Pulp Fiction Review

For those unfamiliar with writer/director Quentin Tarantino’s cult masterpiece Pulp Fiction, it is a twisted combination of plots that capture the very pulp of society that are evident in its title. The plot is a non-linear combination of three main stories that intertwine with the five main characters popping in and out of all of them. The three main stories revolve around a duo of hit men, a deceiving boxer and a mob boss and his wife. In order, they are titled, “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife,” “The Gold Watch” and “The Bonnie Situation”.

The hit men’s story revolves around their retrieval of a mysterious briefcase for their boss and the panic caused after an unfortunate accident after the getaway. The second involves one of the hit man’s mission to take his bosses’ wife out on a date only to find her dying from an overdose halfway through. The third involves a boxer who is supposed to throw his final boxing match but decides to win and run away with a hefty profit.

All three of the stories are very simplistic in theory and purposely made stereotypical by Tarantino. However, his goal was to take these classic mobster stories and add a twist to all of them. Most stories of two hit men retrieving a briefcase would end after they get it, but Tarantino decides to stick with the two and provides the most entertaining and memorable moments of the movie of what happens after they are leaving. A Boxer being paid to throw a match he decides to win instead is nothing new, however, most stories of this origin do not end in the rape dungeon of a pawnshop. It is these aspects of Tarantino’s stories that change the formula from something generic and unoriginal to three of the most intense and memorable stories of film history.

The glue that progresses and ties all of these stories together is the sharp natural dialogue that Tarantino is so well known for. He is at the top of his game in Pulp Fiction providing the most natural and genuinely interesting dialogue that not only serves as something to listen to, but also actually progresses the story just as much as the character’s actions do.

These actions are actually what the film is most criticized for with the movie being rated R for almost everything, including graphic violence, strong sexual material and heavy drug use to name a few. Some claim that the movie is just an excuse to set up extreme situations of violence and substance abuse. This has caused the film to be known for its excessive and brutal nature. However, when paying closer attention, it is quite easy to see that it is largely a story of redemption. Since the film revolves around less than moral individuals, it is not surprising to say that everyone who is killed in this movie could easily be considered a “bad person” but when examined, one will notice that every character that seeks forgiveness for their actions is alive when the credits roll.

The soupy morals and excessive nature are what this movie is known for. For good reasons too, further supporting the choice for the title of the movie. However, the reason this movie has reached a certain level of greatness over the years is not only from its drugs and violence but also from its tangled story superb dialogue.  With Pulp Fiction being the masterpiece of a director as talented as Quentin Tarantino, any movie fan owes it to themselves to see it. (592)

User review: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110912/reviews-1860

Spring Break

Over this spring break I am going to Colorado with my family. This isn’t a huge deal for me since I have gone to Colorado at least twice a year for as long as I can remember since the majority of my family lives there. In fact my family and I have done it so many times that we have gotten the car ride down to twelve hours, and yes, we drive there every single time. I have mastered the car ride better than any other member of my family by staying up all night before and going to sleep when we leave at five in the morning and sleeping literally the entire way. When we go, we mainly go to Fort Collins since almost all of my family lives there, however, this time we are also stopping by Denver since one of my cousins just had a baby. That is the main reason for this trip.

 You see, I have a large family with all my aunts, uncles and cousins and we have been waiting for a baby in the family since a few years after I was born. In the past year, two babies have entered my family and more are on the way. This has caused all the women in my family to simultaneously become baby crazy. This pretty much means I will have a week to the men and myself in my family as all the girls gush over the babies. However, this is not a bad thing considering I will get to go skiing, snowboarding, to the shooting range, possibly a hockey game and anything else I want to do.

I am really most excited to sleep, however, since no matter how much sleep I get during the week, I am always tired. Even if I can never get enough sleep, I am still sure I will have a lot of fun over break seeing all of my family again, including the new ones. (330)

Movie Fan

            I enjoyed a lovely trip to the local movie store this week with a few friends. I had never been to this store, so I was looking forward to what it would be like. I was quite pleasantly surprised when I walked in and noticed the tables to sit down at. It seemed much more friendly than a place like blockbuster since you could sit down and maybe have some food as you talk to your friends. I also enjoyed the smell of pizza from behind the counter. I then continued into the store and looked at all of the movies. As a large fan of movies, I was quite at home in the store. I also did not think a small place like that would have so many movies. As a person who still owns a VHS, I had a large appreciation for the old school tapes. We spent a long time walking around the store looking at the new movies we have not seen yet and the old movies we have not seen in too long. After a long time arguing about which movie we should rent, we finally decided on scream 4. This was immediately followed by the realization that none of us had any money on us. However, we did get a little information sheet with all the prices on it. Even if we did have money, we did not have state ID’s or credit cards to get a membership. The one drawback was the prices of the movies. At the redbox, you can get a movie for about one dollar a night; with an additional dollar every night you keep the movie. It was like three bucks to rent a movie here and I am sure the late fees are even more. I found these prices a little ridiculous, but there were a lot of deals with buy on get one free movies, so it was not terrible. The trip was also not an entire waste because we had a quarter to get a gumball and if you get an orange gumball, you get a free rental. However, we just got a plain old yellow smiley face one, bummer.

Drive

Well, its midnight and I went home this weekend so I am not really in the school state of mind. I have no idea what to blog about; so I will do a blog on the movie I just finished two minutes ago, Drive. For those of you that don’t know, Drive is a movie that came out this year starring Ryan Gosling, Albert Brooks, Bryan Cranston and a few other famous people. It is about a driver whose name you never really figure out who works as a stunt driver for movies during the day but is a getaway driver at night. That sounds really lame and gimmicky but the movie is actually awesome. It’s a really good story that is expertly acted.

Ryan Gosling and Albert Brooks in particular were especially good. Gosling only opens his mouth maybe once every other scene in the entire first half of the movie, using his silence and body language to give him a really unique, almost awkward attitude for a protagonist. Albert Brooks on the other hand, who was the voice of Marlin in Finding Nemo for all you Disney fans out there, is really powerful as the main bad guy. Both actors play smart, realistic characters that can be both relatable at times and downright vicious in the uber-violent second half. For those of you who have seen the commercials, you might be thrown off by this movie in the first half hour. Besides a slick opening getaway, the first half of this movie is comprised completely of dialogue and developing the relationships between all the characters.

Those looking for a straight up action movie will be turned away, but those looking for something deeper to connect with will find a lot to love. Around the 45-minute mark the talking tones down and the action picks up. It almost reminded me of a Quentin Tarantino movie where the story is mainly progressed by smart dialogue and all the sudden, along the way you are treated to scenes of overwhelming violence that you did not see coming (the first head that gets blown up in this movie reminding me a lot of the first scalping in Tarantino’s Inglorious Bastards).

I don’t want to ruin the movie for you by describing much else, all I can say is that it is an extremely quality film and that I enjoyed every minute of it. I didn’t even mention my favorite part which had to be some of the most cinematic camera shots that saturate the screen with color and style that have a very 80’s style to them, including the cover arts pink neon font. However, the visuals are best left to be seen, not described, so if you’re looking for a good movie, I highly suggest Drive. (465)

Books, Pictures and Stuff

So, when I read the prompt for this post, I was not really sure what to do considering the books I read these days do not really have any pictures in them, nor should they. I do not know if I would still want to read Dexter if there were pictures on every page illustrating the countless number of people he has killed (who am I kidding, I would still read that). But I would have to say the last book I have read with pictures in it, besides Captain Underpants, is the Series of Unfortunate Events. I read the first twelve and bought the thirteenth once it came out way back when, but never read it. I think I never actually wanted to know how it ended, or I just forgot about it, either way I am defiantly looking up the ending on Wikipedia after I post this, but I digress.

           

            When reading these books, I specifically remember many of the images due to the fact that the art style was so unique. If you were to read the book without ever looking at the pictures, you would probably picture quite normal people and realistic settings, however, the illustrations provide a sort of wonderfully dark and twisted, yet childish world, due to the fact that these books were aimed at a younger audience. The pictures, in this case, are actually what make the book truly unique. It is almost like a Dr. Seuss book in a way since the story itself is good, but becomes truly classic when paired with its images. The illustrations are also a large reason of why I hated the movie version of this book. Not only are the images too bizarre and structurally unsound (a skyscraper high, twisting building with a massive telescope on top if memory serves), but they also attempted to force the first three books into one movie while mixing the plotlines by still putting the end of the first book at the end of the movie.

            Anyways, when it comes to pictures, they are not abundant in the books I read today. However, when it is done well enough, the images are quite capable of becoming more iconic than the text itself.

-P.S. I read the ending online, made no sense, but then I remembered I really had no idea what was going on when I was actually reading them. (400)

Blackhawks

For our blog about anything, I thought I would write about the Chicago Blackhawks. I grew up watching hawks games with my dad and siblings and they are the only sports team I try to watch every game for. College makes things hard since we do not get all the channels the games are on, but at home my whole family sits down to watch every game. I cannot tell you how crazy my family and friends went during the playoffs two years ago when they won the Stanley Cup. I went to see the cup twice when it came to places around my town. My uncle has season tickets so we go to their games as often as we can.

My favorite player without a doubt is Marian Hossa and I even have one of his customized jerseys. He is my favorite since he was born in Slovakia and because he is one of the best players in the game. As for our season this year, anyone who has been following the hawks will understand the we have looked better, for those of you that don’t know, every year we have a nine game away streak and we are almost halfway through. We were looking like some real contenders for the cup this year but then we went and lost six games in a row. This is the second year in a row that we have started making things more difficult for ourselves on the rush to the playoffs. Despite having two of the best defensemen in the game, Keith and Seabrook, our defense has been loosing game after game, with no stellar performances from either of our goalies, Crawford and Emery.

Even with no shutouts this year, I will never loose faith in these boys and we still have plenty of games to get our act back together and show them what we’ve in the playoffs. Here’s hoping for the cup this year. P.S. Vancouver sucks. (328)