Like a lot of fans, I've always felt a certain kinship with writer/director Quentin Tarantino. After all, at a time in which such things were less common, he was one of us who actually made it in Hollywood, by which I mean, a fellow film geek, comic book nerd and certified music-holic.
Of course, nowadays, you can't throw a clapboard in Hollywood without hitting a full-on geek of some sort- at this point, the comic book movie is absolutely a category, not a novelty.
Ironically, QT has never taken the comic book movie plunge himself, preferring to primarily do his own thing- his adaptation of Elmore Leonard's novel Rum Punch, Jackie Brown, notwithstanding. (He is currently working on a proposed Star Trek movie, however, which is primo geek material.)
But back in the day, such things were uncommon. Tarantino was part of a generation that changed all that. Along with such like-minded individuals as Robert Rodriguez, Kevin Smith, Christopher Nolan, Paul Thomas Anderson and a handful of others, Tarantino changed the course of modern cinema in a way that, for better or worse, is still being imitated left and right to this very day. I'd be hard-pressed to think of a more influential director of his particular generation.
Think about it: I'll bet you can easily name a host of films that bear his influence- Guy Ritchie's Lock, Stock and Smoking Barrels, Snatch and pretty much his entire early output; Bryan Singer's The Usual Suspects; The Way of the Gun, Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead, Go, The Big Hit, 2 Days in the Valley, The Boondock Saints, and, of course, Get Shorty and its sequel, Be Cool. There's plenty more where that came from.
Of course, he has his critics. Ones who point out that he's never had an "original" idea in his life, that the best bits of his work were all ripped off from other sources, and that his films often play like a "Greatest Hits" of other, better films. Yeah, and?
Newsflash: everyone rips off everyone, and has done so for ages now. As no less than the Bible says, in the Book of Ecclesiastes: "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun."
In other words, at this point, it's ALL been done before. Every original story that can be written has already been written- everything which has come in its wake is just a variation of what has come before.
So, of course QT is ripping off a lot of people- so is everyone else. But as is also commonly said: If you're going to steal, steal from the best. And Tarantino tends to steal from the best, which is why I think so many people love what he does.
He also doesn't play favorites, or stick to one type of genre. More highfalutin sources of inspiration like Godard or Kurosawa rest comfortably right next to random references to Kung Fu flicks, Italian horror movies and exploitation favorites as easy as you please. There is no high art or low art in QT's world- it all goes into the pot. And it's precisely that melding of astonishingly different source materials that sets his stuff apart from everyone else's.
When it works, it works like gangbusters. Even when it's kind of half-assed, a la Death Proof or (arguably) The Hateful Eight, it's still more entertaining than a lot of what's out there. That's why, even nearly ten films in- the number at which he claims he'll be retiring at, at least from the big screen (he's hinted he may do more work for the small screen in the future)- his work continues to fascinate.
So, with his soon-to-be-released 9th film, Once Upon a Time
in Hollywood, about to be released, I thought I'd take a look back at what makes QT so popular, and why he hit it big when he did, and how he got there in the first place, as well as taking closer looks at each of his individual films, and the ones he scripted as well.
For the record, I will not be covering movies/TV shows he only acted in, or in which he only contributed a little, i.e. the scene he directed in Sin City, the "additional dialogue" he wrote for the likes of Crimson Tide, The Rock, Curdled, etc.
I also won't be covering the movies he produced or "presented," so no Hostel, Hero or Hell Ride, either. Just the core nine films (including Hollywood) and the stuff he scripted (True Romance, Natural Born Killers, From Dusk Til Dawn) and/or directed (his segment of Four Rooms, his episodes of ER and CSI).
Finally, I will be offering up my own personal connection to each film and with QT in general, and my first experiences seeing them, and how they affected me, as well as an overall ranking of his oeuvre at the end of our journey.
This being the introduction, let's start with a little background. Tarantino was born in Knoxville, Tennessee, on March 27th, 1963. As you might have guessed from his name, he was primarily of Italian heritage, with some Native American Cherokee and Irish blood on his mother's side.
He was named for Burt Reynolds' character in the TV show Gunsmoke- sadly, he never got the chance to work with the actor, who was scheduled to be in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, but died before shooting began. (Actor Bruce Dern took over the role, which was based on the real-life rancher George Spahn, whose ranch notoriously served as the headquarters for the Manson Family for a while.)
His father, Tony, was an actor and producer, who his mother, Connie, met on a trip to Los Angeles. They got married, but it was short-lived, and she lived primarily in Knoxville until 1966, when she and her son moved back to LA. Connie remarried soon after, this time to musician Curtis Zastoupil. It was Curtis who encouraged QT's love of movies, and the two often went together.
His mother had no compunction about letting him see movies with "adult content," so he got to see a lot of R-Rated movies at an early age. His mother and Curtis divorced in 1973, and he briefly moved back to Tennessee for a while, before returning to California less than a year later, where he remained this time.
The Alabama Theater, where I first saw The Rocky Horror Picture Show- they still show it every Halloween.
Aside from the California thing, I can relate to a lot of this. I, too, was born and raised in the South, including a stint in Tennessee, albeit outside of Nashville, not Knoxville. Like QT, my parents divorced early on in my life, and I was never that close to my father, but he did instill a love of movies and music in me, so credit where it's due. And like him, my mom was pretty liberal, in terms of what she let me see at an early age.
She used to take me to the movies, go up to the ticket booth and tell the usher that I had her permission to see an R-rated movie, but that she had no desire to watch it herself- I was a die-hard horror movie fan, and she hated them- but she let me watch them, anyway. (Try getting away with that sort of thing in this day and age of overprotective parents, lol.)
As with QT, once VHS became a thing, I was a frequent visitor to the video rental stores, and eventually worked at several, which allowed me to watch all sorts of movies, which, in turn, gave me a lot of diverse and all-over-the-place influences, even before QT made such things de rigueur.
Back then, you literally used to judge a movie by its cover- or rather, it's cover art- or occasionally, its title or the description on the back. As you might guess, this led me down some wild roads, all of which formed who I am today, in many ways. Directing may not have been in the cards for me, but film criticism has been my bread and butter since college, though I actually started way back in high school. Those who can't do, critique, as it were.
In QT's case, his way in was the legendary Video Archives, in Manhattan Beach, California, where he worked for five years, watching movies in constant rotation, after dropping out of high school at 15. He also studied acting at the James Best Theater Company, where he met many of his future collaborators, including Craig Hamann, whom he would write and co-star with in his directorial debut, My Best Friend's Birthday, released in 1987, though it actually took around four years to write, shoot and edit, beginning back in 1984.
The film, which sadly lost its final reel in a fire at the lab in which it was being stored, is readily available on YouTube- you can watch it here, and I advise you do so before reading this next part, because spoilers abound. While crudely made, like a lot of student films- though, lest we forget, QT never actually went to film school- the 36 minutes that remain are a fascinating look at what was to come from the talented filmmaker, with many of his trademark tropes already firmly in place.
The storyline, which was later recycled in part for his True Romance script, revolves around the efforts of Clarence (Tarantino), a DJ- or, as he puts it, a music "jock"- to put together a surprise party for his down-in-the-dumps best friend, Mickey (Craig Hamann, who also co-wrote the script), which includes hiring a hooker- ahem, make that a "call girl"- for the festivities. Mickey is still reeling from being dumped by his girlfriend, and Clarence thinks all he needs is to get back on the horse again, as it were.
We begin with an amusing scene set at the radio station where Clarence works. He interviews the president of the local chapter of the Eddie Cochran fan club, and admonishes him for bringing along memorabilia that is fun to see in person, but, as Clarence points out, that listeners can't see themselves, which is why he should have brought, I don't know, rare listening material instead, lol.
Meanwhile, a co-worker laments his being hungover from trying some drug that sounds an awful lot like Ayahuasca (long before that was fashionable, either, I might add), to his boss. He tells his boss about tripping balls and going to a novelty shop and buying a lot of practical joke items, some of which he brought with him to work and subsequently uses to play pranks on everyone, including giving garlic-flavored gum to his boss, who is decidedly unamused.
Later, he plops down a bag of white powder in front of Clarence, who gleefully dives in shortly thereafter, right in front of his guest while on the air. He soon bursts into a coughing fits and shouts of his insides burning- it turns out that the substance was actually itching powder, another prank item bought at the novelty store! Clarence practically has to water-board himself to get rid of the burning sensation in his nasal cavity, using the water cooler at the station.
After that amusing bit, we meet Mickey, whose birthday it is. He is happy again, as his ex-girlfriend is paying him a visit, and thinks she wants to get back together, but it turns out that she didn't even know it was his birthday, and was there to get some of her stuff she left behind, including a Rod Stewart tape, and to return an Elvis album he left at her place.
To add insult to injury, she's there with a new boyfriend, who has just dropped a nasty deuce in his bathroom and, it turns out, broke into his place using the old "credit card trick." She informs him she just landed a new acting role and invites him to the premiere. As they leave, he overhears her new boyfriend insulting him. His birthday is not off to a good start, obviously.
We then cut to Clarence at a local pool hall, where he is in the process of procuring a call girl, Misty, aka Louise (Crystal Shaw), who he secures the services of for a cool forty bucks. He gives her Mickey's address and tells her to show up later that night, but she goes over right away instead, popping in on him in the shower, much to his shock.
Just when he is warming to the idea of a new girl, he enters his living room, where he is suddenly confronted with her angry pimp, Clifford (Al Harrell), who is pissed that Misty went out on her own without him, and the two engage in a knock-down, drag-out Kung Fu fight, which is hilarious. It looks like Clarence is about to win, but Clifford eventually gets the best of him with a mop handle!
Meanwhile, Clarence, after buying Mickey a birthday cake, heads over to his place, where he runs into Misty and the two start to hit it off, big-time, adding insult to Mickey's injury. I guess Mickey is still passed out in his room, given that he is nowhere to be seen.
It's at this point the film ends, but from the looks of it, Mickey's birthday bash isn't going to go well, especially with Clarence's girlfriend finding out about the hooker and her own angry bodybuilding boyfriend finding out about Clarence and getting his address from a local bartender and heading over there to kick his ass. How much you want to bet that he mistakes Mickey for Clarence and kicks his ass, too? Lol.
Though amateurishly made, there's a lot to love about the short film. For one thing, most of QT's trademarks are already present and accounted for. Hipster soundtrack? Check. Tunes include "I Walk the Line," "Nadine," "Ballroom Blitz" and QT's patented surf/spaghetti-western music. Oddly, we hear no music at the radio station, but said station is called- you guessed it- K-Billy, so one can assume they play some Super Sounds.
Rampant discussions of pop culture are also on full display, including QT's patented highly-verbose dialogue. Clarence gets into an argument with the baker at the cake shop about the virtues of Elvis vs. The Beatles as a musician, and Elvis vs. Marlon Brando as an actor.
We also get to hear QT's famed speech about how, if he absolutely had to fuck a dude, if his very life depended on it, he'd fuck Elvis, as heard in True Romance, only this time with a punch-line of sorts, as the baker says, "But I don't know that I'd tell everybody that."
There's also random references to Aldo Ray, The Big Bopper (Clarence uses "Hello, Baby!" as part of his amusing answering machine message), and we discover that Misty became a call girl after seeing Nancy Allen in Brian DePalma's Dressed to Kill (a poster of his The Fury is also featured prominently in another scene, and Clarence amusingly refers to DePalma as a "bad motor scooter").
In addition, Clarence's bedroom, much like my own, is covered wall to wall in movie posters, including a lot of Charles Bronson, The She-Beast, The Embalmers, Squirm and, of all things, Disney's That Darn Cat! I also worked as a radio DJ in college, as Clarence does here, so I was a total Clarence back in the day, minus the wacky hair and the Elvis fixation.
Last but not least, there's QT's famed foot fetish, which not only crops up in a shot of Misty's feet at one point, as to be expected, but in Clarence's discussion with Misty, in which he says he once worked at the women's shoe department at K-Mart, but he didn't mind it because he digs on feet! (This is where both QT and Clarence and I differ- I'm more of a booty fan, lol.)
It's a shame the film's final reel is gone, but it's still a fun watch, especially as you can see, even in its crudest possible form, that a lot of what would later make QT the talk of the town is fully present and accounted for here. It's roughly made, the film stock is crap, and, as a direct result, it's really hard to see all the tiny details, but it's still a must-see if you're a die-hard QT fan. It all started here, and you'll be shocked at how much of what made people love him in the first place is already firmly entrenched in his work, even that long ago.
BTW, on a side note, for those wondering about 1983's Love Birds in Bondage, QT's first short film and first listed IMDb credit, it, too, was destroyed, possibly by his co-writer/director Scott Magill's mother, for reasons unknown, though QT suspects Magill himself of being the culprit, according to the site. Either way, like the final reel of Birthday, it's nowhere to be found, so I can't speak on it, personally.
For our next article, we'll move into QT's first real Hollywood experiences, as he works his way up to his first true feature film debut, 1992's Reservoir Dogs. Join me later this week for an in-depth look at that much-beloved film! 😎
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