Editing Pulp Fiction (section)

=== Critical response ===
{{Rotten Tomatoes prose|{{RT data|score}}|{{RT data|average}}|{{RT data|count}}|Injecting its compendium of crime tales with the patois of everyday conversation, ''Pulp Fiction'' is a cinematic shot of adrenaline that cements writer-director Quentin Tarantino as an audacious purveyor of killer kino.|ref=yes|access-date={{RT data|access date}}}} On [[Metacritic]], the film has a [[Arithmetic mean|weighted average score]] of 95 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.metacritic.com/movie/pulp-fiction|title=Pulp Fiction Reviews|publisher=[[CBS Interactive]]|work=[[Metacritic]]|access-date=December 29, 2006}}{{cbignore}}</ref> Audiences polled by [[CinemaScore]] gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.cinemascore.com|title=Find CinemaScore|format=Type "Pulp Fiction" in the search box|publisher=[[CinemaScore]]|access-date=March 20, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180102130540/https://www.cinemascore.com/|archive-date=January 2, 2018|url-status=live}}</ref>

The response of major American film reviewers was widely favorable. [[Roger Ebert]] called it "a comedy about blood, guts, violence, strange sex, drugs, fixed fights, dead body disposal, leather freaks and a wristwatch that makes a dark journey down through the generations... The screenplay by Tarantino and Roger Avary so well-written in a scruffy, [[fanzine]] way that you want to rub noses in it&nbsp;– the noses of those zombie writers who take 'screenwriting' classes that teach them the formulas for 'hit films{{'"}}.<ref>{{cite news|last=Ebert|first=Roger|title=Pulp Fiction|url=https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/pulp-fiction-1994|work=RogerEbert.com|date=October 14, 1994|access-date=September 12, 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130216033721/http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=%2F19941014%2FREVIEWS%2F410140304%2F1023|archive-date=February 16, 2013|url-status=live}}</ref> [[Richard Corliss]] of ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]'' wrote: "It towers over the year's other movies as majestically and menacingly as a gang lord at a preschool. It dares Hollywood films to be this smart about going this far. If good directors accept Tarantino's implicit challenge, the movie theater could again be a great place to live in."<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Corliss|first=Richard|title=A Blast to the Heart|url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,981560-1,00.html|magazine=[[Time (magazine)|TIME]]|date=October 10, 1994|access-date=September 11, 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090402010106/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,981560-1,00.html|archive-date=April 2, 2009|url-status=dead}}</ref> In ''[[Newsweek]]'', [[David Ansen]] wrote: "The miracle of Quentin Tarantino's ''Pulp Fiction'' is how, being composed of secondhand, debased parts, it succeeds in gleaming like something new."<ref>{{cite news|last=Ansen |first=David |title=The Redemption of Pulp |work=[[Newsweek]] |date=October 9, 1994 |url=https://www.newsweek.com/redemption-pulp-189436 |access-date=May 21, 2023}}</ref> "You get intoxicated by it," wrote ''[[Entertainment Weekly]]''{{'}}s [[Owen Gleiberman]], "high on the rediscovery of how pleasurable a movie can be. I'm not sure I've ever encountered a filmmaker who combined discipline and control with sheer wild-ass joy the way that Tarantino does."<ref name="OG" /> "There's a special kick that comes from watching something this thrillingly alive", wrote [[Peter Travers]] of ''[[Rolling Stone]]''. "''Pulp Fiction'' is indisputably great."<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/pulp-fiction-19941014|title=Pulp Fiction|last=Travers|first=Peter|date=October 14, 1994|magazine=Rolling Stone|access-date=March 10, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110415121356/http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/pulp-fiction-19941014|archive-date=April 15, 2011|url-status=live}}</ref>

The ''[[Los Angeles Times]]'' was one of the few major news outlets to publish a negative review on the film's opening weekend. [[Kenneth Turan]] wrote: "The writer-director appears to be straining for his effects. Some sequences, especially one involving bondage harnesses and homosexual rape, have the uncomfortable feeling of creative desperation, of someone who's afraid of losing his reputation scrambling for any way to offend sensibilities."<ref>{{cite web |last=Turan |first=Kenneth |title=Quentin Tarantino's Gangster Rap |work=[[Los Angeles Times]] |date=October 14, 1994 |access-date=April 10, 2018 |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1994-10-14-ca-50020-story.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180505050442/http://articles.latimes.com/1994-10-14/entertainment/ca-50020_1_pulp-fiction |archive-date=May 5, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> Some who reviewed it in the following weeks took more exception to the predominant critical reaction than to ''Pulp Fiction'' itself. While not panning the film, [[Stanley Kauffmann]] of ''[[The New Republic]]'' felt that "the way that [it] has been so widely ravened up and drooled over verges on the disgusting. ''Pulp Fiction'' nourishes, abets, cultural slumming."<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Kauffman|first=Stanley|title=Shooting Up|magazine=[[The New Republic]]|date=November 14, 1994|access-date=April 10, 2018|url=https://newrepublic.com/article/61392/shooting|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180411025845/https://newrepublic.com/article/61392/shooting|archive-date=April 11, 2018|url-status=dead}}</ref> Responding to comparisons between Tarantino's film and the work of [[French New Wave]] director [[Jean-Luc Godard]], especially his first, most famous feature, [[Jonathan Rosenbaum]] of the ''[[Chicago Reader]]'' wrote: "The fact that ''Pulp Fiction'' is garnering more extravagant raves than ''[[Breathless (1960 film)|Breathless]]'' ever did tells you plenty about which kind of cultural references are regarded as more fruitful&nbsp;– namely, the ones we already have and don't wish to expand."<ref name=Profusion/> Observing in the ''[[National Review]]'' that "[n]o film arrives with more advance hype", [[John Simon (critic)|John Simon]] was unswayed: "titillation cures neither hollowness nor shallowness".<ref>{{cite news|last=Simon |first=John |title=''Pulp Fiction''|url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n22_v46/ai_15999907/pg_1|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071130072735/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1282/is_n22_v46/ai_15999907/pg_1|url-status=dead|archive-date=November 30, 2007|work=[[National Review]]|date=November 21, 1994|access-date=October 8, 2010}}</ref>

Debate about the film spread beyond the review pages, with its violence often being the theme. In ''[[The Washington Post]]'', Donna Britt described how she was happy not to see ''Pulp Fiction'' on a recent weekend and thus avoid "discussing the rousing scene in which a gunshot sprays somebody's brains around a car interior".<ref>{{cite news |last=Britt |first=Donna |title=Let's Lose the Gory 'Gulp' Fiction |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |date=October 25, 1994 |access-date=April 10, 2018 |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1994/10/25/lets-lose-the-gory-gulp-fiction/dbe0b009-b042-46ad-b245-cc5ad0f4be01/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180615032351/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1994/10/25/lets-lose-the-gory-gulp-fiction/dbe0b009-b042-46ad-b245-cc5ad0f4be01/ |archive-date=June 15, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> Some commentators took exception to the film's frequent use of the word "[[nigger]]" (mentioned 18 times). In the ''[[Chicago Tribune]]'', Todd Boyd argued that the word's recurrence "has the ability to signify the ultimate level of hipness for white males who have historically used their perception of black masculinity as the embodiment of cool".<ref>{{cite web |last=Boyd |first=Todd |title=Tarantino's Mantra? |work=[[Chicago Tribune]] |date=November 6, 1994 |access-date=April 10, 2018 |url=https://www.chicagotribune.com/1994/11/06/tarantinos-mantra/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180411025837/http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1994-11-06/entertainment/9411060361_1_n-word-hipness-true-romance |archive-date=April 11, 2018 |url-status=live }}</ref> In Britain, [[James Wood (critic)|James Wood]], writing in ''[[The Guardian]]'', set the tone for much subsequent criticism: "Tarantino represents the final triumph of [[postmodernism]], which is to empty the artwork of all content, thus avoiding its capacity to do anything except helplessly represent our agonies&nbsp;... Only in this age could a writer as talented as Tarantino produce artworks so vacuous, so entirely stripped of any politics, metaphysics, or moral interest."<ref>Wood, James (November 12, 1994). ''[[The Guardian]]''.</ref>