Tarantino as an Auteur

Tarantino as an Auteur 

Auteur

1. A director who takes a hold of all aspects of the filmmaking: their film form concept to direction 

Idea - screenplay - directions/ lead camera/ editing - FULL ARTISTIC CONTROL

ANALOGY - BOOK AUTHOR

2. Consistent qualities to be found throughout their work 

For example: to cast particular actors across their films

3. To be an auteur - a sufficient body of work

Film Auteurs

A film director who has a considerable body of film work

Has established a distinctive and recognisable style of work which can be identified in: themes, genre-based approached, technical elements (use of lighting; particular shots, style of editing), working with specific actors

For example: Fincher uses Film Noir elements - shadows, lighting, colour, dark themes; Hitchcock - POV, cameos, thriller/psychological genre; Jane Campion- films with female leads feminist approaches, themes around women and marginality 

Tarantino is an auteur because:

His recognisable experimental style: hybridity of genres, themes, styles (Django Unchained, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs, Once upon a time in Hollywood)

Working in opposition to mainstream ideas/Values/Filmic approaches to greater and innovate - Produce something new or a new perspective

Postmodernism - repetition and difference - Combining familiar elements

This includes our understanding of storytelling - Reviewing our understanding of narrative - perspectives 

Different genres* From Dawn to Dusk - Horror style

Subverting mainstream narratives about American identity, ‘dream’, culture - i.e. the conventional narrative about America

He is a disrupter: the mock heroic style of ‘patriotism’ in Pulp Fiction - the watch scene - the dialogue is key in mocking ideas about American heroism

Not political - ‘Political’ he interprets films as an art medium

Hybridity 

• Mix of comedy with other genres even horror
• Makes his work experimental 
• For example:Kill Bill - Highly stylised, thriller, noir elements - Transforms into farce; exaggerated violence; irony is a typical feature
• Use of animation in Kill Bill - Storytelling and visual style

Subverting Narrative

• Pulp fiction, Jackie Brown - Four rooms
• Black politics - Leading character and the use of the ’N’ word
• Re-Filming and staging of a pivotal sequence which allowed spectators to ‘see’ the events from different perspectives

Django Unchained

• History which is central to identity - Afro-American, slavery - he puts a black slave at centre of the story
• Shift of power - To Django
• Western elements - Revisionist - With Jamie L Fox in the role
• Is he appropriating the Narrative?
• Western Tradition
• The so called ‘greatness’ of American History

Past Question

‘Experimental film is often the result of an auteur challenging established conventions with fresh ideas’. With reference to your chosen film option, how far do you agree with this statement? [20]

Film Context ‘Established Conventions’

• Plot and 3 act structure
• Linear storytelling
• Mainstream cinema - ‘Comfort’ for the spectator
• Cinematic trends - E.g superhero films/genre/star system: He resists and labels about his films/work
• Mainstream - Resist change for financial reasons
• Familiar/Stock characters 

Ideas for Introduction

• Experimental cinema - pushing boundaries of technical aspects (those intrinsic to filmmaking: sound, lighting, visual - mise-en-scene, colour, cinematography and also performance)
• Storytelling and narrative key aspects of film and cinema - what do these contribute?
• Auteurs: distinctive, artistic control, going against conventions of filmmaking BUT ALSO film institutions, in this case Hollywood - this goes back to old and new Hollywood
• Established conventions: narrative, endings, familiarity - scenarios/characters/dialogue; film genres
• Tarantino emerges in the ‘90s - A Band a Part (relevance of this)
• Key approaches to this question in relation to Pulp Fiction and Quentin Tarantino: narrative, performance, comedic stylised sequences - across key elements bricolage effect, unfamiliar perspectives to narrative, characters. ‘genres’, the visual style of filmmaking 

Intro example

Pulp fiction as a whole challenges established conventions through the dismissal of the linear narrative structure as well as many stylistic choices made by Tarantino in terms of his display of violence. As well as this, Tarantino has a completely different take of American values than most American films as he doesn’t show what people want to see, more so what actually happening. To further enhance the idea around experimental film inline with Tarantino being an auteur, certain cinematic techniques such as bricolage, hyperrealism and postmodernism all have a very prominent usage across his works, especially in pulp fiction. However, one must acknowledge that at times, auteur stylistic choices may just be preferences instead of experimentalism.

Approach A: Paragraph 1/2/3

• EXAMPLE: sequence/narrative thread
• How does he go against conventions?
• How far do these elements cohere with the statement
• COUNTER-ARGUMENRS HERE

In Pulp Fiction, and other films of his, Tarantino tends to use non-linear and even quite confusing timelines timelines. Pulp Fiction has three main stores, yet seven different ‘episodes; which make up the entire film including The Diner sequence, Vincent and Jules, Butch and Marcellus, Vincent and Mia, Butch as the gold watch prelude, The gold watch, Vincent, Jules and Jimmie, The diner sequence again at the end. By having all the story lines out of order, it leaves spectators thinking about the correct order for these story lines to go in. This goes against the norms in terms of film conventions as typically films follow a linear narrative in a one stranded story line. However, Tarantino turns against these conventions of film narrative as he has multiple story strands which are not placed in order thought the film. This is a presentation of Tarantino as an auteur challenging these established narrative conventions with his own ideas of film narrative, which then play into the conventions of typically experimental films. However some might argue

Approach B

• Example: Sequence/narrative thread
• How does he go against conventions?
• Go through your 2-3 key example/sequences
• The develop counter arguments in separate paragraphs

‘Experimental film is often the result of an auteur challenging established conventions with fresh ideas’. With reference to your chosen film option, how far do you agree with this statement? [20]

Pulp Fiction as a whole challenges established conventions through the dismissal of the linear narrative structure as well as many stylistic choices made by Tarantino in terms of his display of violence. Tarantino’s films commonly do challenge all sorts of different cinema conventions. As well as this, Tarantino has a completely different take of American values than most American films as he doesn’t show what people want to see, more so what actually happening. To further enhance the idea around experimental film inline with Tarantino being an auteur, certain cinematic techniques such as bricolage, hyperrealism and postmodernism all have a very prominent usage across his works, especially in pulp fiction. However, one must acknowledge that at times, auteur stylistic choices may just be preferences instead of experimentalism.

In Pulp Fiction, and other films of his, Tarantino tends to use non-linear and even quite confusing timelines timelines. Pulp Fiction has three main stores, yet seven different ‘episodes; which make up the entire film including The Diner sequence, Vincent and Jules, Butch and Marcellus, Vincent and Mia, Butch as the gold watch prelude, The gold watch, Vincent, Jules and Jimmie, The diner sequence again at the end. By having all the story lines out of order, it leaves spectators thinking about the correct order for these story lines to go in. This goes against the norms in terms of film conventions as typically films follow a linear narrative in a one stranded story line. However, Tarantino turns against these conventions of film narrative as he has multiple story strands which are not placed in order thought the film. This is a presentation of Tarantino as an auteur challenging these established narrative conventions with his own ideas of film narrative, which then play into the conventions of typically experimental films. A specific point in the film in which this narrative style is apparent in when Butch goes back to the apartment for his watch but finds that Vincent is also in his apartment. Butch ends up killing Vincent and the act ends. However later on in the film, we see that Vincent is alive again which reinforces the idea that the storyline isn’t in order at all. However some might argue that this isn’t experimental at all as its been done before as many other films have differing narrative structure such as a cyclical structure.

Furthermore, Tarantino includes elements of hyper-realism as well as Post-Modernism in order to challenge ‘the norm’ in terms of film conventions. A specific scene in which these techniques are used is the Jack Rabbit Slims sequence with Mia and Vincent. Hyper-realistic scenarios are created through feeding spectators images which can make them see a fictional scenario as real. This is done in this sequence through including content from pop culture references such as having a waiters dressed as famous characters such as Marylin Monroe, Buddy Holly and others who were popular during the era the diner is based on. This alone isn’t the result of Tarantino as an Auteur challenging established conventions as elements of Hyper-Reality can be seen in many other films past and present, so it isn’t necessarily down to Tarantino being an auteur. 

However, the ultimate goals of Post-Modernism are to warp mainstream conventions of narrative structure in order the challenge the spectators mind. Tarantino uses this technique in his films, so whilst it’s fair to say that the experimentalism within Pulp Fiction is the result of Tarantino as an auteur challenging the established conventions of cinema, its not necessarily with ‘fresh’ ideas as post-modernistic techniques are used in a variety of films. So whilst the techniques he uses as an auteur play into the experimentalist aspect of Pulp Fiction, they’re arguably not so called ‘fresh’ ideas.

Due to reasons listed, I can only partly agree with the statement provided as whilst experimental film is often the result of an auteur challenging established cinema conventions, it’s not always necessarily due to the fresh ideas from Tarantino. Most elements of experimental film have been used in many different films in a variety of different ways, however it’s how auteurs utilises these methods which could make them ‘fresh’ ideas. So due to mentioned reasons, I’d have to disagree to a certain extent with the statement.