The story structure of Pulp Fiction separates its overall plot into four short stories (as well as a prologue), with certain recurring characters cropping up in multiple tales. Our first story has hitman Vincent Vaga (John Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) off on a routine assignment that involves both bullets and heavily detailed discussions about burger while the next tale depicts Vincent taking care of Mia Wallace (Uma Thurman), while her husband, Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames) a dangerous and super violent criminal, is out of town, which consists of them heading off to a 1950's themed diner and then Mia succumbing to a drug overdose.
Our third story is the ballad of Butch (Bruce Willis), a boxer who is told by Marsellus Wallace to go down during his next fight, an order Butch refuses to follow. Disobeying the direct order of a super powerful mobster, naturally, puts a target on your back, so Butch and his girlfriend, Fabienne (Maria de Medeiros) make immediate plans to leave their home of Los Angeles for good. Of course, as fate would have it, Butch misplaces a precious family heirloom, a watch his father and grandfather kept safe, so he goes on a hunt to retrieve this watch which results in further calamities. The final segment depicts Vincent and Jules trying to handle the disposal of a dead body and then attempting to enjoy some breakfast.
I'll have plenty of analysis for these individual stories promptly, don't worry, but let me say this succinct statement upfront about Pulp Fiction; it's a total blast to watch. This is a movie that is just ceaselessly engrossing to watch, plain and simple. Quentin Tarantino's zesty dialogue fits right in with the energetic nature of the entire motion picture while the massively impressive ensemble cast not only deliver his dialogue in a natural way, they all feel right at home in the idiosyncratic atmosphere Tarantino is concocting. That thoroughly unique vibe of Pulp Fiction that is so riveting to watch is one that is both built upon plenty of cinematic elements of the past while also bringing so much new and original ideas to the table.
Similar to how, seventeen years prior, George Lucas had taken his love for space opera serials as a child and blown them up in scale into a bigger adventure called Star Wars, Quentin Tarantino takes all the gangster, crime and other similar genre fare he loved as a youngster and infuses these sub genres of storytelling with his own dash of personality. He isn't just content to rest his laurels on what's come before him or directly inspired him artistically, he's looking to transform the status quo into something new. That's one reason why he's presenting the assorted stories of Pulp Fiction in this unique structure that hops around time and constantly shifts lead characters, he wants to take the subgenres he loves so much and present them in a bold and unorthodox narrative presentation.
It's a presentation that keeps the viewer on their toes due to one not knowing where or on what character Pulp Fiction, as a movie, will situate its character on. Accompanying the various stories is wiley sense of sense of showmanship that serves as a primary contributor to the infectious sense of fun in the movie. Take a scene like the one where Butch is searching for a weapon to use to take down a guy whose kidnapped Marsellus Wallace. Each new object he picks up, contemplates and then discards just heightens the viewer's mounting sense of suspense on what's to come next, with the scene culminating in Butch choosing a sword that proceeds to result in the kind of mayhem that exceeds expectations audiences crafted during all of that exciting build-up. That's the kind of anticipation creation and payoff that's just incredibly engrossing to watch and Tarantino knows how to both write and visually execute such moments of memorable excitement.
That moment of brief sword-fighting is one of the few truly action-packed moments in Pulp Fiction, a movie that, while having its fair share of blood and graphic violence, chooses to heavily focus on dialogue which proves to be just as enthralling as any high-octane fight scene could hope to be. Tarantino's unique brand of dialogue is pretty iconic at this point and while it's most certainly well-written, I'd say a lot of its success does come from the actors chosen to deliver it. For instance, Bruce Willis (who I had no idea was in this movie until I watched it) channels that normal guy attitude of his that worked so well in Die Hard into a different but no less compelling character, one whose well-written in Tarantino's script for sure but it's one that Willis brings an undeniable amount of layers to by way of his performance.
Meanwhile, John Travolta and his over-the-top tendencies as an actor actually feel right at home in this more heightened movie while Samuel L. Jackson is obviously having a ball getting to work with such a surprisingly complex character, one who's capable of feeling conflict over his chosen profession just as easily as he can deliver intimidating speeches that immediately get the people he's assigned to kill quivering in their boots. That latter capability of his character gets put on full display in the final story of the movie that has him trying to basically talk a robber character played by Tim Roth "off the ledge", as it were. The tension in the room as Jackson tries to talk to this guy just grips you as a viewer, it's an absolutely magnificent sequence that Samuel L. Jackson just owns acting-wise. That sequence is such a showstopper and yet it may not even be the best scene in Pulp Fiction. There's just so much good stuff here, it staggers the mind on how one film can be so ceaselessly enthralling.
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