With some glittering suits and lousy talk, Quentin Tarantino has risen from a video-store geek to a movie-making maestro. His directorial debut, Reservoir Dogs, remains the ultimate tale of a heist gone wrong.
The film was also a career-defining turn for Micheal Madsen who dances to Steeler’s Wheel Stuck In The Middle With You as Mr Blonde, a sociopathic bank robber who wield a straight razor. Here’s a quick overview of just how Tarantino came to prominence.
The philosophy
Before working into a video store, Tarantino would get, every week, a TV guide and read it cover to cover. After he started to work at Video Archives, he has access to all these great films and terrific directors. He would watch them every day. Tarantino had become a fan of Eric Rohmer, who was a French New Wave director of that time. Tarantino was watching one movie after another and work through different director’s careers.
The director’s that influenced Tarantino the most was Brian De Palma, Sergio Leone and Howard Hawks. He adored Scorsese, but when comes to movie brats he would pick his favourite. Everyone’s favourite was Scorsese, however, De Palma was kind of a rock star of the time’s current directors. Tarantino believes his work was mostly closer to Scorsese but he didn’t want to give him too much credit, even though Tarantino adored him.
Before directing, Tarantino studied acting for 6 years. He would actually recommend to anyone who wants to start a director or writer career, to be an actor first. Even when it comes to starting some writing classes or directing classes, he would suggest joining an acting class instead. Everything he learned about writing he learned from acting. When he writes, he gets lost in what the characters are doing. The same happens in acting, you lose yourself.
After participating in various film festivals, like Sundance Festival, he learned from other cinematographers, like Monte Hellman, that not everyone will like his creations. While on the other hand, Tarantino also learned from Terry Gilliam, that there are people who also love his way of experimenting with long takes.
The line of work
The controversial movie Reservoir Dogs proved the strength of the atmosphere Tarantino had created. The film was peppered with blood, violence and profanity, how could people not see it? Because Tarantino has never been the common or garden filmmaker. He was set to make even bigger waves with his follow-up Pulp Fiction in 1994.
Tarantino’s hallmarks were already present and correct in Dogs, criminals, ultraviolence, pop-culture saturated conversation and love of tinkering with narrative structure. The classic film is still one of the definitive American debuts, joined by Orson Welle’s Citizen Kane and Steven Spielberg’s Duel. The movie changed the course of American independent film with Tarantino joining Robert Rodriguez, Kevin Smith and Richard Linklater. This shaped a new movement in cool counter-culture cinema.
Tarantino was a true model of new film culture, mining influences from all strands of cinema and joining them in a fresh and interesting way to create his own distinct cinema print. Tarantino has also made ground as a screenwriter, by selling True Romance and Natural Born Killer in the early 90s. He was always jumping to direct a bit his own work. He workshopped the Dogs script at the Sundance Festival with the intent of filming it on 16mm with a friend, Lawrence Bender. Lawrence has to play Nice Guy Eddie but his acting-class teacher’s wife gave the script to Harvey Keitel, who championed the film.
The cherry on the top was Tarantino’s sublime use of music, the fictional K-Billy’s Super Sounds of the 70s radio show. Tarantino’s ear for a catchy vintage track that captures the screen without effort, which is only second to Martin Scorsese. The songs Little Green Bag and Stuck In The Middle With You are now among the classics that will instantly conjure the idea of Tarantino’s groove, something that he carried through all of his films.
Tarantino went so far that he “stole” some of his own reputation to promote Roger Avary’s Killing Zoe. In 1996, Robert Rodriguez stepped in to direct Tarantino’s From Dusk Till Dawn. Besides his script and Tarantino starring in it, the film catapulted Clooney’s career, with his breakout movie role cast which portrayed him as a hood on the lam with his psycho brother, played by Tarantino.
From Dusk Till Dawn was one of the best movies around, but it had modest reviews. People who watched it remained by having more questions than answers. In addition, the film had two more sequels, yet they were received poorly by the critics. In addition, the movie has become a cult film.
In 2014, From Dusk Till Dawn came with the TV series, directed by Robert Rodriguez. The TV series filled the gaps left by the first film and they somehow completed each other. Fans could understand the first film because of the TV series and the TV series could be understood with the help of the movie.
Because From Dusk Till Dawn created such a fanbase, after 20 years since the first film came out, From Dusk Till Dawn was resurrected as an entertaining slot machine game, called From Dusk Till Dawn slots. It is based on Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez cult film From Dusk Till Dawn. This brand new Novomatic title made its first appearance in the seventeenth Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas.
Rick Meitzler, the CEO of Novomatic Americas said that exhibitions like G2E are a great place to show off and demonstrate the commitment and innovation towards the player entertainment. Even one year later, in 2018 at the next Global gaming Expo Novomatic mentioned the game on other new series of slot machines cabinets. In addition, the company upgraded the game to be played online too.
If people loved the film and the TV series, now, they can live the game as well. The story goes around the Gecko brothers in a beautifully animated slot experience. The sole mission in the game is to help Seth and his brother Richie in their explosive escape.
Last words
A good film can wane over time, can drift from people’s mind and then it disappears. However, a classic can hold for a long time and it can even increase in reputation and to be turned into a cultural impact. An example of such reputation is From Dusk Till Dawn, who started as an idea of a different theme, continued with its sequels, added more intel with the TV series and then to be added into a slot game. From Dusk Till Dawn isn’t the only movie who passed the test of time. Another example, Reservoir Dogs, after 24 years, still remains one of the best early 90’s indie breakouts.
