On Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction

I watched Pulp Fiction last night, the second time I have seen it. I was struck by how loose it was compared with tight theatrical Reservoir Dogs. Pulp Fiction could be seen to be the equivalent of Chopin's Preludes or a tapas dish in that each scene is by itself a work of art, greater than the whole. So characterisation is not of great importance: the differences between Samuel L Jackson's and John Travolta's characters not nearly as important as those of Harvey Keitel's and Steve Buscemi's (let alone Michael Masden's, the psychotic Mr Blonde). In Pulp Fiction, gangsters get screwed (one literally) as well as screw and their responses are invariably predictable: so what counts is situation not character. In Reservoir Dogs the gangsters are in the same kinds of situation to each other but find very different and contradictory ways to deal with them. Reservoir Dogs, along with Gosford Park, is perhaps the best film I have ever seen, partly because there is no slack and partly because the script and acting are uniformly brilliant; of particular merit is Harvey Keitel's performance when his character explains to Mr Pink at the warehouse why he told his name to Tim Roth's character(strangely it is the pauses that do it), and Lawrence Tierney's performance throughout the film which I learnt last night was him being pretty much how he is off-screen (grouchy, intimidating, and by all accounts too annoying and even downright malignant to be called a lovable old rogue).

My nasty conjunctivitis has spread to the other eye but the virus has lost its venom so healthwise I feel fine. I bemoan the lack of time to do everything I want to do. So many books to read, films to see on cinema and dvd, Radio 4 programmes to listen to and, oh yes, time should be spent with friends I guess. These fortnightly wednesdays off work are wonderful but the compressed hours mean more time at work. Work is bearable but I have pertinent and potent information to get into my head and sensuous beauty to experience. I shall be old in 40 years and dead in 60 so no time to waste.