Podcast: Tarantino and Avary’s film Pulp Fiction

The film Pulp Fiction is the topic for this edition of the Torg Stories Podcast.

General background on film:

• Released May 1994. (29 years ago) I was moving to Indy to live with Aaron Spaulding to work camps and look for a job. I just finished being a student assistant at Olivet Nazarene University.
• 154 minutes long
• Story by Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary; written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.
• Budget of 8.5 million, earned 213 million

Why this film:

• I knew there was a lot to talk about with this film, but I knew the structure would offer some extra.
• I feel like narrowing the categories that we discuss, so we can get more quickly to, “What’s interesting here?”

What’s interesting?

1. The structure: why re-arrange time? What would have been the last thing chronologically? What was the last scene in the film? The fact that we see the same scene from a different viewpoint.
2. A novel in stories. How creativity works. My book Horseshoe. My screenplay Love on the Big Screen. What this film gave to me.
3. Tackling controversial subjects. In general, white people aren’t supposed to use the N word. But of course variations of the N word get used constantly. This film isn’t about that, but real people are depicted, what I’ve heard Tarantino call “the truth.” The importance of writing the truth in fiction.
4. I’m ill equipped to talk about the film. Language of film. Film history. Knowledge of film.
5. I’d never seen anything like this. Language. Drugs. LA. Situations.
6. Religious epiphany.
7. So much conversation and there are theories laid out: foot massages, pot bellies on women what society finds attractive, the nature of miracles, Amsterdam and the metric system, you have to promise not to be offended. Having a theory on something is interesting, something a writer or filmmaker does.

Favorite scenes:

1. Last scene in the diner.
2. Vincent takes Mia to the drug house for the adrenaline shot.
3. Butch goes back in to save Marcellus from the rapist murderers.
4. Mr. Wolf gets the car ready.

Golden Lines:

1. What is significant is that I felt the touch of God. God got involved. (going to walk the earth, have adventures)
2. Don’t blaspheme. -Jules in the diner.
3. This is a moral test of one’s self, a test of loyalty. (Vincent in the mirror at Mia’s house).
4. Just because you are a character doesn’t mean you have character.
5. We’re all going. tobe like three little Fonzis.
6. I’m the guns of Navarone.
7. I’m curious about that myself.
8. A royale with cheese.
9. Zed is dead baby.
10. My name is Paul, this sh** between y’all.

Shots / Cinematography:

1. Vincent first shoot up scene, blood in vial
2. Butch’s girl’s reflection on the TV as the war movie plays.
3. from the truck while Vincent and Jules get their guns to go in to kill Brett.
4. People listening. For example, Butch framed center just listening for awhile. The bandaid on the back of Marcellus’s neck as he talks.
5. Toaster pops, Butch shoots Vincent.

Starting five:

1. John Travolta
2. Samuel L Jackson
3. Bruce Willis
4. Uma Thurman
5. Ving Rhames (from Mission: Impossible!)

Starred off the bench:

• Harvey Keitel, Christopher Walken, did you see Kathy Griffin was in it?

Who is that?

• Eric Stoltz playing Lance.
• Frank Whaley playing Brett. Field of Dreams. The ballplayer Kevin and Darth Vader pick up.

Other details:

• Vincent was reading Modesty Blaise, a 1965 spy novel, related to Fox Force 5.
• Case a MacGuffin, a plot device. to push the story forward. Marcellus soul, holy grail, like what’s in the Ark of the Covenant, that kind of thing.
• Butch is headed to Knoxville, where Tarantino was born.

What Tarantino films have you seen and/or liked?

• Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
• Kill Bills.
• Jackie Brown.
• Reservoir Dogs.