Oh Quentin, Quentin...

Rating: 5/10 (13 November 2004)

This is probably the hardest movie for me to rate and review; how do you review a film where about half of it is great, and the rest(which pretty much means the other half) is awful? I decided to rate it a 5, since that seems to be the sensible thing to do in this situation. Like a few others have said, Tarantino's style is hip and makes you, the audience, feel hip. The dialog, the editing, the violence... the problem is, it's empty. The dialog is entirely superficial, which is OK if there's not too much of it or what there is there to be superficial. But here it carries half of the scenes. The dialog scenes(as pretty much everything else in the film) is very dull, visually. The camera doesn't move and rarely changes angle, and it's something that'll make you fall asleep, if the pointless, shallow dialogs don't do so first. The editing is daft as well. The violence is so over the top that you almost have to be mentally disturbed not to be affected(read: repulsed) by it... is that why it's there? Does Tarantino want to gross out his audience? Is that what it's about? The length and pace is horrible. I don't believe I've ever managed to sit through the entire thing attentively. The problem is not the length itself as much as what appears to be Tarantino yelling at his audience "You want to see my movie? Well, you better prepare to sit there for what feels like 10 hours straight!" Just to ensure that there are no misunderstandings; that was a metaphor. Tarantino doesn't *actually* yell at the audience. It just feels like it. The whole film feels like it's trying to get somewhere, to say something, but then the film is over, and it forgot to tell us what it was. The film is anticlimactic throughout(quite an achievement... usually only the end of a film is anticlimactic), and when it's done, you'll be saying to yourself "That's it? What the heck was all that hype about?" The truth is, in my opinion, a small group of Tarantino fans got together, and started 'converting' anyone they could find to love the film, and suddenly, this had taken over the general opinion on the film. Everybody thinks it's great, but no one can really explain why. I have yet to meet someone who've explained why Tarantino's films supposedly are great. Now don't get me wrong; I don't have anything against the guy. I like several of his films; Jackie Brown, From Dusk 'Till Dawn and Kill Bill 1&2. The problem here is that the film lacks any real substance. None of the characters are likable, not even slightly. They are killers, drug-dealers, psychos and morons. The film has the typical non-linear time-line which Tarantino utilizes in virtually all of his films. However, here it seems redundant, like it was just tagged on for no actual reason. Both volumes of Kill Bill were great because of good use of this; Pulp Fiction is not, because of the use of aforementioned effect is seemingly pointless here. The actors all play exactly the same type of character that they always play, with one or two possible exceptions. Samuel Jackson plays the 'violent, loud-mouthed individual with an unusual belief or philosophy' what do you know, that came right off his trademark section of his biography on this very site. John Travolta is the usual cool guy. Ving Rhames is the typical tough black guy, same as always. Do I need to go on? If you've read everything up to this point, you might think I hate this movie... I don't. I just dislike half of it. And that's just the thing... I can't entirely hate this. The scenes with Travolta and Jackson are pretty good, a few of the lines in the film are quotable, and most of the characters are well-cast. There you have it; half bad, half good. Better than Reservoir Dogs, but not as good as Jackie Brown and not even in the same league as the two Kill Bill films. I recommend this only to Tarantino junkies. Everyone should stay away, unless they are crazy about one or more actors in the film. If you do see it, only see it once and try to pay attention(even though it's really hard). 5/10