Winner of Cannes Palme d’Or Award and the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay
Plot(Spoiler Alert)
Pulp Fiction weaves a story of seemingly random people whose lives touch each other through coincidence often involving violence.
Blaine: Quentin Tarantino was a fan of John Travolta’s earlier films and he was interested in meeting John in person. One of the things Quentin said after they met was they should work together on a film someday. Quentin was writing the script for “Pulp Fiction” at the time and had another actor in mind for the part of Vincent Vega, but after meeting with John, Quentin started to think he should play the character. So Quentin rewrote the pages with Vincent Vega in them and wrote new pages with Travolta in mind. One of the reasons Quentin decided that John should be in “Pulp Fiction" was because the previous movies John Travolta did weren’t so great and Quentin felt that John should be in something with more his style. John loved the script and thought it was so well written, but he had one problem and that was how Quentin was going to bring this to life. Quentin knew exactly what he was going to do to bring his vision to life.
Samuel L. Jackson had auditioned for a part in “Reservoir Dogs”, but he didn’t get it, which pissed him off because he really wanted to be apart of the project. Samuel attended the “Reservoir Dogs” premiere at the Sundance Film Festival and he loved the film. After it was over, Quentin went up to Samuel asking him how he liked the guy who got the part he auditioned for and Samuel told him that he wished he had played it. Quentin told Samuel not to feel down because he informed him he was writing a part for him in “Pulp Fiction”, his next project. Samuel didn’t know what to think at first, but he was very flattered. When Samuel got the script for “Pulp Fiction” he read it immediately. He loved it so much that he read it again. The weird thing was that Samuel had to audition for the part that was written for him. Laurence Fishburne was in competition with Samuel for the part of Jules Winnfield and it really pissed Samuel off. They both did the scene at the diner and that was it. Samuel flew back to New York after that all pissed off. Laurence Fishburne was amazed by Samuel’s audition that he knew this role was meant for him and the part went to him at the end.
Eric Stoltz was promoting a movie at the Sundance Film Festival called “The Waterdance” and he saw a screening of “Reservoir Dogs” while he was there. He was so impressed with “Reservoir Dogs” that it gave him strange dreams in his sleep. He told that to Quentin Tarantino when he met him and Quentin was happy about that. A while after, Quentin called up Eric telling him about “Pulp Fiction” and he wanted him to be in it. Quentin wanted Eric to play one of the two characters that wears a robe, Lance or Jimmie. But deep down Quentin knew he wanted Eric to play Lance because he is involved with the needle in the heart scene. Quentin was going to play one of the robe characters and if he played Lance it would be hard for him to act and direct an intense scene like needle in the heart.
Rosanna Arquette auditioned for the role of Mia, but the part went to Uma Thurman. However, Quentin liked her audition that he felt she should be in the movie. Quentin called Rosanna up on her birthday asking her if she would want to play Lance’s wife, Jody. Rosanna would have played any part in “Pulp Fiction” because she loved the script so much that she was happy enough to be involved with the project. Rosanna would meet with Quentin at a bar to talk about the movie and she was amazed how Quentin knew so much about film because he’s a moviegoer.
Quentin Tarantino also wrote parts for Tim Roth and Amanda Plummer. Tim Roth is interested in playing any part Quentin writes after working with him on “Reservoir Dogs”. Quentin met Amanda though Tim Roth. Tim and Amanda had been friends for a while and he was her ride to “The Fisher King” premiere. Quentin attended that premiere and Tim introduced Amanda to him. Amanda took a liking to Quentin immediately. Quentin told them both that he wanted them to be in “Pulp Fiction”.
Quentin wanted the actors to rehearse scenes before principal photography began and he would be their as a guide during that time. The cinematographer was there to figure out where the camera should be. The actors would have suggestions on how they should act in a scene and Quentin was open minded to any suggestions they had because he wanted to see how it would look. After ten days of rehearsal, the actors were ready to shoot the movie. Rehearsing became a great exercise for the actors and they knew what to do as soon as those cameras started rolling. The first scene they shot was when Vincent Vega rushes to Lance’s house because Mia Wallace is overdosed after snorting Vincent’s heroin thinking it was cocaine. The only way to save her life is to stab an adrenaline shot at her chest. Quentin would tell the actors to just go at each other in that scene. Quentin would laugh at the actors while they shot that scene. Quentin would hold the camera a couple of times to shoot a take himself. He shot this long take. It starts off with Rosanna Arquette getting out of her bed to see what’s going on. The camera goes back and forth to whoever is talking. Then the camera focusses on Eric Stoltz and focusses on him going into the other room while he’s trying to find the medical book. Finally he goes back into the main room and then it cuts to another shot.
John Travolta had a lot of suggestions on how he should dance for the scene where he is dancing with Uma Thurman. John Travolta has had a lot of experience in dancing in movies. Some of his suggestions were doing the twist, the Batman, the hitchhiker and the swim. They shot that dance scene for thirteen hours and at the end of the day, Quentin told John that each take they did of him dancing with Uma was so fascinating for everyone to watch. Quentin was very proud of the work John did for that scene.
Quentin wanted Samuel L. Jackson to have an afro at first and he had sent a woman to a wig store to buy one. She came back with a Jheri curl wig and Quentin was so upset that he couldn’t look at it, but then he had second thoughts about it. So Quentin had Samuel put it on, they shined it up and Quentin thought it looked good. Tim Roth tried not to laugh when Amanda Plummer said her line as she was pulling out her gun. She’s all crazy and moving around the place and the extras had no idea what was going on while Tim and Amanda were moving around the place and waving their guns at people. By the time the cameras focussed on Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta, the extras were relieved because they thought they were undercover cops and Tim and Amanda were whacked out of their minds. The only thing Samuel was disappointed about was that his character didn’t shoot and kill Tim and Amanda’s characters because it was in the script before Quentin changed it.
Everyone thought Quentin was as good of an actor as a director. His performance as Jimmie, the other robe character, was really good. They added stuff into that scene, that wasn’t in the script, where Vincent and Jules are trying to figure out how to get rid of the dead body that is in Jules’ car and the blood that is splattered all over the inside of the car.
“Pulp Fiction” wrapped after that and months later it premiered at the Cannes Film Festival where audiences were blown away by it. But not everyone was impressed with it. When “Pulp Fiction” won the Palm’dor award, there was one guy shouting out “it was a piece of shit!” and Samuel L. Jackson shouted back at him saying “fuck you!” At another premiere, an old woman was having a heart attack because the scene where Uma Thurman gets a needle stabbed in her chest was too much for her. They stopped the movie and an ambulance took her away. Quentin Tarantino was starting to become an inspiration after “Pulp Fiction” was released and became a hit. No one made movies like he did. One of the things that made “Pulp Fiction” different from other movies was the time frame wasn’t told in order.
My rating on “Pulp Fiction” is five out of five stars
Parody
The Simpsons
Episode: 22 Short Films About Springfield
Blaine: The conversation the policemen are having about McDonald’s represents the famous “Royal With Cheese” discussion John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson have at the beginning of “Pulp Fiction". And then when Snake hits Chief Wiggum with his car it represents the scene when Bruce Willis hits Ving Rhames with his car and Ving goes after him.
