Pulp Fiction Movie Review

I was very reluctant to watch Pulp Fiction, but overall I thought that it was a good movie.

Pulp Fiction is split into 7 different sequences but they all intertwine together.

The movie starts off in a diner and you see a couple talking about their life as robbers. They are contemplating about whether or not they want to rob the diner that they are in. They end up deciding to rob the diner because they think that they could make money off of both the diner and the customers in the diner. This is the “Prologue-The Diner”. We later learn that this is Pumpkin or Ringo (Tim Roth) and Honey Bunny or Yolanda (Amanda Plummer).

The opening credits then begin to roll and we are then introduced to Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) and Vincent Vega (John Travolta), who are driving to go retrieve a briefcase that a man at the apartment had stolen from their boss, gangster Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames). While they are walking up to the man’s apartment Jules tells Vincent that Marsellus had a man thrown off of a fourth-floor balcony for giving his wife a foot massage. Vincent then tells Jules that Marsellus has asked him to escort his wife while he is out of town. Vincent and Jules then enter the man’s apartment and confront him and his two friends about stealing the briefcase. After questioning the man, Vincent and Jules end up killing him and leaving with the briefcase.

We are then taken to the next sequence titled “Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife”. In this sequence we see boxer Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis) accepting a large sum of money from Wallace after agreeing to throw the upcoming fight he will be in. Coolidge and Vega briefly cross paths at the cocktail lounge where everyone is. The next day, Vega then goes to Lance (Eric Stoltz) and Jody’s (Rosanna Arquette) house to purchase heroin. He does that heroin and then drives over to the Wallace house to pick up Mia Wallace (Uma Thurman), Marsellus’ wife. They go out to eat at Jack Rabbit Slim’s, and they eat and participate in a twist contest where they win a trophy.

Vega and Mia then go back to the Wallace house and while Vega is in the bathroom, Mia finds his heroin in his coat pocket and snorts it mistaking it for cocaine and overdoses. Vega finds her and then rushes her to Lance’s house where they are able to revive her.

The next sequence we are shown is the prelude to “The Gold Watch”. We see a flashback of a young Butch who meets Vietnam veteran Captain Koons (Christopher Walken). Koons tells the young Butch that it was his father’s dying wish to give the gold watch to him. A bell rings and we are then shown Butch in his boxing clothes, waiting to go throw the fight.

In the “Gold Watch” sequence we see Butch hopping in a cab and fleeing the arena after winning the fight. He then learns from the cab driver that he actually killed the opposing fighter. Butch had actually bet his payoff on himself at favorable odds to double-cross Marsellus.  

Butch and his girlfriend are about to leave town when he realizes that she forgot to pack the gold watch. He then goes back to his apartment to retrieve it and realizes that he is not alone in the apartment when he sees a machine pistol on the kitchen counter. Vega comes out of the bathroom in the apartment and he and Butch are then in a standoff. The toaster which has bread in it ejects the bread which scares Butch and he fires the weapon and ends up killing Vega.

Butch then drives away from the scene and at the traffic light that he is waiting at in his car Marsellus walks by and notices Butch. Butch rams Marsellus with his car and another car ends up hitting his. The two men then chase each other on foot and end up at a pawnshop. The owner of the shop then captures the two and ties them up in the basement of the shop. Butch ends up escaping and killing one of their captors and shooting the other one and then Butch frees Marsellus as well. Marsellus tells Butch that they are even as long as he leaves Los Angeles and never returns and doesn’t speak of the incidents that happened in the basement.

The movie then goes back to the beginning of the movie where we see Jules and Vincent at the man’s apartment retrieving the briefcase for their boss Marsellus, We then hear Jules and Vincent talk about retiring from the hitman life, as their informant ends up getting shot by accident. They then work to clean up the situation with the help of some of their friends and then Jules and Vincent head off to breakfast at the diner.

The diner is the same diner that “Pumpkin” and “Honey Bunny” are sitting in that we are introduced to in the beginning of the movie. Things then get tricky for the couple as Jules holds Pumpkin at gunpoint and Honey Bunny turns her gun on Jules.  Vincent emerges from the diner bathroom and points his gun on Honey Bunny as he starts to reflect on his life of crime. The couple takes all the cash from the diner, except for the briefcase that Jules and Vincent still have. Jules then finishes up his final job for Marsellus.

I actually ended up liking the movie but it was a little too long for me. If the plot unfolded in a more traditional way rather than jumping back and forth like it did then the movie would have definitely not have had the same impact as it did, at least for me personally. The movie kept me on my toes and made me really wonder and guess where they were going to take the story line next. If the plot would have been more traditional then I don’t believe I would have enjoyed the movie as much as I actually did. Overall I would give the movie a B. It had enough action and suspense in it, but if the time could have been a little shorter then I would have liked it even more than I did.