Reservoir Dogs

Yes, after twenty years and three months of life I have finally seen a Quentin Tarantino film! I'd never had any great interest in doing so but for the sake of cinematic completeness (and the tiniest dose of film buff street cred) I made a sojourn to the Hillman tonight and took in his first feature film, Reservoir Dogs. At the very least, I didn't feel like I'd wasted my time in doing so.

Veteran crook Joe Cabot (Laurence Tierney) and his son Nice Guy Eddie (Chris Penn) assemble a gang of professional thieves to pull off a diamond heist - one of whom happens to be an undercover cop. The heist goes horribly wrong, leading to a bloody police ambush. The survivors - harried and frantic Mr. Pink (Steve Buschemi), gutshot Mr. Orange (Tim Roth), frazzled tough guy Mr. White (Harvey Keitel), and the psychotic Mr. Blonde (Michael Madsen) - come together in a garage, trying to figure out who ratted them out and what they should do as the cops close in. That's a pretty short plot description, but it's all you really need.

Reservoir Dogs succeeds mostly because it's simple and to the point. It's a lean story that makes the most of its 100 minutes. It owes a great deal to Stanley Kubrick's The Killing, in its straightforward depiction of a heist gone wrong, its use of flashback and real-time, and its gang of immoral, traitorous crooks. There isn't a lot of excessive meat on the bones, the few subplots related to the characters. All in all, it's a simple story told simply, and executed very well by Tarantino, showing a large degree of restraint, its references to other films and pop culture mostly limited and only a few moments of showiness.

The biggest flaw is that the movie is rather cold and distant. None of these guys are really likeable or overly interesting, and so it's hard to get very involved in their story. Mr. Orange is the only truly sympathetic character - he's the cop, and he spends most of the movie in a pool of his own blood - unless you count Kirk Baltz's hapless cop who becomes a hostage to the psychopathic Mr. Blonde. As such, the movie is detached and a bit distant; it's done well, it's just not overly involving, and I can't see it holding up well to rewatches. Its simpleness is what makes it work, but it's also (to a smaller degree) a detriment.

Quentin Tarantino's direction is rather restrained; he allows the actors and script to do most of the footwork and has only a few indulgent "I'm a DIRECTOR!" moments (the rotating shots around the breakfast table at the beginning) which show a restraint that, I'm told, he would largely abandon in his later works. The action scenes are pretty straight-forward although QT piles on the blood and squibs when people do get hurt. Tarantino's scripting is tight and well-executed; he has a good sense of pacing definitely shows an ear for small-talk and dialogue although some of the conversations go a bit over-the-top. The tough guy ensemble cast is good, with Harvey Keitel's nice guy Mr. White and Steve Buschemi's frantic Mr. Pink standing out.

Reservoir Dogs is a pretty good movie, but it's not great by any means; well-done but not overly memorable. It didn't convince me that I need to go out of my way to see any more of Tarantino's work, but I'm at least open to the idea.

Rating: 7/10 - Recommended