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Pulp Fiction
Miramax Films


9.1

based on 24 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 406 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie

FILM:

Internet Movie Database

MPAA RATING: R

Starring John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Uma Thurman, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Amanda Plummer, Ving Rhames, and Eric Stoltz

Several inter-locking stories of crime and intrigue form a temporal mosaic set in the Los Angeles underworld.

GENRE(S):	Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Quentin Tarantino (also stories) Roger Avary (stories)
DIRECTED BY:	Quentin Tarantino
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: May 19, 1998 Video: March 18, 1997 Theatrical: October 14, 1994
RUNNING TIME:	154 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

Pulp Fiction isn't just funny. It's outrageously funny. [14 Oct 1994]

100

USA Today Mike Clark

For a brutal black comedy about L.A. hitmen, Pulp Fiction bursts out of its binding with loopy delights. [14 Oct 1994]

100

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

It is an exhilaration from beginning to end. It's the movie equivalent of that rare sort of novel where you find yourself checking to see how many pages are left and hoping there are more, not fewer.

100

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Like "Citizen Kane," Pulp Fiction is constructed in such a nonlinear way that you could see it a dozen times and not be able to remember what comes next.

100

ReelViews James Berardinelli

With this film, every layer that you peel away leads to something deeper and richer. Tarantino makes pictures for movie-lovers, and Pulp Fiction is a near-masterpiece.

100

Rolling Stone Staff (Not Credited)

The new King Kong of crime movies...Ferocious fun without a trace of caution, complacency or political correctness to inhibit its 154 deliciously lurid minutes.

100

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Rick Groen

Pulp Fiction is at least three movies rolled into one, and they're all scintillating.

100

Variety Staff (Not Credited)

A spectacularly entertaining piece of pop culture, Pulp Fiction is the "American Graffiti" of violent crime pictures.

100

Film Threat Brad Laidman

The first masterwork of the post-modern pop culture generation...gets better with every viewing, and like good rock n' roll, needs to be played loud!

100

Washington Post Desson Thomson

Brilliant and brutal, funny and exhilarating, jaw-droppingly cruel and disarmingly sweet...To watch this movie (whose 2 1/2 hours speed by unnoticed) is to experience a near-assault of creativity.

100

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Tarantino's mock-tough narrative--which derives most of its titillation from farcical mayhem, drugs, deadpan macho monologues, evocations of anal penetration, and terms of racial abuse--resembles a wet dream for 14-year-old male closet queens (or, perhaps more accurately, the 14-year-old male closet queen in each of us), and his command of this smart-alecky mode is so sure that this nervy movie sparkles throughout with canny twists and turns.

100

Entertainment Weekly Staff (Not Credited)

[Tarantino's] ability to take what seem like minor conversational themes and dovetail them onto later exchanges for maximum comic effect is close to genius. And the action can be literally heart-stopping.

100

The New York Times Elvis Mitchell

A triumphant, cleverly disorienting journey through a demimonde that springs entirely from Mr. Tarantino's ripe imagination, a landscape of danger, shock, hilarity, and vibrant local color. Nothing is predictable or familiar within this irresistably bizarre world. You don't merely enter a theater to see Pulp Fiction; you go down a rabbit hole. [23 Sept 1994]

100

Time Richard Corliss

It towers over the year's other movies as majestically and menacingly as a gang lord at a preschool. [10 Oct 1994]

100

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

Very satisfying. Classic storytelling, modern techniques. And the images: This movie has embedded so many strange and new mental pictures in my head that I'm not able to shake free. Yet, neither would I want to be free.

100

Film.com Lucy Mohl

There isn't a scene or a character in the film that plays just one way. Bloody bits turn hysterically funny, relief gets riddled with tension, and the lurking question marks are as intriguing as the story resolutions -- rec.arts.movies has been filled for months with theories about what was in the briefcase.

100

Empire Philip Thomas

A scintillating piece of filmmaking, the kind of movie you look forward to seeing again even as you're watching it, and an extraordinary response to both the Dogs-Is-Overrated brigade and the He'll-Never-Top-His-Debut sceptics.

100

Wall Street Journal Julie Salamon

The most imaginative movie to come along in ages. [18 Oct 1994, p.A14(W)]

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

The architecture of Pulp Fiction may look skewed and strained, but the decoration is a lot of fun. [10 Oct 1994, p.95]

Film.com John Hartl

Quentin Tarantino's latest movie puts an epic spin on a favorite genre, taking it to time-tripping levels rarely tested by its forerunners.

TV Guide Staff (Not credited)

Without its commitment to an idea of salvation, Pulp Fiction would be little more than a terrific parlor trick; with it, it's something far richer and more haunting.

Washington Post Rita Kempley

The experience overall is like laughing down a gun barrel, a little bit tiring, a lot sick and maybe far too perverse for less jaded moviegoers.

The New Republic Stanley Kauffmann

But the way that this picture has been so widely ravened up and drooled over verges on the disgusting. Pulp Fiction nourishes, abets, cultural slumming. [14 Nov 1994]

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

The writer-director appears to be straining for his effects. Some sequences, especially one involving bondage harnesses and homosexual rape, have the uncomfortable feeling of creative desperation, of someone who's afraid of losing his reputation scrambling for any way to offend sensibilities. [14 Oct 1994]

The average user rating for this movie is 9.1 (out of 10) based on 406 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

M. Caparelli gave it a10:
Brilliant cast, brilliant acting, brilliant dialogue and plot.Best modern film available.

Neil L. gave it a10:
Those people who rate this as crap probably gave movies like starship troopers a perfect 10. this is not one of those movies that you watch once. Every Tarantino movie that I saw was different. Everytime you watch it, you will notice something that you havents seen the first time. Pulp Fiction is deffinately the best movie of all time.

Peter f gave it a7:
It was a good film but way too overrated, it seemed to drag on too much for me and the dialogue was sometimes too pointless. whenever i say reservoir dogs is better than pulp fiction evreyone thinks thats stupid but reservoir dogs was short and entertaining. i only find john trovolta and samuel jacksons roles the only neseciary and entetaing roles to watch. In reservoir dogs all cast had its part in the storyline and alll eqaully entertaining. also there is too much copying from reservoir dogs, the diner scene at the start, the gimp scene which is a torture scene lik reservoir dogs and the mexican stand off at the end. Tarantino is a unique director but in some parts of this film a found him just a bit too bizzare.

Felix K. gave it a10:
Definitely belongs to the 10 best movies of all times !!! The story and the dialogues are just awesome and it's really sad to see that it only received the script-oscar. What about this ridiculous Forrest Gump is worth these many trophies !

d h gave it a4:
Tarantino's movies are way overrated. Not saying this film was rubbish. It was fun and all but for it to be in metacritics all time top 10 is bad. I don't know why there are critics- i always look at the viewers section as its always more accurate!

M M. gave it a10:
Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, of course. But I don't think that any serious viewer -- or at least any viewer with an opinion worth considering -- will grant Pulp Fiction its rightful place in the canon. That doesn't mean the film is perfect or that reasonable viewers can't differ on its relative strengths and weaknesses. Those who find the dialogue too steeped in post-modern hipsterism, however, can still marvel at a non-linear storyline that may best "Citizen Kane" in its elegance and ingenuity. Those who find some of the plot twists (think Gimp, baby) too contrived can still appreciate performances -- and character interactions -- whose artistry will stun audiences for many, many generations to come. In other words....hell, that guy below is right: If you don't find something -- or lots of things -- to love about this movie, see a doctor. It's time to get that stick removed.

Peter P. gave it a10:
If your idea of a good movie is filled with slow motion or flashy action sequences, love scenes, and a clear cut happy ending, don't watch this movie. But if you want something gritty, real and entirely different than most the movies out there, you just might need to see this one.

Pulp Fiction Miramax Films

Pulp Fiction
Miramax Films