Review of Pulp Fiction (1994) by Oscar I — 02 Sep 2015

The most perfect combination of characters, story lines, and curse words ever made in a movie.

When you watch Pulp Fiction, you're not just watching any movie: think of it as the scene where you have Lance explaining to Vincent the difference between the "goods" he had for sale: you get good movies, then you get movies that are different but equally good as the previous, and there's nothing wrong with those two types of movies since they're all good; but then comes the "fuckin' madman", the one movie that once you finish watching it, you simply know that it is so good, it goes above the good stuff - movies I should say.

It's hard for a person to explain in one sentence, with very few adverbs and adjectives, what Pulp Fiction is about. It'll be so much easier to say that it's a mayhem-adrenaline-disaster-driven-badass-violent-funny movie, but that wouldn't get the point across a lay audience, this is why when someone asks me what the movie is about I just say: "Just watch it. It's funny, it's clever, it's a mess, and it will keep you on your seat throughout the entire movie that you won't even notice how long the movie was".

When the movie starts you get a nice dialogue between Pumpkin and Honey Bunny; you get a talkie opening scene, but, boy, what a talk! And since you don't even realize the connection between that dialogue and the movie plot, you just enjoy the conversation they're having; however, by the end of that scene you get a nice surprise when you realize what they were talking about.

And this is a pattern throughout the entire movie: scenes that seem to start out normal take a sudden and unexpected twist - think of the Marvin scene in the car -; this is what will delight you the most: you never see things coming, and you really enjoy watching those characters talk their ways through those scenes with those badass lines and hilarious situations that will keep you at the edge of your seat!

Now, the characters: you get so many memorable characters in this movie that it's hard to root for one in particular. You get the two gangsters (Vincent and Jules) that talk and argue about life, death, and Royale with cheese. You get Marcellus Wallace, who at the beginning of the movie, all you know about him is that he does not like being fucked by anybody except Mrs. Wallace - and that he has a cut in the back of his neck where they probably stole his soul and put it in The Briefcase (?). You get Butch, the tough-mean old boxer, who turns out to be a sweetheart with his little croissant, and who fucked with the wrong man: Marcellus Wallace. You get the cool-master-of-cleaning-up-your-mess: Mr. Wolf, who talks fast, acts fast, and drives really fucking fast. You get Jimmy who can make one kick-ass coffee. You get Mia Wallace (Marcellus Wallace's wife) who likes to dance and snort the wrong shit into her nose. And that's just to mention a few... oh and let's not forget about Pumpkin and Honey Bunny at the beginning and at the end of the movie.

And then we get the dialogues, those great conversations that makes us wish that we could, at least once in our lives, establish a conversation as good and fun as the ones in the movie. Let's just take one example of a fun dialogue, the Royale with Cheese: you get two guys talking about the cultural differences and similarities between Europe and U.S., they converse in such an eloquent manner that it makes you feel relaxed about the whole talk, which most of it won't be key to the plot of the movie, yet one phrase will become key-sub-cultural reference: "Royale with cheese".

That's the kind of dialogues we get with this movie. You can just sit back and relax while you see the characters talk. You even enjoy those uncomfortable moments of silence that characters get, since those moments will give characters another reason to talk about what an "uncomfortable silence" is, and it'll give them a chance to take break so one can "powder her nose".

Now, if you want to talk about the story line, well you're in for a very long conversation since it's a non-linear story. One can just basically say that the story becomes a full circle by the end of the movie given the nature of the opening and closing scene. Plus, the key dialogues that characters talk about in the movie that seemed irrelevant until the very end where you start to see them connecting, somehow, to the story.

There are some who like to look at the movie as an anthology movie, and they're right, since the movie can be divided into three or four stories that are intertwined between each other, that makes the movie somewhat even more interesting just by thinking about it.

And yes, for crying-out-loud, it's violent. It has violence, lots of it, and you know what? It's hilarious. It's purely aesthetical. It is so stylized that the violence in the movie looks cool. Enough said about that.

The story it's a masterpiece of modern cinema. The characters are memorable. The dialogues are wonderful. The direction of the movie is superb. What else can you ask for? Perhaps a better reference to the movie, I assume... well, the most wonderful things in life sometimes require simple words that will sum-up their greatness, Pulp Fiction being one - just watch it and enjoy it.