uentin Tarantino’s ear for
backstreet vernacular is
matched only by his flair for
physical violence. Hollywood’s
chopsocky-loving bad boy
has revolutionised cinema, turning pop
culture into high art. From groundbreaking
heist film Reservoir Dogs to provocative
WWII revenge drama Inglourious Basterds,
his films have left an indelible impression.
With his latest project Once Upon
a Time... in Hollywood – a black comedy
starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt
- hitting cinemas this month, we look at
the maverick writer-director’s greatest hits.
Reservoir Dogs (1992)
Shot in 35 days for just US$1.2 million,
the ultra-violent, unusually chatty heist film
announced then-20-something Tarantino
as a talent to watch. Set in a warehouse
following a botched jewellery store robbery,
Reservoir Dogs introduced the auteur’s
trademark blend of comedy, savagery
and whip-smart incidental dialogue.
Best line: “Are you gonna bark all day,
little doggy, or are you gonna bite?”
- Mr Blonde (Michael Madsen).
Killer moment: The infamous torture
scene, in which Mr Blonde severs the
ear of a police officer (Kirk Baltz), scarred
moviegoers for life. More unexpected is
the film’s opening diner scene, where the
gangsters debate tipping etiquette and
the lyrics to Madonna’s Like a Virgin.
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Deliciously dark, chronologically twisted
and precociously postmodern, Pulp Fiction
garnered the Cannes Film Festival’s coveted
Palme d’Or and is widely regarded as one
of the most influential films of the 1990s.
Resurrecting John Travolta’s flagging
career and making Samuel L Jackson
a star, this Elmore Leonard tribute
interweaves the story of their bantering
hitmen with that of Uma Thurman’s
gangster’s wife (pictured), Bruce Willis’s
has-been boxer and Tim Roth and Amanda
Plummer’s nervous armed robbers.
Best line: “If my answers frighten you,
then you should cease asking scary
questions” – Jules Winnfield (Jackson).
Killer moment: Thurman and Travolta’s
Jack Rabbit Slim’s dance sequence. Many
assumed the scene was written especially
for Travolta, but Tarantino reveals it was
conceived before the Saturday Night Fever
star had even been cast.
Kill Bill: Volume 1 and 2
Tarantino’s blood-soaked magnum opus
sees Thurman’s avenging angel, ‘The Bride’,
hunt down those who left her for dead in
a desert chapel four years earlier. The
sword-wielding assassin is so thorough, it
takes her two movies to complete the task.
The director and his muse conceived
of the film while working on Pulp Fiction,
but the project was put on hold when
Thurman fell pregnant.
“Yes, this is my samurai movie; yes, this
is my bad-arse chick movie; yes, this is
my spaghetti western and my comic book
movie,” Tarantino told the BBC. “But it’s
also my Josef von Sternberg movie, and
if Josef von Sternberg is getting ready to
make Morocco and Marlene Dietrich gets
pregnant, he waits for Dietrich!”
Kill Bill: Volume I (2003)
Best line: “You didn’t think it was going
to be that easy, did you? Silly rabbit”
- O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu) to The Bride,
immediately before scores of masked
yakuza burst through the tatami screen.
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Killer moment: Thurman’s cartwheeling
assassin facing off against Liu’s ‘Deadly
Viper’ in an orgy of stylised violence
choreographed by Hong Kong fightmaster
Yuen Woo-ping (The Matrix, Crouching
Tiger, Hidden Dragon).
Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004)
Best line: “You and I have unfinished
business” – The Bride to Bill (David
Carradine), who replies: “Baby, you
ain’t kidding.”
Killer moment: The emotional scene in
which The Bride takes out Bill. She slices,
dices and skewers more than 40 people
in her remorseless pursuit of her former
lover but, when she finally catches up with
him, a surprising amount of tenderness
accompanies that lethal blow.
Inglourious Basterds (2009)
US soldiers set out to kill Hitler in this
genre-blending WWII drama starring Pitt
and Michael Fassbender. What they don’t
know is there’s a second assassination
plot involving a young Jewish woman
named Shosanna (Mélanie Laurent),
who runs the cinema that’s set to host
the premiere of a Nazi propaganda film.
Best line: “My name is Shosanna Dreyfus
and this is the face... of Jewish vengeance.”
Killer moment: Nazi Colonel Hans Landa
(Christoph Waltz) toying mercilessly with
the French dairy farmer (Denis Ménochet)
hiding Shosanna’s terrified family beneath
his floorboards. Seldom have good
manners seemed so menacing.
MOVIE NOSTALGIA
TOP 5
25 years after Pulp Fiction
hit our screens in all its
gory glory, we celebrate the
film’s influential director
SPOTLIGHT ON QUENTIN TARANTINO
Stream* now or watch from August 2, Fridays
at 8.30pm on Masterpiece Movies [408]
available in the MOVIES pack
36 Foxtel AUGUST