A long while later, after really digging Kill Bill, I went back and had another look at Pulp Fiction. And enjoyed the hell out of it. It’s pointless to expand on what I liked, as so much has already been written about this movie, and QT hardly needs the support of my opinions. But my turnabout struck me as saying a lot about the subjectivity of our impressions in the dark of a movie theater.

I don’t think my intensely negative reaction was the shock of witnessing a blazing artistic comet, like the public response to The Rite of Spring or Chien Andalou, the likes of which had really never been seen before. I can only guess that being a crusty ex film student in my mid twenties, I was rubbed a little raw by the build-up of PF and felt profoundly let down by the experience itself. Here was a mash-up of the high-artistry of Godard and Kubrick and the lowbrow of Don Siegel and Corman. Even this had been done before, most notably by Schrader and Scorsese with Taxi Driver. But that film had a beating, Dostoyevskian heart. And PF just seemed like empty folly, cinema for its own sake.

While my youthful criticism was understandably immature and unfairly vituperative, I think my core issue with the movie is that in invoking the Nouvelle Vague, PF tips more of a hat to Godard than Bresson. This is the chief difference for me between PF and Taxi Driver – as PF lifts liberally from Band Apart, TD reeks of Pickpocket. At the risk of digging a deeper grave for myself than I did with my original ungainly critique, it could be said that Band Apart is more of a celebration of movies (of a simulacra) while Pickpocket is dealing with deeper existential themes.

But whether or not my theorizing is pure elitist claptrap, it’s no reason to dislike PF and dismiss its merit. A movie that successfully celebrates art for art’s sake, and does so with Tarantino’s level of energy, dexterity and plain old homegrown fucking attitude, deserves props. And these are mine.

Adieu.

check ‘er out

Please come to our panel if you’re in town…

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Courtesy of the venerable Quint. Check his blurb out here

Takes me back. I remember dying my hair brown to mock those Beverly Hills 90210 guys who were on the cover of every teenbeat mag at the time. Others pictured: the magnificent Billy Sadler of course, the mad-haired Tom Stern (when he had hair to go mad), the hilarious Brian Brophy lurking in the background…and apologies to the woman beside him. Give me points for doing this well, 800 years later…

From the 92nd St Y Tribeca Freaked Q&A
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