In a Nutshell. Mini reviews of movies old and new. No fuss. No spoilers. And often no sleep.

Monday 17 August 2015

Pulp Fiction (1994)

QT’s second film is a nonlinear collection of about half a dozen stories that overlap in interesting ways, even though none of them really go anywhere meaningful. On one hand it’s deserving of being pulped, but the performances, dialogue and love shown to established filmic techniques (rear projection car rides, long tracking shots, split-focus lens and even a McGuffin) are indulgently entertaining. It’s not unlike the tasty burger that Sam Jackson makes a big deal over in one of the stories: it’s constructed from chopped up pieces and satisfies for a brief time. However, at 154 minutes I do feel that it pushes against the limits of acceptability for that kind of thing.

4 moral tests of oneself out of 5

2 comments:

Neg said...

Is it really that long? o_O I guess it's a testament to its quality that I felt every single minute of the Bayformer movies but have never realized that this was equally as sprawling.

Dr Faustus said...

That’s the US (NTSC) running time. The PAL version comes out at 148 mins. There’s no difference in content. I went with the NTSC one because both IMDB and Wiki use it.