Quentin Tarantino Movies
Think back to 1992. It was a leap year. Then President George H.W. Bush was vomiting in the lap of the Japanese Prime Minister. The Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl and proceeded to fade into near-obscurity. Russian President Boris Yeltsin agreed to stop targeting American cities with nuclear weapons. It was still the beginning of the 1990s, a decade marked by political strife and intrigue both at home and abroad -- and Quentin Tarantino's first feature-length film Reservoir Dogs was a smash hit at the Sundance film festival.
This was back when Sundance still had some street cred. Not yet the media extravaganza that produced hits like Run Lola Run or The Station Agent, Sundance was a small-town, small-venue film festival that produced buzz for art-house films. Though Dogs didn't win a single award at Sundance, its appearance there started the ball rolling on the massive amount of critical acclaim that would make Tarantino's first feature film a cult hit and something of a financial success. Sure, the movie barely made enough in America to pay back its investors, but abroad the film did well, earning between 8 and 10 million bucks.
Reservoir Dogs will always be the Quentin Tarantino movie that defines his style -- dialogue-driven, at times funny, at times violent and obscene, and focusing on the underbelly of the criminal world. Though Tarantino made a handful of movies that fit this description (Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, etc) his style can not be this easily defined. Don't pigeon-hole the man who contributed to the brilliant Four Rooms as a creator of "crime films" or "new wave film noir".
So back to 1992. What was it about this era that made us thirsty for Tarantino's gritty movies? Why did films like Pulp Fiction interest audiences enough to make it the first "indie film" to break the $100 million mark at the box office? And why do we still line up in droves to see Tarantino's films almost 20 years later?
Rather than chalk it up to luck (I don't think a high school dropout working at a video store can be considered "lucky") or blaming America's supposed "taste for violence" is completely fair. Tarantino's movies appeal to audiences outside of America, and to people from all walks of life.
I think there are four elements present in the movies of Quentin Tarantino that make them appealing to people of all types.
1. Dialogue
Don't buy this crap that movie audiences want nothing but flash -- all style, no substance. When audiences are presented with films that show off dialogue, as is the case with most of Tarantino's body of work, they lap it up. Sure, you can say that Tarantino learned everything he knows from reading Elmore Leonard (whose novel he rewrote as Jackie Brown), but even Shakespeare knew when to borrow and when to outright steal.
Here are some classic lines from Quentin Tarantino movies that have become part of our popular culture:
"You like to bleed . . ."
"You'll find it a bit lonely on my side."
"I'm sorry, did I break your concentration?"
"You know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in France? A royale with cheese."
"Let me tell you what 'Like a Virgin' is about. It's all about a girl who digs a guy with a big dick. The entire song. It's a metaphor for big dicks."
Let the man who doubts that Tarantino is a great writer of dialogue explain himself, and let him be laughed at. There's no doubt that Quentin Tarantino the writer is just as strong as Tarantino the director, and for that we love him and his movies.
2. Casting
Quentin Tarantino is a man blessed with excellent casts. What can you say... the man made a lot of friends in Hollywood. From his obsession with Uma Thurman (foot fetish aside) to his obvious buddy-buddy relationships with Robert Rodriguez and Samuel L. Jackson, the latter of which can credit most of his success as an actor to Tarantino, who gave him his first award-nominated role in Pulp Fiction. Is Quentin a guy with friends in the right places? Does he luck out with great casts because he loves to have people over for roast beef on a Sunday? Or are his films so good that they can't help but attract talent?
However Tarantino does it, his films have always had remarkable casts. Look at this list of actors who have appeared in Quentin Tarantino movies. It reads like a "Who's Who" of American cinema for the past couple decades.
- Samuel L. Jackson
- John Travolta
- Uma Thurman
- Bruce Willis
- Christopher Walken
- Harvey Keitel
- Steve Buscemi
- Tim Roth
- David Carradine
- Robert Forster
- Vivica Fox
- Michael Madsen
- Daryl Hannah
- Rosanna Arquette
- Ving Rhames
- Eric Stoltz
- Lucy Liu
- Amanda Plummer
And that's nowhere near a complete list. Quentin Tarantino's great casts have had a major contribution to his status as one of our greatest filmmakers.
3. "Cool"
from Pulp Fiction
Jules -- Nobody's gonna hurt anybody. We're gonna be like three little Fonzies here. And what's Fonzie like? Come on, Yolanda, what's Fonzie like?
Yolanda -- Cool?
Nothing is more important than "cool". Cool rules the world. Where once it was said that money makes the world go 'round, we'd like to suggest a substitute -- cool. Cool is King, and without Cool, half our popular culture would be a blank spot. The films of Quentin Tarantino are undoubtedly cool.
4. Media
The story of the success of Quentin Tarantino's movies closely mirrors the story of the expansion and contraction of our culture through the media over the past two decades. Where would films like Kill Bill be without Internet buzz? Where would Tarantino's films be without the undying support of blogs like Ain't It Cool News? We can't say for sure -- but we can say that the creation of a 24 hour news cycle and the expansion of the Internet into our everyday lives had no small impact on Tarantino's success.
Look at a film like Pulp Fiction. This movie had a midnight release at Cannes, and Tarantino and his producers had the smarts to pull the whole cast over to France for the premiere. That midnight showing is now legend -- people were laughing, yelling, cheering -- it was like an old movie house premiere from the 30s. And the buzz spread quickly. First, Variety did a big spread on the film, and the rest of the media world was quick to pick up the torch.
It is no surprise that Tarantino's movies are so popular when he has the entirety of the media at his command. His ability to make friends and influence people is legendary, and with friends like these, enemies are a thing of the past.
So. Back to 1992. The end of that year saw the release of Dr. Dre's epic album The Chronic which changed music forever. Prince Charles and Princess Diana separate. A little-known governor from the South, William Jefferson Clinton, beats the incumbent President and prepares to take office. It was a big year. with lots of big changes on the horizon, not the least of which was the appearance of Tarantino's collection of films. You could argue that little else has influenced the world of cinema in the same way Tarantino's movies have, but you'd probably get less than a rise out of Quentin himself. He's a little busy changing the face of modern American movies.