Tarantino Documentaries: Notes

Quentin Tarantino: The Inspiration for Pulp Fiction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5KkI_YS4ug 

Notes on Tarantino:

- Loved movies from a young age, had an early inspiration. Originally wanted to be an actor, wanted to quit school & become an actor at 16

- At 22, got a job at Video Archives, a famous video store

- Worked on his first film whilst working at the video store, used the money he got from his job to fund this. Was amateur but his version of a 'film school', learnt new skills & techniques

- Used to be that Europe was character-mood based film & America told the story but now believes America tell the worst stories -> prefers film that unfold in a non-linear style

- Doesn't consider himself as a writer, considers himself as a filmmaker

- Prefers to write his own stuff -> more personal, his own idea

- Works in the crime genre: got a kick out of it

- Harvey Keitel, Lawrence Bender (producer), Marty?, Richard Gladstein (executive producer) helped get Reservoir Dogs made, the latter took a chance on Tarantino cos of the script

Tarantino's influences:

- Inspired by crime genre: 30's, 40's, stuff from the 70's, Elmore Leonnard -> inspired True Romance and helped Tarantino to figure out his style, one of the first ever writers Tarantino ever read that wrote mundane conversations that informed info about the characters

- Inspired by European art film and blaxploitation?/american exploitation films and French new wave (Godard, Truffant etc)

- In his 20's, inspired by Brian De Palma, would read all his interviews/reviews of his film, would make sure to see first showings & take in the story. Would watch multiple times in the cinema to see how he did it. 'Greatest satirist of the last 20 years'.

- Would be interested in studying the evolution of careers of a filmmaker, also interested in comparing their films and seeing where they stopped caring about filmmaking & start doing star-vehicles after a personal film fails.

- Inspired by Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorcese ('daring', 'always been a big influence'), Howard Hawks ('the single greatest storyteller in the history of cinema', 'single most entertaining filmmaker in the history of cinema', only had 1 disappointing movie), Sam Fuller ('one of the greatest wildmen? of cinema' 'king of making war films'), Sergio Leone (because of the Spaghetti Westerns, inspired him to become a filmmaker, his films are 'so stylised'), Jean Luc-Godard ('his inventiveness, breaking the rules, commenting on cinema whilst you are watching cinema), Jean-Pierre-Melville (did a series of crime series,'take a genre that's well known but do it with a whole different style & perspective & reinvent the genre' -> applies to Leone as well)

Tarantino's auteur traits:

- Non-linear style: 'novels have a complete freedom to tell their stories any way they saw fit' -> what Tarantino tries to do with movies. 'can be more resonant telling it this way'. Keeps the audience on the edge of the seat.

Other documentaries on Tarantino to watch at a later date:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejlRORZWui8&t=2s 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0i1OVdpeTg