Pulp Fiction (1994)

All Critics (68) | Top Critics (23) | Fresh (64) | Rotten (4) | DVD (54)

This movie gets its charge not from action pyrotechnics but from its electric barrage of language, wisecracks and dialogue, from the mordant '70s classicism of its long-take camera style and its smart, offbeat, strangely sexy cast.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Michael Wilmington

Chicago Tribune

Top Critic

The result, especially in the scenes involving Bruce Willis as a nervy boxer, can be long patches of dialogue that must have tickled Tarantino but will not necessarily resonate for anyone else.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Kenneth Turan

Los Angeles Times

Top Critic

The talk is dirty and funny, the violence always waiting just around the corner.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Anthony Lane

New Yorker

Top Critic

Whether you call it razzmatazz, pizazz or sizzle, Pulp Fiction's got it, enough style for a dozen movies and, truth be told, enough story for five.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Carrie Rickey

Philadelphia Inquirer

Top Critic

At 153 minutes, the movie does occasionally flirt with tedium, but the risk is worth it: The whole is finally greater than the sum of its pulpy parts. What could have been an anything-goes pastiche has surprising rigor and narrative clarity.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

John Hartl

Seattle Times

Top Critic

In terms of mood and style, it could be the most influential film to come along since Blue Velvet.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Jay Boyar

Orlando Sentinel

Top Critic

Pulp Fiction isn't the sleazy work of a shock artist giving us things no one else will put on film. This is the work of someone talented, smart and thrilled to be making movies, giving us things no one else can put on film.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Gary Thompson

Philadelphia Daily News

Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction is a Saturday Night Fever dream: a hot, dense, wicked disco of tough-guy posturings, vivid dips of violence and literally unbelievable plot moves.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Stephen Hunter

Baltimore Sun

John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson are terrific as talkative hit men, and Bruce Willis is equally good as a boxer who refuses to throw a fight.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

David Sterritt

Christian Science Monitor

Clever and daring, this high-pitched film never falters. Pulp Fiction is simply masterful. It's also one of the few films this year that bears seeing twice for maximum pleasure.

May 15, 2013 Full Review

Candice Russell

South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Its dedicated fan-base and the pop-culture reverberations that have flowed steadily from it, almost 20 years on, echo Tarantino's achievements with Pulp Fiction. Unassailable filmmaking.

October 16, 2012 Full Review

Patrick Kolan

Shotgun Critic

Some of its strengths still impress. There's the trivial-turned-menacing, the gangster-gone-poppy, and the various sadnesses, poignancies, and tragic pointlessnesses that seep out of the best noirs.

May 10, 2012 Full Review

Brian Gibson

Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Canada)

Seventeen years on, Pulp Fiction still works like a motherfucker

November 13, 2011 Full Review | Comments (2)

Walter Chaw

Film Freak Central

A balls-out postmodern comedy par excellence. It's a Royale with Cheese. [Blu-ray]

October 19, 2011 Full Review

Peter Canavese

Groucho Reviews

Look deeply enough, and the universe emerges in full.

April 28, 2011 Full Review

Rob Humanick

Projection Booth

[VIDEO] After reinventing American cinema with his thrilling first film "Reservoir Dogs," Quentin Tarantino delivered an even better one, "Pulp Fiction."

January 29, 2011 Full Review

Cole Smithey

ColeSmithey.com

• 1. Vincent Vega: Aw, man, I shot Marvin in the face.
  – Submitted by Daniel H (3 months ago)
• 1. Jules Winnfield: What does Marcellus Wallace look like?
  2. Brett: What?
  3. Jules Winnfield: What country you from?
  4. Brett: What?
  5. Jules Winnfield: 'What' ain't no country I ever heard of, do they speak English in 'What'?
  6. Brett: What?
  7. Jules Winnfield: English, mother fucker, do you speak it?
  – Submitted by Andrew J (4 months ago)
• 1. Jules Winnfield: You ever read the Bible, Brett?
  2. Brett: Yes!
  3. Jules Winnfield: There's a passage that I got memorized, seems appropiate for this situation: Ezekiel 25,17. "The path of the righteous man is beset of all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil me. Blessed is he who, in the name of the charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.
  – Submitted by Jean R (5 months ago)
• 1. Jules Winnfield: Oh, man, I will never forgive your ass for this shit. This is some fucked-up repugnant shit.
  2. Vincent Vega: Jules, did you ever hear the philosophy that once a man admits that he's wrong that he is immediately forgiven for all wrongdoings? Have you ever heard that?
  3. Jules Winnfield: Get the fuck out my face with that shit! The motherfucker that said that shit never had to pick up itty-bitty pieces of skull on account of your dumb ass.
  – Submitted by Eli T (6 months ago)
• 1. Jules Winnfield: Normally, both your asses would be dead as fucking fried chicken, but you happen to pull this shit while I'm in a transitional period so I don't wanna kill you, I wanna help you. But I can't give you this case, it don't belong to me. Besides, I've already been through too much shit this morning over this case to hand it over to your dumb ass.
  – Submitted by Eli T (6 months ago)
• 1. Jules Winnfield: Say 'what' again. Say 'what' again, I dare you, I double dare you motherfucker, say what one more Goddamn time!
  – Submitted by Eli T (6 months ago)