Quentin Tarantino

I was preparing to move to L.A. when I first saw Reservoir Dogs. I was venturing west to try my hand at acting and writing. QT was not the reason I wanted to be involved with movies. That spot on the influence list was reserved for Buster Keaton, Al Pacino, Stanley Kubrick, and Martin Scorsese among others. Still I, like a number of young members of Generation X, was blown away by the film. It moved and appealed to me in ways that I didn't see coming. It was as if all the movies I had seen were an appetizer to this cinematic feast. The movie galvanized my belief that acting and writing was what I was meant to do.

You see, I'm old enough to remember what movies were like before Tarantino. It's somewhat difficult to remember that action, horror, heist, or suspense movies were so different from today. They were, on the whole, mind-numbingly formulaic, predictable, and simple with generic unrealistic dialogue. The characters were two-dimensional, and the humor consisted of a punnishly stupid one-liner before or after someone was killed. Even the entertaining and successful ones like Die Hard, Rambo, and Terminator followed this easy and simple blueprint.

Then, with that first electric film about the men with the color-coded names and the the equally as dynamic Pulp Fiction, Tarantino chnaged it all. In what has become known as the "Reservoir Dogs watershed" the formula for those types of movies was thrown on it's head, beaten up, and replaced with a fresher, more genuine cinema style that jumped out of a noir setting in broad daylight. The story was so non-linear it was everywhere, the dialogue was as real and raw as could be imagined, the bad guys became the protagonist the audience identified with, and the entire package was laid out in all its gritty unHollywood glory with a 70's dance tune as the backdrop.

It was so different and exciting that it was quickly aped and plagiarized to the point that it created its own genre -- a "Tarantino script." Pretty soon, everyone was trying to make a Tarantino movie, so much so that there was an inevitable backlash. All of the Tarantino rip-offs (you know you saw them -- Killing Zoe, Two Days in the Valley, and even QT's Destiny Turns on the Radio) had the effect of a hit song being overplayed on the radio to the point that you don't even remember why you like the song in the first place.

The thing is, without Tarantino, the cinema that we know today would not have existed. There would be no Memento, Sin City, or The Usual Suspects. He laid the foundation for Robert Rodriguez, Alexander Payne, and a host of other talented directors that didn't want t0 play by mainstream rules. He revived the careers of talented actors that had fallen out of favor. Maybe most importantly he took independent movies out of the art houses and into mainstream. Before Tarantino, Miramax handled foreign films and small, arty films. Today Miramax is considered a beast -- a major player in the movie world.

Because Tarantino's movies became so much more than movies, some peolpe have forgotten what made them so special. Watch his movies again, especially the first two and it is crystal why they had the impact. The scripts are brilliant. The way his characters talk is blazingly real and precise, and the stories are just enough off the center of normal that they become addictive. It's apparent that Tarantino lives, breathes, and eats movies. His scene homages are legendary, crafted to a point close enough for some to call it stealing. But his movies are his own, his voice, and his vision. His enthusiasm and confidence are, to me, what is so infectious about his movies. He makes the movies he wants because he loves them and has fun with them. In doing so he made going to the movies better for all of us.

Iraq

I can't believe we still have soldiers in Iraq. Even more, I can't believe that the war has become a background to other things going on. More coverage is devoted to American Idol, Michael Jackson, and Tom Delay. It's as if the American people have resigned themselves to the occupation with no exit plan and no change in the foreseeable future.

I'm against the war in Iraq, as you can probably tell. I have been since before it started. I didn't think we should invade the country back when WMDs and al Qaeda links were still accepted as probabilities and I sure don't think we should have gone to war now that we know the reasons were flat out lies. No, I was never going to be in favor of war ... any war, especially one built on deception. I'm for peace and tolerance -- two ideas in short supply here in Houston, deep in the heart of hatred.

So I understand why I was in the minority (although not as much of a minority as the conservative pundits would have you believe) and why a number of people were so bloodthirsty for some sort of revenge after the 9/11 tragedy. But what I don't understand is why we are still there and why a majority of the people don't see the problem.

I recently wrote a paper aiming to convince people to support getting out of Iraq, and most of the research pointed to people feeling like even though it may have been a mistake, we are already in there, it's too late now, so let's make the most of a bad situation. What a load of shit.

Certainly invading Iraq was a mistake. We invaded a sovereign nation and committed unspeakable acts of violence on normal, every day, wake-up-in-the-morning-go-to-work-care-for-your-kids people when diplomacy would have been a much better option. The claim was that Hussein was a bad man and the world would be better and Iraq safer with him gone. Now we see that even if he was a bad man, the world and Iraq is no safer. We replaced a bad man with a number of bad men and a horrible spiral of violence and lawlessness. Our mission, which was misguided, a lie, and morally bankrupt, was a total failure.

What made people think that we had the right to force our idea of what is right on a totally different culture in the first place? What arrogance. What greed. With practically no global support and a rush to arms we effectively destroyed a nation and alienated ourselves from friends and allies. What shame we should feel.

Yet surprisingly we don't. We continue along hearing the latest attack and the most up to date body count in the background on TV and read it on page six of the paper. In writing my paper I doubt I convinced anyone. I don't think many people are listening, and the few who listen are like me, growing more frustrated and numb at the same time.

We should get out of this tragedy now. Perhaps then the other problems like the economy, the chaos in Iraq, and the growing divide between the right and the left of the country could be dealt with. Because as long as soldiers and citizens are dying in Iraq America will continue to suffer at home.