Pulp Fiction Essay

According to Hugh Helclo, “Postmodern America” was not just ideas in philosophy and the analysis of culture and society, but an expanded importance of critical thinking associated to a departure for works of literature and traditional architecture. Moreover, about combining technology advancement with a marketing/business geared society that had become accustom to interpretation of industrialization and urbanization through a shift in culture.

Postmodernism is a philosophical movement branches its roots in the mid to late 20th century as a response to modernism. “It refers to a cultural, intellectual, or artistic state lacking a clear central hierarchy or organizing principle”. Therefore, there is no well-shaped definition or sets of rules for postmodernism as it is a critique of structures and what we refer to as real but for postmodernism, there is no “absolute truth”.

Postmodernism is a term which is highly contested in the sociological world, where it is used to indicate a significant detachment from modernism. It is easier to give the uses of the term; ‘to give a name to the present historical period, to name a specific style in arts and architecture and to name a point of rupture or disjuncture in epistemology’ (Buchanan, 2010). For this,

The star-studded romantic comedy Midnight in Paris is one of Woody Allen’s most recent films which he did both, wrote and directed. It is a film about a man named Gil (Owen Wilson) who travels to Paris with his fiancée’s parents in order to expand his imagination and he ends up embarking on a journey to the 1920s while walking the streets of Paris at night. Not only is this film engaging and witty, but it also manages to provide both, overt and covert examples of postmodernism in film. By analyzing Woody Allen’s 2011film Midnight in Paris, we can identify the presence of many underlying motifs in both the narrative and the characterization of the film when using some of Frederic Jameson and Jean Baudrillard’s concepts on postmodernism.

The great death and suffering of WWII caused many to focus their writings more on the killing and power-hungry desires of the society we live in, and thus gave birth to the genre. Most works of postmodern literature were written to criticize the darker and controversial issues of society and human behavior through satire and

Non-linear storytelling was first seen sometime between the late nineteenth century and the end of the 1920s. Non-linear storytelling is “the structure of a movie in the way time is presented. A nonlinear story can begin at the beginning or end. ”(LoBrutto 2012). Non-linear storytelling is one of the many stylistic elements Tarantino uses in his own films, largely influenced by The Killing (1956).

The notion that film functions rhetorically is hardly novel, and, indeed, there is a long tradition of film criticism within rhetorical studies.5 Historically, the rhetorical criticism of film has tended to focus on the representational aspects of cinema, attending to how films compel audiences at a cognitive rather than corporeal level. But more recently, scholars in an array of fields (Kennedy, 2000; MacDougall, 2006; Massumi, 2002; Shaviro, 1993; Sobchack, 1995, 2004) have begun to consider how cinema appeals directly to the senses, how it sways viewers somatically as well as symbolically. Attention to the body corresponds closely to the affective (re)turn in rhetorical studies,6 for conceptualizing rhetoric as embodied necessarily “reflects a merger of reason and emotion” (McKerrow, 1998, p. 322; see also Johnson, 2007). Rhetorical

The film Pulp Fiction was an immediate box office success when it was released in 1994 and it was also well received by the critics, and celebrated for the way it appeared to capture exactly a certain pre-millennial angst and dislocation in Western capitalist societies. The term post-modernist, often used to refer to art and architecture, was applied to this film. The pulp fiction refers to popular novels which are bought in large numbers by less well educated people and enjoyed for their entertainment value. The implication is that the film concerns topics of interest to this low culture, but as this essay will show, in fact, the title is ironic and the film is a very intellectual presentation of issues at the heart of contemporary

Pastiche is a technique used in artistic works that is constructed from borrowing various elements from other texts. The strategy of pastiche is present in the film “Pulp Fiction” (1994) by Quentin Tarantino and the artistic photographic series ‘Living in Hell and Other Stories’ by Tom Hunter. Through these artworks the audience is able to identify a range of textual works that imitate the style or character of particular artwork, film or literature.

Quentin Tarantino is one of the most recognizable directors alive today and one of the most influential during the 1990’s to 2010s’s. The passion he poured into his films garnered worldwide acclaim and recognition. He has won two Oscars for best writing and original screenplay and been nominated for best director twice. His films are generally characterized by two aspects: excellent dialogue and masterfully edited scenes. Two of his masterpieces are Pulp Fiction (1994) and Inglorious Basterds (2009). In Pulp Fiction, I have chosen the excerpt from when the pawn shop owner enters the back room to just before Julius calls Jimmy (1:42:09-1:56:37,) and from Inglorious Basterds, I have chosen from the title ‘Chapter Five: Revenge of the Giant Face’ to when Colonel Landa bids the Basterds impersonating Italian cameramen farewell (1:45:43-1:55:10) to analyse. Tarantino is an undeniable auteur, creating worlds that could exist in our own, enabling his audiences to be emersed in stories far more intresting than our own mundane lives. Through his excellent direction, the films draw attention to the cheapness of life and society’s desensitised attitude towards violence.

Postmodern art decided to make revolutionary break with past and questioned previous theories known as “big narratives” of art, politics, economics and overall culture in order to create new theories. The big part of postmodern theory deals with the belief of preexistence of the art all around us. The artist is the one who can recognize these elements of art around as and synthesize them into the art work. This art work becomes object of interpretation which inevitably varies among different generations, social groups, national group, religious groups, and depends on some extent of the educational level of the observers and it is also different in the same individual in different times or environments. The different interpretations of

Pulp fiction is a movie filled with drugs, violence, gambling, and pop iconography, describing how real-life society is going towards the “death of god” era; a life without morals. A lot of movie critics would say that Jules (Samuel L. Jackson) and Vincent (John Travolta) possess no ethical values, no sense of morality. They also say that the movie does not convey a message. The movie does convey a message; Quentin Tarantino just masks it behind the street-savvy talk and murdering of persons who “wronged the boss.”

Postmodernism refers to a broad term used to explain movements in philosophy, art, music and critical theory. Postmodernism is viewed as a reaction to the pioneering modernist movement. In literature and art, postmodernism responds against classical ideas. With respect to post-structuralism and structuralism, there is a great difference between postmodernism

The main features of a postmodernist are that he or she is overly subjective, sensitive towards the role of ideology in assertion and maintenance of political and economic power. On the other hand, a modernist for example, there exists objective natural reality which is independent of human beings, their practices and relationships (Duignan, 2014). Such realities

of art as a finished product, signed by the artist and authenticated by the art market,