Reservoir Dogs

      Was Tarantino, the right director at the right time? Was he too talented not to be noticed? Tarantino was fortunate in one respect; his first film was embraced by cerebral critics as well as the national publicity machine starved for new heroes.

      In a few years, Tarantino evolved from an unemployed actor-writer working in a video store to the hottest American filmmaker. He has become a crucial figure, replacing Martin Scorsese as a role model for young indie directors. Like Scorsese, Tarantino is a cineaste who knows movies inside out and is deeply committed to the medium. Unlike Scorsese, though, Tarantino did not go to film school, instead getting his education in a video store.

      At the beginning of his career, Tarantino planned to use the money he received for his first writing job – the screenplay for Rutger Hauer’s thriller Past Midnight – combined with money his friend-producer Lawrence Bender had on his credit cards to make Reservoir Dogs guerrilla-style for $30,000. But after reading the script, Bender felt it had potential. He told Tarantino he could raise real money for this. But he said, “No way man.” Eventually, Tarantino relented and gave Bender a two-month option on his script to find backer. Fantasizing about the dream cast for their yet-to-be-made movie, both immediately thought of Harvey Keithel. Bender’s acting teacher, who knew Keithel, agreed to deliver the screenplay to him. The strategy worked. Keithel fell in love with the script, and his involvement changed everything. With Keithel in the cast, Live Entertainment, a division of Carolco, committed a budget of $1.5 million. Things came easily after that. Keithel put up his own money to fly Tarantino and Bender to New York, where they assembled a top-notch cast that included Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Lawrence Tierney and Steve Buscemi. With no further financial worries, they finished Reservoir Dogs in time for Sundance Festival, where it began its conquest of the festival circuit.  

Join now!

      Reservoir Dogs swept through Sundance, Cannes, and Toronto like a brushfire. Distributors who saw the film at Sundance were worried that it would end up with an NC-17 rating for its graphic violence, which drove many viewers out of the theatre. That particular fear did not materialize, although eventually the violence worked against the film’s broader acceptance. Reservoir Dogs left Sundance without winning any awards, but it became the festival’s most talked-about movie, and Miramax decided to distribute it. Over the course of that year, Tarantino turned up at festival after festival, receiving lavish praise from intellectual critics for ...

This is a preview of the whole essay