast as Marvin.[54]
Tarantino appears as Jules' friend Jimmie, in whose house they clean up a murder. Tarantino was unsure whether to play Jimmie or Lance, choosing Jimmie as he wanted to be behind the camera during Mia's overdose scene.[41]
Frank Whaley portrays Brett, who has a briefcase requested by Marsellus. Whaley met Tarantino while he was filmingReservoir Dogs at a lab inSundance Institute. He recalls, "we ended up meeting and spending time together, and I liked him, so I was really happy when he asked me to be in this movie."[55]
Burr Steers appears as Roger, a friend of Brett's nicknamed "Flock of Seagulls" by Jules. The scene of the confrontation between Brett and Jules went through several takes due to Steers making mistakes. Steers recalled in an interview that he had found acting difficult due to the loudness of the gunshots.[56]
Angela Jones portrays Esmarelda Villa Lobos, a cab driver who aids Butch's escape. Her casting and character were inspired by her performance in the 1991 short filmCurdled, later remade as a1996 feature film with finance from Tarantino and again starring Jones.[57]
Steve Buscemi makes acameo appearance as a waiter at Jack Rabbit Slim's, dressed asBuddy Holly. Buscemi, who had appeared inReservoir Dogs, was originally considered for the role of Jimmie but was unable to commit.[57]
The roots ofPulp Fictioncan be traced back to the late 1980s, when Quentin Tarantino andRoger Avaryworked together atVideo Archives, a video store in Southern California.[59] Avary recalls that their initial concept was to create three short films with three different filmmakers—himself, Tarantino, and a friend, Adam Rifkin.[59]Avary wrote the first element of what would become the film's screenplay in the fall of 1990,[60] titled "Pandemonium Reigns," which eventually expanded into a feature-length screenplay.[59] While Tarantino's short film similarly evolved into a full script, Rifkin never completed his contribution, leavingPulp Fictioninitially uncertain.[59] The initial inspiration was the three-part horroranthology filmBlack Sabbath (1963), by Italian filmmakerMario Bava.[61] The Tarantino–Avary project was provisionally titled "Black Mask", after the seminalhardboiledcrime fiction magazine.[34] Tarantino's script was produced asReservoir Dogs, his directorial debut; Avary created the basis for the "Gold Watch" storyline ofPulp Fiction.[62][63][64][65]
With work onReservoir Dogs completed, Tarantino returned to the notion of a trilogy film: "I got the idea of doing something that novelists get a chance to do but filmmakers don't: telling three separate stories, having characters float in and out with different weights depending on the story."[66] Tarantino explains that the idea "was basically to take like the oldest chestnuts that you've ever seen when it comes to crime stories – the oldest stories in the book ... You know, 'Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace's Wife' – the oldest story about ... the guy's gotta go out with the big man's wife and don't touch her. You know, you've seen the story a zillion times."[9] "I'm using old forms of storytelling and then purposely having them run awry", he says.[67] "Part of the trick is to take these movie characters, these genre characters and these genre situations and actually apply them to some of real life's rules and see how they unravel."[67] In at least one case, boxer Butch Coolidge, Tarantino had in mind a specific character from a classic Hollywood crime story: "I wanted him to be basically likeRalph Meeker asMike Hammer inAldrich'sKiss Me Deadly [1955]. I wanted him to be a bully and a jerk".[51]
Tarantino went to work on the script forPulp Fiction in Amsterdam in March 1992,[68] possibly at the Winston Hotel in theRed Light District.[69] He was joined there by Avary, who contributed "Pandemonium Reigns" to the project and participated in its rewriting as well as the development of the new storylines that would link up with it.[62][63][64] Two scenes originally written by Avary for theTrue Romance screenplay, exclusively credited to Tarantino, were incorporated into the opening of "The Bonnie Situation": the "miraculous" missed shots by the hidden gunman and the rear seat automobile killing.[70] The notion of the crimeworld "cleaner" that became the heart of the episode was inspired by a short,Curdled, that Tarantino saw at a film festival. He cast the lead actress,Angela Jones, inPulp Fiction and later backed the filmmakers' production of a feature-length version of the short, likewise titledCurdled.[71] The script included a couple of made-up commercial brands that often featured in later Tarantino films:Big Kahuna burgers (a Big Kahuna soda cup appears inReservoir Dogs) and Red Apple cigarettes.[72] As he worked on the script, Tarantino also accompaniedReservoir Dogs around the European film festivals. Released in the United States in October 1992, the picture was a critical and commercial success. In January 1993, thePulp Fiction script was complete.[73][74]
Tarantino and his producer,Lawrence Bender, brought the script toJersey Films. Before even seeingReservoir Dogs, Jersey had attempted to sign Tarantino for his next project.[77] Ultimately a development deal worth around $1 million had been struck: The deal gaveA Band Apart, Bender and Tarantino's newly formed production company, initial financing and office facilities; Jersey got a share of the project and the right to shop the script to a studio.[78][79][80][81] Jersey had a distribution and "first look" deal withColumbia TriStar, which paid Tarantino for the right to consider exercising its option.[50] In February,Pulp Fiction appeared on aVariety list of films inpre-production atTriStar.[82] In June, however, the studio put the script intoturnaround.[50] According to a studio executive, TriStar chiefMike Medavoy found it "too demented".[83] There were suggestions that TriStar was resistant to back a film featuring a heroin user; there were also indications that the studio simply saw the project as too low-budget for its desired star-driven image.[84][85] Avary—who was about to start shooting his own directorial debut,Killing Zoe—has said that TriStar's objections were comprehensive, encompassing the script's fundamental structure. He characterizes the studio's position:"'This is the worst thing ever written. It makes no sense. Someone's dead and then they're alive. It's too long, violent, and unfilmable.' ... So I thought, 'That's that!'"[70]
Bender brought the script toMiramax Films, the formerly independent studio that had recently been acquired byDisney.Harvey Weinstein—co-chairman of Miramax Films, along with his brotherBob—was instantly enthralled by the script and the company picked it up.[86]Michael Shamberg, the executive producer, reflected on the bidding process, saying, "Only Harvey [Weinstein] placed a bid. Harvey believed he was engaged in a bidding war, but he wasn't. Even now, whenever I seeBob Shaye, he expresses regret for turning downPulp Fiction. Quentin initially wanted to collaborate withMike Medavoy, given Medavoy's history with the greatOrion films. Ironically, when the opportunity arose, Mike deemed the script too violent."[59]Pulp Fiction, the first Miramax Films project to get agreen light after theDisney acquisition, was budgeted at $8.5 million, and at the end $500,000 was returned, bringing the final budget to $8 million.[a][59] According to Bender, a lower budget meant that the producers could maintain more control over the movie itself.[59]It became the first movie that Miramax Films completely financed.[87] Helping hold costs down was the plan Bender executed to pay all the main actors the same amount per week, regardless of their industry status.[88][50]The New York Times reported, "Most of the actors received relatively small salaries along with a percentage of the profits."[89] The biggest star to sign on to the project wasBruce Willis. Though he had recently appeared in several big-budget flops, he was still a major overseas draw. On the strength of his name, Miramax Films garnered $11 million for the film's worldwide rights, virtually ensuring its profitability.[90][91]
Casting
Danny DeVito, one of the film's executive producers,[92] recalls that Weinstein suggested castingDaniel Day-Lewis, who had just won anAcademy Award forMy Left Foot. DeVito responded by stating that Tarantino wanted John Travolta and reminded Weinstein that he had final cut and cast approval. He later reflected: "I think he [Weinstein] called me every name in the book, but of course, Quentin got what he wanted, and he was absolutely right, and the rest is history."[59]
Bender noted that during the casting process, while Samuel L. Jackson's initial audition was impressive, another candidate later delivered a performance that "blew them away." This prompted Bender to inform Jackson's agent that they might need to consider the other actor. The agent firmly insisted, "No, no, no, you can't do that. Sam will come back." Initially hesitant to ask him for another audition, Bender discovered that Jackson believed he was simply reading for the role, not auditioning, and his subsequent return resulted in an outstanding performance.[59]
Tim Roth, initially interested in the role meant for Willis, suggested Amanda Plummer as a co-star, insisting she should have a gun as he thought it would be "terrifying" - a notion Tarantino later incorporated into the script.[59]
Harvey Keitel played a crucial role in gettingReservoir Dogs made and introduced Bruce Willis to Tarantino. Bender and Tarantino went to see him at his house in Malibu, where they learned that he could recite practically the entire movie ofReservoir Dogs, a movie he loved. After a conversation, Tarantino and Willis took a walk on the beach, where Willis revealed he'd read thePulp Fiction script and expressed interest in playing Vincent or Jules. Tarantino encouraged him to read the script one last time with the Butch character in mind. Willis called Tarantino the next day and said, "the shortest sentence in the Bible is, 'Jesus wept.' The shortest sentence in Hollywood is, 'I'm in.'"[59]
Filming
Willis evoked one 1950s actor in particular for Tarantino: "Aldo Ray inJacques Tourneur'sNightfall [1956] ... I said let's go for that whole look."[95] His boxing robe, designed byBetsy Heimann, exemplifies Tarantino's notion of costume as symbolic armor.[96]
Principal photography commenced on September 20, 1993.[97] The lead offscreen talent had all worked with Tarantino onReservoir Dogs –cinematographerAndrzej Sekuła,film editorSally Menke,production designerDavid Wasco, andcostume designerBetsy Heimann. According to Tarantino: "[W]e had $8 million. I wanted it to look like a $20–25 million movie. I wanted it to look like an epic. It's an epic in everything – in invention, in ambition, in length, in scope, in everything except the price tag."[98] The film, he says, was shot "on50 ASA film stock, which is the slowest stock they make. The reason we use it is that it creates an almostno-grain image, it's lustrous. It's the closest thing we have to 50sTechnicolor."[99] The largest chunk of the budget – $150,000 – went to creating the Jack Rabbit Slim's set.[88][100] It was built in aCulver City warehouse, where it was joined by several other sets, as well as the film's production offices.[101] The diner sequence was shot on location inHawthorne at the Hawthorne Grill, known for itsGoogie architecture.[102] For the costumes, Tarantino took his inspiration from French directorJean-Pierre Melville, who believed that the clothes his characters wore were their symbolic suits of armor.[96] Tarantino cast himself in a modest-sized role as he had inReservoir Dogs. One of his pop totems,Fruit Brute, a long-discontinuedGeneral Mills cereal, also returned from the earlier film.[103] The shoot wrapped on November 30.[104] BeforePulp Fiction's premiere, Tarantino convinced Avary to forfeit his agreed-on cowriting credit and accept a "story by" credit, so the line "Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino" could be used in advertising and onscreen.[25]
Nofilm score was composed forPulp Fiction; Quentin Tarantino instead used an eclectic assortment ofsurf music,rock and roll,soul, andpop songs.Dick Dale's rendition of "Misirlou" plays during the opening credits. Tarantino chose surf music as the basic musical style for the film, but not, he insists, because of its association with surfing culture: "To me it just sounds like rock and roll, evenMorricone music. It sounds like rock and rollspaghetti Western music."[105] Tarantino planned to use apower pop song, "My Sharona" byThe Knack, during the film's rape scene, but ultimately discounted it.[58]
Some of the songs were suggested to Tarantino by his friends Chuck Kelley and Laura Lovelace, who were credited as music consultants. Lovelace also appeared in the film as Laura, a waitress; she reprises the role inJackie Brown.[106] Thesoundtrack album was released along with the film in 1994. The album peaked on theBillboard 200 chart at number 21.[107] The single,Urge Overkill's cover of theNeil Diamond song "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon", reached number 59.[108]
Estella Tincknell describes how the particular combination of well-known and obscure recordings helps establish the film as a "self-consciously 'cool' text. [The] use of the mono-tracked, beat-heavy style of early 1960s U.S. 'underground' pop mixed with 'classic' ballads such asDusty Springfield's 'Son of a Preacher Man' is crucial to the film's postmodern knowingness." She contrasts the soundtrack with that ofForrest Gump, the highest-grossing film of 1994, which also relies on period pop recordings: "[T]he version of 'the sixties' offered byPulp Fiction ... is certainly not that of the publicly recognized counter-culture featured inForrest Gump, but is, rather, a more genuinely marginal form of sub-culture based around a lifestyle – surfing, 'hanging' – that is resolutely apolitical." The soundtrack is central, she says, to the film's engagement with the "younger, cinematically knowledgeable spectator" it solicits.[109]
Release and reception
Release and box office
Pulp Fiction premiered in May 1994 at theCannes Film Festival. The Weinsteins "hit the beach like commandos," bringing the picture's entire cast over to France.[110] The film was unveiled at a midnight hour screening and caused a sensation.[111][112] It won thePalme d'Or, the festival's top prize, generating a further wave of publicity.[113]
The first U.S. review of the film was published on May 23 in industry trade magazineVariety.Todd McCarthy calledPulp Fiction a "spectacularly entertaining piece of pop culture ... a startling, massive success."[114] From Cannes forward, Tarantino was on the road continuously, promoting the film.[91] Over the next few months, it played in smaller festivals around Europe, building buzz: Nottingham, Munich,Taormina, Locarno,Norway, andSan Sebastián.[115] Tarantino later said: "One thing that's cool is that by breaking up the linear structure, when I watch the film with an audience, it does break [the audience's]alpha state. It's like, all of a sudden, 'I gotta watch this ... I gotta pay attention.' You can almost feel everybody moving in their seats. It's actually fun to watch an audience in some ways chase after a movie."[116] In late September, it opened theNew York Film Festival.The New York Times published its review the day of the opening.Janet Maslin called the film a "triumphant, cleverly disorienting journey through a demimonde that springs entirely from Mr. Tarantino's ripe imagination, a landscape of danger, shock, hilarity and vibrant local color ... [He] has come up with a work of such depth, wit and blazing originality that it places him in the front ranks of American film makers."[112]
On October 14, 1994,Pulp Fiction went into general release in the United States. As Peter Biskind described: "It was not platformed, that is, it did not open in a handful of theaters and roll out slowly as word of mouth built, the traditional way of releasing anindie film; it went wide immediately, into 1,100 theaters."[117] In the eyes of some cultural critics,Reservoir Dogs had given Tarantino a reputation for glamorizing violence. Miramax played with the issue in its marketing campaign: "You won't know the facts till you've seen the fiction", went one slogan.[118]Pulp Fiction was thetop-grossing film at the US box office its first weekend with a gross of $9,311,882, edging out aSylvester Stallone vehicle,The Specialist, which was in its second week and playing at more than twice as many theaters. The gross claimed by Miramax Films was disputed by others.Warner Bros. initially reported an estimated gross of $8.9 million forThe Specialist, with Bob Weinstein then reporting a gross forPulp Fiction of $9.1 million, claiming that the film was on another 100 screens that had previously been overlooked. Warner Bros. then updated their gross to $9.3 million, claiming they had made a calculation error.[119]Early Monday morning, Miramax Films reported a gross of $9.3 million with Warner Bros. reporting $8.9 million forThe Specialist, placingPulp Fiction first but other industry sources did not believe Miramax Films' numbers.Variety estimated thatPulp Fiction grossed $8.6 to $9 million for the weekend.[120]
Against its budget of $8.5 million and about $10 million in marketing costs,Pulp Fiction grossed $107.93 million at the U.S. box office, making it the first Miramax film to surpass $100 million in the United States and Canada.[121] Worldwide, it took in nearly $213 million.[c] In terms of domestic grosses, it was the tenth biggest film of 1994, even though it played on substantially fewer screens than any other film in the top 20.[123] Popular engagement with the film, such as speculation about the contents of the precious briefcase, "indicates the kind of cult status thatPulp Fiction achieved almost immediately."[124] AsMovieMaker puts it, "The movie was nothing less than a national cultural phenomenon."[125] Abroad, as well: in Britain, where it opened a week after its U.S. release, not only was the film a big hit, but in book form its screenplay became the most successful in UK publishing history, a top-ten bestseller.[126]
Critical response
On thereview aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes, 92% of 186 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 9.3/10. The website's consensus reads: "Injecting its compendium of crime tales with the patois of everyday conversation,Pulp Fiction is a cinematic shot of adrenaline that cements writer-director Quentin Tarantino as an audacious purveyor of killer kino."[127] OnMetacritic, the film has aweighted average score of 95 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[128] Audiences polled byCinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.[129]
The response of major American film reviewers was widely favorable.Roger Ebert called it "a comedy about blood, guts, violence, strange sex, drugs, fixed fights, dead body disposal, leather freaks and a wristwatch that makes a dark journey down through the generations... The screenplay by Tarantino and Roger Avary so well-written in a scruffy,fanzine way that you want to rub noses in it – the noses of those zombie writers who take 'screenwriting' classes that teach them the formulas for 'hit films'".[130]Richard Corliss ofTime wrote: "It towers over the year's other movies as majestically and menacingly as a gang lord at a preschool. It dares Hollywood films to be this smart about going this far. If good directors accept Tarantino's implicit challenge, the movie theater could again be a great place to live in."[131] InNewsweek,David Ansen wrote: "The miracle of Quentin Tarantino'sPulp Fiction is how, being composed of secondhand, debased parts, it succeeds in gleaming like something new."[132] "You get intoxicated by it," wroteEntertainment Weekly'sOwen Gleiberman, "high on the rediscovery of how pleasurable a movie can be. I'm not sure I've ever encountered a filmmaker who combined discipline and control with sheer wild-ass joy the way that Tarantino does."[21] "There's a special kick that comes from watching something this thrillingly alive", wrotePeter Travers ofRolling Stone. "Pulp Fiction is indisputably great."[133]
TheLos Angeles Times was one of the few major news outlets to publish a negative review on the film's opening weekend.Kenneth Turan wrote: "The writer-director appears to be straining for his effects. Some sequences, especially one involving bondage harnesses and homosexual rape, have the uncomfortable feeling of creative desperation, of someone who's afraid of losing his reputation scrambling for any way to offend sensibilities."[134] Some who reviewed it in the following weeks took more exception to the predominant critical reaction than toPulp Fiction itself. While not panning the film,Stanley Kauffmann ofThe New Republic felt that "the way that [it] has been so widely ravened up and drooled over verges on the disgusting.Pulp Fiction nourishes, abets, cultural slumming."[135] Responding to comparisons between Tarantino's film and the work ofFrench New Wave directorJean-Luc Godard, especially his first, most famous feature,Jonathan Rosenbaum of theChicago Reader wrote: "The fact thatPulp Fiction is garnering more extravagant raves thanBreathless ever did tells you plenty about which kind of cultural references are regarded as more fruitful – namely, the ones we already have and don't wish to expand."[136] Observing in theNational Review that "[n]o film arrives with more advance hype",John Simon was unswayed: "titillation cures neither hollowness nor shallowness".[137]
Debate about the film spread beyond the review pages, with its violence often being the theme. InThe Washington Post, Donna Britt described how she was happy not to seePulp Fiction on a recent weekend and thus avoid "discussing the rousing scene in which a gunshot sprays somebody's brains around a car interior".[138] Some commentators took exception to the film's frequent use of the word "nigger" (mentioned 18 times). In theChicago Tribune, Todd Boyd argued that the word's recurrence "has the ability to signify the ultimate level of hipness for white males who have historically used their perception of black masculinity as the embodiment of cool".[139] In Britain,James Wood, writing inThe Guardian, set the tone for much subsequent criticism: "Tarantino represents the final triumph ofpostmodernism, which is to empty the artwork of all content, thus avoiding its capacity to do anything except helplessly represent our agonies ... Only in this age could a writer as talented as Tarantino produce artworks so vacuous, so entirely stripped of any politics, metaphysics, or moral interest."[140]
Pulp Fiction quickly came to be regarded as one of the most significant films of its era. In 1995, in a special edition ofSiskel & Ebert devoted to Tarantino,Gene Siskel argued that the work posed a major challenge to the "ossification of American movies with their brutal formulas". In Siskel's view,
the violent intensity ofPulp Fiction calls to mind other violent watershed films that were considered classics in their time and still are.Hitchcock'sPsycho [1960],Arthur Penn'sBonnie and Clyde [1967], andStanley Kubrick'sA Clockwork Orange [1971]. Each film shook up a tired, bloated movie industry and used a world of lively lowlifes to reflect how dull other movies had become. And that, I predict, will be the ultimate honor forPulp Fiction. Like all great films, it criticizes other movies.[157]
Ken Dancyger writes that its "imitative and innovative style" – like that of its predecessor,Reservoir Dogs – represents
a new phenomenon, the movie whose style is created from the context of movie life rather than real life. The consequence is twofold – the presumption of deep knowledge on the part of the audience of those forms such as thegangster films or Westerns, horror films or adventure films. And that the parody or alteration of that film creates a new form, a different experience for the audience.[158]
In a widely covered speech on May 31, 1995,Bob Dole, Senate Majority Leader andRepublican presidential candidate for the then-upcoming1996 presidential election (as well as the party's vice presidential nominee in the1976 presidential election), attacked the American entertainment industry for peddling "nightmares of depravity".Pulp Fiction was soon associated with his charges concerning gratuitous violence. Dole had not mentioned the film, instead citing two less-celebrated movies based on Tarantino screenplays,Oliver Stone'sNatural Born Killers andTony Scott'sTrue Romance.[159] In September 1996, Dole did accusePulp Fiction – which he had not seen at the time – of promoting "the romance of heroin".[160]
Paula Rabinowitz expresses the general film industry opinion thatPulp Fiction "simultaneously resurrected John Travolta and film noir".[161] In Peter Biskind's description, it created a "guys-with-guns frenzy".[162] The film has also been labeled as ablack comedy[3] and a "neo-noir".[163][164][165] CriticGeoffrey O'Brien, however, argued against the classification ofPulp Fiction into the neo-noir genre: "The old-timenoir passions, the brooding melancholy and operatic death scenes, would be altogether out of place in the crisp and brightly lit wonderland that Tarantino conjures up. [It is] neither neo-noir nor a parody of noir."[166] Similarly,Nicholas Christopher calls it "more ganglandcamp than neo-noir",[167][168] andFoster Hirsch suggests that its "trippy fantasy landscape" characterizes it more definitively than any genre label.[169] Regardless, the stylistic influence ofPulp Fiction soon became apparent. Less than a year after the picture's release, British critic Jon Ronson attended theNational Film School's end-of-semester screenings and assessed the impact: "Out of the five student movies I watched, four incorporated violent shoot-outs over a soundtrack of iconoclastic 70s pop hits, two climaxed with all the main characters shooting each other at once, and one had two hitmen discussing the idiosyncrasies ofThe Brady Bunch before offing their victim. Not sinceCitizen Kane has one man appeared from relative obscurity to redefine the art of moviemaking."[170] Among the first Hollywood films cited as its imitators wereDestiny Turns on the Radio (1995), in which Tarantino acted,[157]Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead (1995),[171] and2 Days in the Valley (1996).[172] It "triggered a myriad of clones", writes Fiona Villella.[173] Internationally, according toDavid Desser, it "not only influenced a British brand of noir, but extended the noir vision virtually around the world".[174]Pulp Fiction's effect on film form was still reverberating in 2007, whenDavid Denby ofThe New Yorker credited it with initiating the ongoing cycle of disordered cinematic narratives.[175]
According toVariety, the trajectory ofPulp Fiction from Cannes launch to commercial smash "forever altered the game" of so-calledindependent cinema.[176] It "cemented Miramax's place as the reigning indie superpower", writes Biskind.[117] "Pulp became theStar Wars of independents, exploding expectations for what an indie film could do at the box office."[177] The film's large financial return on its small budget
transform[ed] the industry's attitude toward the lowly indies ... spawning a flock of me-too classics divisions ... [S]mart studio executives suddenly woke up to the fact that grosses and market share, which got all the press, were not the same as profits ... Once the studios realized that they could exploit the economies of (small) scale, they more or less gave up buying or remaking the films themselves, and either bought the distributors, as Disney had Miramax, or started their own ... copy[ing] Miramax's marketing and distribution strategies.[178]
In 2001,Variety, noting the increasing number of actors switching back and forth between expensive studio films and low-budget independent or indie-style projects, suggested that the "watershed moment for movie stars" came with the decision by Willis – one of Hollywood's highest-paid performers – to appear inPulp Fiction.[179] In 2024, on the film's 30th anniversary, the magazine wrote that the film "revived the career of John Travolta, minted a star in Samuel L. Jackson and spawned a still-thriving cottage industry of knockoffs and imitation films."[59]
It has been described as a "major cultural event", an "international phenomenon" that influenced television, music, literature, and advertising.[173][180] Not long after its release, it was identified as a significant focus of attention within the growing community of Internet users.[181] AddingPulp Fiction to his roster ofThe Great Movies in 2001, Roger Ebert called it "the most influential film of the decade".[182] Four years later,Time's Corliss wrote much the same: "(unquestionably) the most influential American movie of the 90s".[183]
Several scenes and images from the film achieved iconic status; in 2008,Entertainment Weekly declared, "You'd be hard-pressed, by now, to name a moment from Quentin Tarantino's film that isn't iconic."[5] Jules and Vincent's "Royale with Cheese" dialogue became famous.[184] It was referenced more than a decade and a half later in the Travolta vehicleFrom Paris with Love.[185] The adrenalin shot to Mia Wallace's heart is onPremiere's list of "100 Greatest Movie Moments".[186] The scene of Travolta and Thurman's characters dancing has been frequently homaged, most unambiguously in the 2005 filmBe Cool, starring the same two actors.[187] The image of Travolta and Jackson's characters standing side by side in suit and tie, pointing their guns, has also become widely familiar. In 2007,BBC News reported that "London transport workers have painted over an iconic mural by 'guerrilla artist'Banksy ... The image depicted a scene from Quentin Tarantino'sPulp Fiction, with Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta clutching bananas instead of guns."[188] Certain lines were adopted popularly as catchphrases, in particular Marsellus's threat, "I'm 'a get medieval on your ass."[189] Jules's "Ezekiel" recitation was voted the fourth greatest movie speech of all time in a 2004 poll. One of the more notable homages to Jules's "Biblical" quote was one Jackson himself played a part in, near the end of 2014'sCaptain America: The Winter Soldier, Jackson's characterCol. Nick Fury, presumed dead, visits his own gravestone, on which, below Fury's name is inscribed "The path of the righteous man ..." Ezekiel 25:17.[190] In 2019, it was reported thatDominic Cummings,special political adviser toBritish Prime MinisterBoris Johnson, quoted Jules by telling Conservative MPs to "be cool likeFonzies" as political pressure built to request an extension to the date ofthe UK's withdrawal from the European Union.[191]
Pulp Fiction now appears in several critical assessments of all-time great films. In 2008,Entertainment Weekly named it the best film of the past quarter-century.[5] That same year, theAmerican Film Institute's "Ten Top Ten" poll ranked it number 7 all-time in the gangster film genre.[192] In 2007, it was voted 94th overall on theAFI's 100 Years ... 100 Movies list.[193] In 2005, it was named one of "Time's All-Time 100 Movies".[183] As of September 2018, it is number 54 on Metacritic's list of all-time highest scores.[194] The film ranks very highly in popular surveys. A 2008Empire poll combining the opinions of readers, movie industry professionals, and critics namedPulp Fiction the ninth-best film of all time.[195] In a 2006 readers' poll by the British magazineTotal Film, it ranked as the number three film in history.[196] It was voted as the fourth-greatest film of all time in a nationwide poll for Britain'sChannel 4 in 2001.[197] In 2015,Pulp Fiction ranked 28th onBBC's "100 Greatest American Films" list, voted on by film critics from around the world.[198]
Critical analysis
Tarantino has stated that he originally planned "to do aBlack Mask movie", referring to the magazine largely responsible for popularizinghardboiled detective fiction. "[I]t kind of went somewhere else".[166] Geoffrey O'Brien sees the result as connected "rather powerfully to a parallel pulp tradition: the tales of terror and the uncanny practiced by such writers asCornell Woolrich [and]Fredric Brown ... Both dealt heavily in the realm of improbable coincidences and cruel cosmic jokes, a realm thatPulp Fiction makes its own."[199] In particular, O'Brien finds a strong affinity between the intricate plot mechanics and twists of Brown's novels and the recursive, interweaving structure ofPulp Fiction.[200] Philip French describes the film's narrative as a "circular movement orMöbius strip of a kindResnais andRobbe-Grillet would admire".[201] James Mottram regards crime novelistElmore Leonard, whose influence Tarantino has acknowledged, as the film's primary literary antecedent. He suggests that Leonard's "rich dialogue" is reflected in Tarantino's "popular-culture-strewn jive"; he also points to the acute, extremely dark sense of humor Leonard applies to the realm of violence as a source of inspiration.[202]
Film scholar/historianRobert Kolker sees the "flourishes, the apparent witty banality of the dialogue, the goofy fracturing of temporality [as] a patina over apastiche. The pastiche ... is essentially of two films that Tarantino can't seem to get out of his mind:Mean Streets [1973; directed byMartin Scorsese, who lovedPulp Fiction and the way the film was told[203]] andThe Killing [1956; directed byStanley Kubrick]."[204] He contrastsPulp Fiction with postmodern Hollywood predecessorsHudson Hawk (1991; starring Willis) andLast Action Hero (1993; starringArnold Schwarzenegger) that "took the joke too far ... simply mocked or suggested that they were smarter than the audience" and flopped.[205] Todd McCarthy writes that the film's "striking widescreen compositions often contain objects in extreme close-up as well as vivid contrasts, sometimes bringing to mind the visual strategies ofSergio Leone", an acknowledged hero of Tarantino's.[114] To Martin Rubin, the "expansive, brightly colored widescreen visuals" evoke comedy directors such asFrank Tashlin andBlake Edwards.[206]
The movie's host ofpop culture allusions, ranging from the famous image ofMarilyn Monroe's skirt flying up over a subway grating to Jules addressing a soon-to-be victim as "Flock of Seagulls" because of his haircut,[207][208] have led many critics to discuss it within the framework ofpostmodernism. Describing the film in 2005 as Tarantino's "postmodern masterpiece ... to date", David Walker writes that it "is marked by its playful reverence for the 1950s ... and its constantly teasing and often deferential references to other films". He characterizes its convoluted narrative technique as "postmodern tricksiness".[209] Calling the film a "terminally hip postmodern collage", Foster Hirsch findsPulp Fiction far from a masterpiece: "authoritative, influential, and meaningless". Set "in a world that could exist only in the movies", it is "a succulent guilty pleasure, beautifully made junk food forcinéastes".[210] O'Brien, dismissing attempts to associate the movie withfilm noir, argues that "Pulp Fiction is more a guided tour of an infernal theme park decorated with cultural detritus,Buddy Holly andMamie Van Doren, fragments ofblaxploitation andRoger Corman andShogun Assassin, music out of a twenty-four-hour oldies station for which all the decades since the fifties exist simultaneously."[166] Catherine Constable takes the moment in which a needle filled with adrenalin is plunged into the comatose Mia's heart as exemplary. She proposes that it "can be seen as effecting her resurrection from the dead, simultaneously recalling and undermining theGothic convention of the vampire's stake. On this model, the referencing of previous aesthetic forms and styles moves beyond ... empty pastiche, sustaining an 'inventive and affirmative' mode of postmodernism."[211]
Mark T. Conard asks, "[W]hat is the filmabout?" and answers, "Americannihilism."[212] Hirsch suggests, "If the film is actually about anything other than its own cleverness, it seems dedicated to the dubious thesis that hit men are part of the human family."[172] Richard Alleva argues that "Pulp Fiction has about as much to do with actual criminality or violence asCyrano de Bergerac with the realities of seventeenth-century France orThe Prisoner of Zenda with Balkan politics." He reads the movie as a form of romance whose allure is centered in the characters' nonnaturalistic discourse, "wise-guy literate, media-smart, obscenelyepigrammatic".[213] In Alan Stone's view, the "absurd dialogue", like that between Vincent and Jules in the scene where the former accidentally kills Marvin, "unexpectedly transforms the meaning of the violence cliché ...Pulp Fiction unmasks the macho myth by making it laughable and deheroicizes the power trip glorified by standard Hollywood violence."[214] Stone reads the film as "politically correct. There is no nudity and no violence directed against women ... [It] celebrates interracial friendship and cultural diversity; there are strong women and strong black men, and the director swims against the current of class stereotype."[214]
Where Stone sees a celebration, Kolker finds a vacuum: "The postmodern insouciance, violence, homophobia, and racism ofPulp Fiction were perfectly acceptable because the film didn't pretend seriousness and therefore didn't mock it."[205] Calling it the "acme of postmodern nineties filmmaking", he explains, "the postmodern is about surfaces; it is flattened spatiality in which event and character are in a steady state of reminding us that they are pop-cultural figures."[215] According to Kolker:
That's whyPulp Fiction was so popular. Not because all audiences got all or any of its references to Scorsese and Kubrick, but because the narrative and spatial structure of the film never threatened to go beyond themselves into signification. The film's cycle of racist and homophobic jokes might threaten to break out into a quite nasty view of the world, but this nastiness keeps being laughed off – by the mock intensity of the action, the prowling, confronting, perverse, confined, and airless nastiness of the world Tarantino creates.[216]
Henry A. Giroux argues that Tarantino "empties violence of any critical social consequences, offering viewers only the immediacy of shock, humor, and irony-without-insight as elements of mediation. None of these elements gets beyond the seduction of voyeuristic gazing ... [t]he facile consumption of shocking images and hallucinatory delight."[217]
Regarding the violence and nihilism in the film, Pamela Demory has suggested thatPulp Fiction should be seen in light of the short stories ofFlannery O'Connor,[218] which likewise feature "religious elements, banality, and violence with grotesque humor." Discussing "the connection between violence and redemption," Demory concludes that while O'Connor's purpose is to convince readers "of the powerful force of evil in the world and of our need for grace," Tarantino "seeks to demonstrate that in spite of everything we have seen in the film – all the violence, degradation, death, crime, amoral behavior – grace is still possible; there might still be a God who doesn't judge us on merits."[219]
Homage as essence
Cinema
Pulp Fiction is full ofhomages to other movies. "Tarantino's characters", writesGary Groth, "inhabit a world where the entire landscape is composed of Hollywood product. Tarantino is a cinematic kleptomaniac – he literally can't help himself."[220] Two scenes in particular have prompted discussion of the film's highlyintertextual style. Many have assumed that the dance sequence at Jack Rabbit Slim's was intended as a reference to Travolta's star-making performance as Tony Manero in the epochalSaturday Night Fever (1977); Tarantino, however, credits a scene in theJean-Luc Godard filmBande à part (1964) with the inspiration. According to the filmmaker, he clarified that the dance scene was not written specifically to showcase John Travolta's dancing; the scene was written in the script before Travolta was cast.[221] However, once Travolta joined the film, Tarantino embraced the opportunity to feature him dancing, citing Jean-Luc Godard's films as his favorite example of musical sequences, admiring how they appear unpredictably and bring a sense of warmth and spontaneity.[221] Tarantino noted that the charm lies in the fact that these films are not musical, yet they pause the narrative to include a musical moment, which he found particularly endearing.[221]
Jerome Charyn argues that, beyond "all the better", Travolta's presence is essential to the power of the scene, and of the film:
Travolta's entire career becomes "backstory", the myth of a movie star who has fallen out of favor, but still resides in our memory as the king of disco. We keep waiting for him to shed his paunch, put on a white polyester suit, and enter the 2001 Odyssey club in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, where he will dance for us and never, never stop. Daniel Day-Lewis couldn't have woken such a powerful longing in us. He isn't part of America's own mad cosmology ... Tony Manero [is] an angel sitting on Vince's shoulder ... [Vince and Mia's] actual dance may be closer to the choreography ofAnna Karina's shuffle with her two bumbling gangster boyfriends inBande à part, but eventhat reference is lost to us, and we're with Tony again ...[222]
Estella Tincknell notes that while the "diner setting seems to be a simulacrum of a 'fifties' restaurant ... the twist contest is a musical sequence which evokes 'the sixties,' while Travolta's dance performance inevitably references 'the seventies' and his appearance inSaturday Night Fever. ... The 'past' thus becomes a more general 'pastness' in which the stylistic signifiers of various decades are loaded in to a single moment."[223] She also argues that in this passage the film "briefly shifts from its habitually ironic discourse to one that references the conventions of the classicfilm musical and in doing so makes it possible for the film to inhabit an affective space that goes beyond stylistic allusion."[223]
The pivotal moment in which Marsellus crosses the street in front of Butch's car and notices him evokes the scene in which Marion Crane's boss sees her under similar circumstances inPsycho (1960).[224][225] Marsellus and Butch are soon held captive by Maynard and Zed, "two sadistic honkies straight out ofDeliverance" (1972), directed byJohn Boorman.[214] Zed shares a name withSean Connery's character in Boorman's follow-up, the science-fiction filmZardoz (1974). When Butch decides to rescue Marsellus, in Glyn White's words, "he finds a trove of items with film-hero resonances".[226] Critics have identified these weapons with a range of possible allusions:
At the conclusion of the scene, a portentous line of Marsellus's echoes one from the crime dramaCharley Varrick (1973), directed by another of Tarantino's heroes,Don Siegel; the name of the character who speaks it there is Maynard.[228][229][230][231]
David Bell argues that far from going against the "current of class stereotype", this scene, likeDeliverance, "mobilize[s] a certain construction of poor white country folk – and particularly their sexualization ... 'rustic sexual expression often takes the form of homosexual rape' in American movies."[232] Stephen Paul Miller believes thePulp Fiction scene goes down much easier than the one it echoes: "The buggery perpetrated is not at all as shocking as it was inDeliverance ... The nineties film reduces seventies competition, horror, and taboo into an entertainingly subtle adrenaline play – a fiction, a pulp fiction."[233] Giroux reads the rape scene homage similarly: "in the end Tarantino's use of parody is about repetition, transgression, and softening the face of violence by reducing it to the property of film history."[234] In Groth's view, the crucial difference is that "inDeliverance the rape created the film's central moral dilemma whereas inPulp Fiction it was merely 'the single weirdest day of [Butch's] life.'"[235] ("American Me did it too," Tarantino observed. "There's likethree butt-fucking scenes inAmerican Me. That's definitely the one to beat in that particular category!"[236])
Neil Fulwood focuses on Butch's weapon selection, writing, "Here, Tarantino's love of movies is at its most open and nonjudgemental, tipping a nod to the noble and the notorious, as well as sending up his own reputation as an enfant terrible of movie violence. Moreover, the scene makes a sly comment about the readiness of cinema to seize upon whatever is to hand for its moments of mayhem and murder."[227] White asserts that "the katana he finally, and significantly, selects identifies him with ...honourable heroes."[226] Conard argues that the first three items symbolize a nihilism that Butch is rejecting. The traditional Japanese sword, in contrasts, represents a culture with a well-definedmoral code and thus connects Butch with a more meaningful approach to life.[237]
Thebiker filmNam's Angels is also shown with Fabienne characterizing it as "A motorcycle movie, I'm not sure the name."[238]
Television
Robert Miklitsch argues that "Tarantino's telephilia" may be more central to the guiding sensibility ofPulp Fiction than the filmmaker's love for rock 'n' roll and even cinema:
"The above list, with the possible exception ofThe Avengers," writes Miklitsch, "suggests thatPulp Fiction has less of an elective affinity with the cinematic avant-gardism of Godard than with mainstream network programming."[240] Jonathan Rosenbaum had brought TV into his analysis of the Tarantino/Godard comparison, acknowledging that the directors were similar in wanting to cram everything they like onscreen: "But the differences between what Godard likes and what Tarantino likes and why are astronomical; it's like comparing a combined museum, library, film archive, record shop, and department store with a jukebox, a video-rental outlet, and an issue ofTV Guide."[136]
Sharon Willis focuses on the way a television show (Clutch Cargo) marks the beginning of, and plays on through, the scene between young Butch and his father's comrade-in-arms. The Vietnam War veteran is played by Christopher Walken, whose presence in the role evokes his performance as a traumatized G.I. in the Vietnam War movieThe Deer Hunter (1978). Willis writes that "when Captain Koons enters the living room, we see Walken in his function as an image retrieved from a repertoire of 1970s television and movie versions of ruinedmasculinity in search of rehabilitation ... [T]he gray light of the television presiding over the scene seems to inscribe the ghostly paternal gaze."[241] Miklitsch asserts that, for some critics, the film is a "prime example of the pernicious ooze-like influence of mass culture exemplified by their bête noire: TV."[240] Kolker might not disagree, arguing that "Pulp Fiction is a simulacrum of our daily exposure to television; its homophobes, thugs and perverts, sentimental boxers and pimp promoters move through a series of long-take tableaux: we watch, laugh, and remain with nothing to comprehend."[216]
Notable motifs
The mysterious 666 briefcase
Vincent "stares ... transfixed" into the glowing case, as specified in Tarantino's screenplay.[242]
Vincent's demeanor reinforces the allusion to the scene inKiss Me Deadly (1955) in which Lily Carver, a.k.a. Gabrielle (Gaby Rodgers), gazes into the glowing case.[243]
The combination of the mysterious suitcase lock is 666, the "Number of the Beast". Tarantino has said there is no explanation for its contents – it is simply aMacGuffin, a pureplot device. Originally, the case was to contain diamonds, but this was seen as too mundane. For filming purposes, it contained a hidden orange light bulb that produced an otherworldly glow when the case was opened.[244] In a 2007 video interview with fellow director and friendRobert Rodriguez, Tarantino purportedly "reveals" the secret contents of the briefcase, but the film cuts out and skips the scene in the style employed in Tarantino and Rodriguez'sGrindhouse (2007), with an intertitle that reads "Missing Reel". The interview resumes with Rodriguez discussing how radically the "knowledge" of the briefcase's contents alters one's understanding of the movie.[245]
Despite Tarantino's statements, many solutions to what one scholar calls this "unexplained postmodern puzzle" have been proposed.[124] A strong similarity has often been observed withRobert Aldrich's 1955film noirKiss Me Deadly, which features a glowing briefcase housing an atomic explosive.[235][246][247] In their review ofAlex Cox's 1984 filmRepo Man inThe Daily Telegraph, Nick Cowen and Hari Patience suggest thatPulp Fiction may also owe "a debt of inspiration" to the glowing car trunk in that film.[248] In scholar Paul Gormley's view, this connection withKiss Me Deadly, and a similar one withRaiders of the Lost Ark (1981), makes it possible to read the eerie glow as symbolic of violence itself.[249] The idea that the briefcase contains Marsellus's soul gained popular currency in the mid-1990s. Analyzing the notion,Roger Ebert dismissed it as "nothing more than a widely distributed urban legend given false credibility by the mystique of the Net".[250]
Jules' Bible passage
Jules ritually recites what he describes as a biblical passage,Ezekiel 25:17, before he executes someone. The passage is heard three times – in the introductory sequence in which Jules and Vincent reclaim Marsellus's briefcase from the doomed Brett; that same recitation a second time, at the beginning of "The Bonnie Situation", which overlaps the end of the earlier sequence; and in the epilogue at the diner. The first version of the passage is 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 goodwill 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.
The second version, from the diner scene, is identical except for the final line: "And you will know I am the Lord when I lay My vengeance upon you."
While the final two sentences of Jules's speech are similar to the actual cited passage, the first two are fabricated from various biblical phrases.[251] The text of Ezekiel 25 preceding verse 17 indicates that God's wrath is retribution for the hostility of thePhilistines. In theKing James Version from which Jules's speech is adapted, Ezekiel 25:17 reads in its entirety:
And I will execute great vengeance upon them with furious rebukes; and they shall know that Iam the LORD, when I shall lay My vengeance upon them.[252]
Tarantino's primary inspiration for the speech was the work of Japanesemartial arts starSonny Chiba. Its text and its identification as Ezekiel 25:17 derive from an almost identical creed that appears at the beginning of the Chiba movieKarate Kiba (The Bodyguard; 1976), where it is both shown as a scrolling text and read by an offscreen narrator.[253][254]
The version seen at the beginning ofThe Bodyguard (1976) is as follows:
The path of the righteous man and defender is beset on all sides by the inequity 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 father 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 shall lay my vengeance upon them!
In the 1980s television seriesKage no Gundan (Shadow Warriors), Chiba's character would lecture the villain-of-the-week about how the world must be rid of evil before killing him.[255] A killer delivers a similar biblical rant inModesty Blaise, the hardback but pulp-style novel Vincent is shown with in two scenes.[256]
Two critics who have analyzed the role of the speech find different ties between Jules's transformation and the issue ofpostmodernity. Gormley argues that unlike the film's other major characters – Marsellus aside – Jules is:
linked to a "thing" beyond postmodern simulation ... [T]his is perhaps most marked when he moves on from being a simulation of a Baptist preacher, spouting Ezekiel because it was "just a cool thing to say ..." In his conversion, Jules is shown to be cognizant of a place beyond this simulation, which, in this case, the film constructs as God.[257]
Adele Reinhartz writes that the "depth of Jules's transformation" is indicated by the difference in his two deliveries of the passage: "In the first, he is a majestic and awe-inspiring figure, proclaiming the prophecy with fury and self-righteousness ... In the second ... he appears to be a different sort of man altogether ... [I]n true postmodern fashion, [he] reflects on the meaning of his speech and provides several different ways that it might pertain to his current situation."[258] Similar to Gormley, Conard argues that as Jules reflects on the passage, it dawns on him "that it refers to an objective framework of value and meaning that is absent from his life"; to Conard, this contrasts with the film's prevalent representation of a nihilistic culture.[259] Rosenbaum finds much less in Jules's revelation: "[T]he spiritual awakening at the end ofPulp Fiction, which Jackson performs beautifully, is a piece of jive avowedly inspired by kung-fu movies. It may make you feel good, but it certainly doesn't leave you any wiser."[136]
The bathroom
Much ofPulp Fiction's action revolves around characters who are either in the bathroom or need to use the toilet. To a lesser extent, Tarantino's other films also feature this narrative element.[260] At Jack Rabbit Slim's, Mia goes to "powder her nose" – literally; shesnorts coke in the restroom, surrounded by a bevy of women vainly primping. Butch and Fabienne play an extended scene in their motel bathroom, he in the shower, she brushing her teeth; the next morning, but just a few seconds later in screen time, she is again brushing her teeth – vigorously, after having given Butch "oral pleasure." As Jules and Vincent confront Brett and two of his pals, a fourth man is hiding in the bathroom – his actions will lead to Jules' transformative "moment of clarity". After Marvin's absurd death, Vincent and Jules wash up in Jimmie's bathroom, where they get into a contretemps over a bloody hand towel.[175] When the diner holdup turns into a standoff, "Honey Bunny" whines, "I gotta go pee!"[261]
As described by Peter and Will Brooker, "In three significant moments Vincent retires to the bathroom [and] returns to an utterly changed world where death is threatened."[262] The threat increases in magnitude as the narrative progresses chronologically, and is realized in the third instance:
Vincent and Jules's diner breakfast and philosophical conversation is aborted by Vincent's bathroom break; an armed robbery ensues while Vincent is reading on the toilet.
While Vincent is in the bathroom worrying about the possibility of going too far with Marsellus's wife, Mia mistakes his heroin for cocaine, snorts it, and overdoses.
During a stakeout at Butch's apartment, Vincent emerges from the toilet with his book and is killed by Butch.
In the Brookers' analysis, "Through Vince ... we see the contemporary world as utterly contingent, transformed, disastrously, in the instant you are not looking."[262] Fraiman finds it particularly significant that Vincent is readingModesty Blaise in two of these instances. She links this fact with the traditional derisive view of women as "the archetypal consumers of pulp":
Locating popular fiction in the bathroom, Tarantino reinforces its association with shit, already suggested by the dictionary meanings of "pulp" that preface the movie: moist, shapeless matter; also, lurid stories on cheap paper. What we have then is a series of damaging associations – pulp, women, shit – that taint not only male producers of mass-market fiction but also male consumers. Perched on the toilet with his book, Vincent is feminized by sitting instead of standing as well as by his trashy tastes; preoccupied by the anal, he is implicitly infantilized and homosexualized; and the seemingly inevitable result is being pulverized by Butch with a Czech M61 submachine gun. That this fate has to do with Vincent's reading habits is strongly suggested by a slow tilt from the book on the floor directly up to the corpse spilled into the tub.[263]
Willis readsPulp Fiction in almost precisely the opposite direction, finding "its overarching project as a drive to turn shit into gold. This is one way of describing the project of redeeming and recycling popular culture, especially the popular culture of one's childhood, as is Tarantino's wont as well as his stated aim."[241] Despite that, argues Fraiman, "Pulp Fiction demonstrates ... that even an open pulpophile like Tarantino may continue to feel anxious and emasculated by his preferences."[261]
The first home video release was aVHS on September 12, 1995.[270] Following their June 1993 sale toThe Walt Disney Company, all of Miramax's home video releases were handled by Disney'sBuena Vista Home Entertainment. However, the releases were being branded as Miramax Home Entertainment releases rather than Disney/Buena Vista releases, as a result of the studio's adult focused content. In 1996, Miramax issued a Special Collector’s Edition VHS, which included deleted scenes introduced by Tarantino.[271] In Australia, the Special Collector's Edition VHS was released in late 1997, throughVillage Roadshow, who had an Australian distribution agreement with Miramax at the time.[272] The film's first USLaserDisc release occurred on October 4, 1995, and was followed by a specialCriterion Collection LaserDisc release on June 19, 1996.[273] Between 1995 and 1997, the film received additional LaserDisc releases in France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Spain, Taiwan, and the United Kingdom.[273] On August 20, 2002, Miramax Home Entertainment released a two-disc Collector’s Edition DVD. This version includedDTS sound, and extensive extras such as documentaries, interviews with cast and crew, and trailers.[274][275]
In December 2010, The Walt Disney Company sold Miramax to a private equity holding company known asFilmyard Holdings. The company had multiple investors, includingTutor-Saliba Corporation and the private equity firmColony Capital, who were making their first entertainment-related investment.[276][277] Filmyard licensed the home media rights for most of Miramax's notable titles toLionsgate Films, with lower profile titles being licensed toEcho Bridge Entertainment.[278]Lionsgate Home Entertainment reissuedPulp Fiction on DVD on April 26, 2011, and on October 1, 2011, the film received aBlu-ray release through Lionsgate Home Entertainment.[279][280] The UK version of the Lionsgate Blu-ray was released on November 26, 2012.[281] In 2011, Filmyard Holdings licensed the Miramax library to streamerNetflix. This streaming deal includedPulp Fiction, and ran for five years, eventually ending on June 1, 2016.[282]
Filmyard Holdings sold Miramax to Qataristate-owned companybeIN Media Group in March 2016.[283] In April 2020,ViacomCBS (now known asParamount Skydance) acquired the rights to Miramax's library, after buying a 49% stake in the studio from beIN.[284]Pulp Fiction is among the 700 titles they acquired in the deal,[285][286][287] and since April 2020, the film has been distributed byParamount Pictures. The deal also included a first look agreement with beIN/Miramax, which allows Paramount to release any future projects based on Miramax properties.[288]
In late 2020,Paramount Home Entertainment started reissuing many of the Miramax titles they had acquired, and on September 22, 2020, they reissuedPulp Fiction on DVD and Blu-ray.[279][289] Most of Paramount's Miramax reissues during this period had the same artwork as previous releases, but add the Paramount mountain logo to the packaging. On December 6 2022, Paramount Home Entertainment releasedPulp Fiction on4K Ultra HD Blu-ray.[279] The release includes special features originally from the 2011 Lionsgate Blu-ray.[290] In celebration ofPulp Fiction's 30th anniversary, Paramount Home Entertainment released a 4K Ultra HD Collector's Edition on December 3, 2024, as anAmazon-exclusive set (also available viaZavvi in Australia). This edition retains the 2022 version's 2160p transfer with HDR-10 and Dolby Vision, also retaining the legacy special features. It includes a new slipcover featuring pop-up artwork of the Jack Rabbit Slim's dance scene between John Travolta and Uma Thurman. Additional collectibles include reproductions of lobby cards showcasing key film moments, a photography contact sheet, and collectible stickers/decals with film imagery, all presented in a protective folder with custom artwork.[291]
Pulp Fiction was not one of the inaugural titles included on Paramount's subscription streaming serviceParamount+, which launched on March 4, 2021, although it was later added to the service.[292][293] It has also been made available on Paramount's free streaming servicePluto TV.[294]
NFT dispute
In November 2021, Miramax filed a lawsuit against Tarantino who released sevenNFTs based on uncut and unseen scenes ofPulp Fiction and including the original handwritten script "revealing secrets about the film and its creator." Miramax claimed they own the film rights.[295] Tarantino disputed the lawsuit and claimed he had rights to the film script in written form.[296] The matter was later settled with Miramax's lawyers filing a brief statement in court: "The parties have agreed to put this matter behind them and look forward to collaborating with each other on future projects, including possible NFTs."[297]
^Walken's speech to the young Butch has been described as a "bravura performance of patriotic zeal and scatological fetishism worthy of a Kubrickian anti-hero".[44]
^[117][122][2]Box Office Mojo gives $106 million in foreign grosses for a worldwide total of $213.9 million; Biskind and Waxman apparently concur that $105M / $212.9M are the correct figures.
^National Society of Film Critics,[141] National Board of Review,[142] Los Angeles Film Critics Society,[143] Boston Society of Film Critics,[144] Society of Texas Film Critics,[145] Kansas City Film Critics Circle[146]
^abSee, e.g., King (2002), pp. 185–7;Kempley, Rita (October 14, 1994)."Pulp Fiction (R)".The Washington Post.Archived from the original on July 9, 2017. RetrievedSeptember 19, 2007.;LaSalle, Mike (September 15, 1995)."Pulp Grabs You Like a Novel".San Francisco Chronicle.Archived from the original on January 12, 2012. RetrievedSeptember 20, 2007.
^Bhattacharya, Sanjiv (April 18, 2004)."Mr Blonde's Ambition".The Guardian. London.Archived from the original on July 9, 2008. RetrievedDecember 27, 2006.
^For $100,000, see e.g., Enhanced Trivia Track, ch. 3,Pulp Fiction DVD (Buena Vista Home Entertainment). For USD$140,000, see e.g.,Wills, Dominic."John Travolta Biography". Tiscali. Archived fromthe original on January 4, 2007. RetrievedDecember 27, 2006. Note again that all the main actors were paid identical weekly salaries. It appears that these figures cited for Travolta do not include his participation, if any, in the film's profits.
^abGleiberman, Owen (October 10, 1994)."Pulp Fiction (1994)".Entertainment Weekly.Archived from the original on October 15, 2007. RetrievedSeptember 20, 2007.
^Roberts, Chris (August 1999). "Gary Oldman: A sheep in wolf's clothing".Uncut (27).IPC Media.[True Romance] wouldn't have been [Oldman's] last Tarantino collaboration, had TriStar execs gotten their way ... Oldman was the preferred choice for [Lance].
^Enhanced Trivia Track, ch. 6,Pulp Fiction DVD (Buena Vista Home Entertainment). See alsoRabin, Nathan (June 25, 2003)."Interviews: Pam Grier".The A.V. Club. The Onion.Archived from the original on October 2, 2007. RetrievedSeptember 20, 2007.
^Polan 2000, p. 69: Willis's deal for a percentage of the box office gross was presumably on top of a base weekly salary that was identical to the other main actors, per Polan.
^Dawson 1995a, p. 147: The published version of the screenplay identifies its basis as "May 1993/last draft," incorporating brief revisions made in August, September, and October (Tarantino [1994], n.p.).
^Quoted inDargis (1994a, p. 10). Other sources have claimed that Butch was patterned after Ray'sNightfall role.[93] Tarantino's one public statement on the topic, quoted in Polan,[94] is clearly devoted to Butch's look and not his personality.
^See, e.g.,Wilson, Bee (February 14, 2007)."The Joy and Horror of Junk Food".Times Literary Supplement. London. Archived fromthe original on November 21, 2007. RetrievedOctober 11, 2007.Gates, Anita (August 1, 2004)."Movies: Critic's Choice".The New York Times.Archived from the original on June 2, 2018. RetrievedOctober 11, 2007.
^Demory, Pamela H. (1995). "Violence and Transcendence in Pulp Fiction and Flannery O'Connor". In Wright, Will; Kaplan, Steven (eds.).The Image of Violence in Literature, the Media, and Society: Selected Papers [from the] 1995 Conference of the Society for Interdisciplinary Study of Social Imagery. Society for the Interdisciplinary Study of Social Imagery. Pueblo, CO. pp. 187–194.
^Scott, R. Neil, ed. (2002).Flannery O'Connor: An Annotated Reference Guide to Criticism. Milledgeville, Georgia: Timberlane Books. p. 185.ISBN978-0971542808.
^Miklitsch 2006, pp. 15, 16: Note that while the Three Stooges did have an original TV series that ran briefly in the mid-1960s, they were most familiar from their cinematicshorts that weresyndicated to television.
^Cowen, Nick; Patience, Hari (August 16, 2008)."Wheels on Film: Repo Man".The Daily Telegraph.Archived from the original on August 13, 2018. RetrievedJuly 14, 2012.
^Thomas 2003, pp. 61–62: Thomas notes that instead of "the Lord", this version reads "... and they shall know that I am Chiba the Bodyguard ...".
^Conard 2006, p. 134: Conard claims that the text originates from the filmBodigaado Kiba (Bodyguard Kiba orThe Bodyguard; 1973) and that the end phrase there is "And you will know my name is Chiba the Bodyguard ...".
^Enhanced Trivia Track, ch. 4,Pulp Fiction DVD (Buena Vista Home Entertainment).
^Enhanced Trivia Track, ch. 25,Pulp Fiction DVD (Buena Vista Home Entertainment).
^White, Mike & Thompson, Mike (Spring 1995)."Tarantino in a Can?".Cashiers du Cinemart. Archived fromthe original on February 11, 2012. RetrievedDecember 31, 2006.
^Fraiman 2003, p. 14: Fraiman's identification of the submachine gun as aCzech M61 matches the description in the screenplay: Tarantino (1994), p. 96. Visual evidence suggests that a different gun was actually used in the film, possibly aMAC-10 or similar model.
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