True Romance | |
---|---|
Directed by | Tony Scott |
Written by | |
Produced by |
|
Starring | |
Cinematography | Jeffrey L. Kimball |
Edited by | |
Music by | Hans Zimmer |
Production companies | |
Distributed by | Warner Bros. (United States and United Kingdom) Metropolitan Filmexport (France) August Entertainment (Overseas) |
Release date |
|
Running time | 118 minutes [1] |
Country | United States [2] [3] |
Language | English |
Budget | $12.5 million [4] |
Box office | $12.6 million [4] |
True Romance [a] is a 1993 American romantic crime film directed by Tony Scott and written by Quentin Tarantino. It features an ensemble cast led by Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette, with Dennis Hopper, Val Kilmer, Gary Oldman, Brad Pitt, and Christopher Walken in supporting roles. Slater and Arquette portray newlyweds on the run from the Mafia after stealing a shipment of drugs.
True Romance began life as an early script by Tarantino; he sold the screenplay in order to finance his debut feature film, Reservoir Dogs (1992). It is regarded by proponents as a cross-section of writer Tarantino and director Scott's respective trademarks, including a Southern California setting, pop cultural references, and stylized violence punctuated by slow motion. [6] [7]
Though initially a box-office failure, the film's positive reviews, with critics praising the dialogue, characters, and off-beat style, [8] helped it earn a cult following. It has come to be considered one of Scott's best films and one of the best American films of the 1990s. [9] [10] [11]
At a Detroit theater showing kung fu films, Alabama Whitman strikes up a conversation with Elvis Presley fanatic Clarence Worley. They later have sex at his downtown apartment. Alabama tearfully confesses that she is a call girl hired by Clarence's boss as a birthday present but has fallen in love with him. The two get married the next day at City Hall. An apparition of Elvis visits Clarence and convinces him to kill Alabama's abusive pimp, Drexl Spivey. Going to the brothel where Alabama worked, he shoots and kills Drexl and takes a bag he assumes contains Alabama's belongings. Back at the apartment, he and Alabama discover it contains a large amount of cocaine that Drexl had stolen from two drug pushers.
The couple visits Clarence's estranged father Clifford, a retired cop, for help. He tells Clarence the police assume Drexl's murder is a gang killing committed in revenge for the murdered dealers. After the couple leave for Los Angeles, Clifford is interrogated by Vincenzo Coccotti, consigliere to mobster "Blue Lou Boyle", who had hired Drexl to steal and distribute the cocaine on his behalf. He reveals that the mob knows about Clarence's theft since they found his driver's license near Drexl's body. Clifford, realizing he will die anyway, mockingly defies Coccotti, who shoots him dead. One of his men then finds a Los Angeles address taped to Clifford's refrigerator.
In Los Angeles, Clarence and Alabama meet Clarence's aspiring actor friend, Dick Ritchie, who introduces him to actor and production assistant Elliot Blitzer. He reluctantly agrees to broker the sale of the drugs to his boss, film producer Lee Donowitz. While Clarence is out buying lunch, Coccotti's enforcer Virgil finds Alabama in her motel room and beats her for information. Alabama fights back, stabbing him with a corkscrew, putting nail polish remover in his eyes and using hairspray to set fire to Virgil's face before grabbing his sawed-off shotgun, and shooting him to death in a maniacal rage. Clarence tends to Alabama's wounds, and they discuss their future together.
Elliot is pulled over for speeding and gets charged when his mistress hits him with a bag of cocaine and spills it on him. To stay out of jail, he agrees to wear a wire and record the drug deal between Clarence and Donowitz for police detectives Dimes and Nicholson. Coccotti's men also learn about where the deal will take place from Dick's stoner roommate Floyd. Clarence, Alabama, Dick, and Elliot go to Donowitz's suite at the Ambassador Hotel with the drugs. In the elevator, a suspicious Clarence threatens Elliot at gunpoint but is persuaded by Elliot's pleading for mercy.
Clarence fabricates a story for Donowitz that the drugs were given to him by a corrupt cop, and he agrees to the sale. Excusing himself to the bathroom, the vision of Elvis reassures him that things are going well. Donowitz and his bodyguards are ambushed by the cops and the mobsters. Elliot reveals himself to be an informant by asking the cops if he could leave, whereupon a shootout erupts. Dick throws the suitcase of drugs into the air, where it gets shredded by gunfire, and flees. Donowitz, his bodyguards, Elliot, the cops, and the mobsters are all killed, and Clarence is wounded as he exits the bathroom. He and Alabama escape with Donowitz's money as more police arrive. They flee to Mexico, where Alabama gives birth to a son, whom they name Elvis.
Additionally, Patricia Arquette's son Enzo Rossi plays Elvis in the final scene of the movie.
The title and plot are a play on the titles of romance comic books such as True Life Secrets, True Stories of Romance, Romance Tales, Untamed Love and Strange Love. [12]
The film was a breakthrough for Quentin Tarantino. Released after Reservoir Dogs , it was his first screenplay for a major motion picture, and Tarantino contends that it is his most autobiographical film to date. He had hoped to direct the film, but lost interest in directing and sold the script. According to Tarantino's audio commentary on the DVD release, he was happy with the way it turned out. Apart from changing the nonlinear narrative he wrote to a more conventional linear structure, it was largely faithful to his original screenplay. He initially opposed director Tony Scott's decision to change the ending (which Scott maintained was of his own volition, not the studio's, saying "I just fell in love with these two characters and didn't want to see them die"). When seeing the completed film, he realized Scott's happy ending was more appropriate to the film as Scott directed it. [13] The film's first act, as well as some fragments of dialogue, were repurposed from Tarantino's 1987 amateur film My Best Friend's Birthday . [14]
The film's score by Hans Zimmer is a theme based on Gassenhauer from Carl Orff's Schulwerk . [15] This theme, combined with a voiceover spoken by Arquette, is an homage to Terrence Malick's 1973 crime film Badlands , in which Sissy Spacek speaks the voiceover, and that also shares similar dramatic motifs. [16]
The movie was cut by the United States MPAA for an R rating for its wide theatrical release. The majority of the confrontation between Alabama and Virgil was cut, as well as the ending shootout scene. There was also an alternative edit where Detective Nicky Dimes is shot not by Alabama, but by Toothpick Vic, one of the mafia hitmen. This edit was the official 1993 rental VHS release, but subsequently all DVD and most Blu-ray releases are of the original unrated director's cut. [17] The 2022 4K release from Arrow however, has both cuts of the movie.
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes the film holds an approval rating of 93% with an average rating of 7.60/10, based on 60 reviews. The site's critics consensus states: "Fueled by Quentin Tarantino's savvy screenplay and a gallery of oddball performances, Tony Scott's True Romance is a funny and violent action jaunt in the best sense." [8] On Metacritic the film received a weighted average score of 59 out of 100 based on 19 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". [18] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale. [19]
Phil Villarreal of the Arizona Daily Star called it "one of the most dynamic action films of the 1990s". [20] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone gave it three stars, saying "it's Tarantino's gutter poetry that detonates True Romance. This movie is dynamite." [21]
Roger Ebert gave the film a positive review remarking that "the energy and style of the movie are exhilarating", and that "the supporting cast is superb, a roll call of actors at home in these violent waters: Christopher Walken, Dennis Hopper, and Brad Pitt, for example". [22] A negative review by The Washington Post 's Richard Harrington claimed the film was "stylistically visceral" yet "aesthetically corrupt". [23]
Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote, "True Romance, a vibrant, grisly, gleefully amoral road movie directed by Tony Scott and dominated by the machismo of Quentin Tarantino (who wrote this screenplay before he directed Reservoir Dogs), is sure to offend a good-sized segment of the moviegoing population". [24]
Although a critical success, True Romance was a box office failure. The film earned $4 million during its opening weekend, ranking in third place behind The Fugitive and Undercover Blues . [25] It was given a domestic release and earned $12.3 million [4] on a $12.5 million budget. Despite this, the film developed a cult following over the years. [13] [26]
Empire ranked True Romance the 83rd greatest film of all time in 2017, writing: "Tony Scott's handling of Quentin Tarantino's script came off like the cinematic equivalent of cocaine-flavoured bubble-gum: a bright, flavoursome confection that had an intoxicatingly violent kick. It also drew some tremendous big names to its supporting cast." [9]
The Hopper/Walken scene, colloquially named "The Sicilian scene", was praised by Oliver Lyttelton of IndieWire , who called it "one of the most beautiful tête-à-têtes in contemporary cinema, wonderfully written and made utterly iconic by the two virtuoso actors". [27] Tarantino himself has named it as one of his proudest moments. "I had heard that whole speech about the Sicilians a long time ago, from a black guy living in my house. One day I was talking with a friend who was Sicilian and I just started telling that speech. And I thought: 'Wow, that is a great scene, I gotta remember that'." [28]
Oldman's villain also garnered acclaim. MSN Movies wrote: "With just a few minutes of screen time, Gary Oldman crafts one of cinema's most memorable villains: the brutal, dreadlocked pimp Drexl Spivey. Even in a movie jammed with memorable cameos from screen luminaries [...] Oldman's scar-faced, dead-eyed, lethal gangster stood out." [29] Jason Serafino of Complex magazine named Spivey as one of the top five coolest drug dealers in movie history, writing: "He's not in the film for a long time, but the few scant moments that Gary Oldman plays the psychopathic dealer Drexl Spivey make True Romance a classic ... Oldman gave us a glimpse at one of cinema's most unfiltered sociopaths." [30] Maxim journalist Thomas Freeman ranked Spivey as the greatest performance of Oldman's career. [31]
"Robbers", a song by the English indie rock band The 1975 from their 2013 debut album, was inspired by the film. Vocalist Matthew Healy explained: "I got really obsessed with the idea behind Patricia Arquette's character in True Romance when I was about eighteen. That craving for the bad boy in that film [is] so sexualized." [32]
True Romance , the 2013 debut album from English pop star Charli XCX, was named after the film. [33]
Brad Pitt's stoner character in True Romance, Floyd, was the inspiration for making the film Pineapple Express , according to producer Judd Apatow, who "thought it would be funny to make a movie in which you follow that character out of his apartment and watch him get chased by bad guys". [34]
James Gandolfini landed his role of Tony Soprano on The Sopranos when he was invited to audition for the role after casting director Susan Fitzgerald saw a short clip of his performance in True Romance. Gandolfini ultimately received the role ahead of several other actors, including Steven Van Zandt and Michael Rispoli. [35]
In the trance song "Solarcoaster" by Solarstone, a sample is used from the film. The sample includes the line spoken by Alabama, "That three words went through my mind endlessly. Repeating themselves like a broken record. You're so cool. You're so cool. You're so cool." [36]
Hans Zimmer's first track "You're So Cool" is an adaptation of Carl Orff's "Gassenhauer" for marimba. [37] [38] [39]
True Romance | |
---|---|
Soundtrack album by Various Artists | |
Released | September 7, 1993 |
Genre | Rock |
Length | 46:58 |
Label | Morgan Creek |
Producer | Hans Zimmer |
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
AllMusic |
No. | Title | Contributing artist | Length |
---|---|---|---|
1. | "You're So Cool" | Hans Zimmer | 3:40 |
2. | "Graceland" | Charlie Sexton | 3:26 |
3. | "In Dreams" | John Waite | 3:45 |
4. | "Wounded Bird" | Charles & Eddie | 5:11 |
5. | "I Want Your Body" | Nymphomania | 4:18 |
6. | "Stars at Dawn" | Hans Zimmer | 2:04 |
7. | "I Need a Heart to Come Home To" | Shelby Lynne | 4:21 |
8. | "Viens Mallika Sous Le Dome Edais from Lakmé" | Léo Delibes | 3:57 |
9. | "(Love Is) The Tender Trap" | Robert Palmer | 2:37 |
10. | "Outshined" | Soundgarden | 5:12 |
11. | "Amid the Chaos of the Day" | Hans Zimmer | 4:54 |
12. | "Two Hearts" | Chris Isaak | 3:33 |
True Romance was originally released by Warner Home Video on VHS on September 12, 1994. This release contains only the director's cut, however the theatrical cut was released on an R rated rental VHS.
The DVD was released on September 24, 2002, as a Two-Disc set. [40] It was later released on Blu-ray on May 26, 2009. [41] Again, these releases only contain the director's cut, the theatrical cut remained excluded.
The 4K UHD Blu-ray was released on June 28, 2022 by Arrow Video. [42] Unlike the previous DVD and Blu-ray releases, this release contains the theatrical cut for the first time since the original VHS release, it also includes the director's cut from past DVD and Blu-ray releases. [43]
Natural Born Killers is a 1994 American romantic crime action film directed by Oliver Stone and starring Woody Harrelson, Juliette Lewis, Robert Downey Jr., Tommy Lee Jones, and Tom Sizemore. The film tells the story of two victims of traumatic childhoods who become lovers and mass murderers, and are irresponsibly glorified by the mass media.
Pulp Fiction is a 1994 American independent crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino from a story he conceived with Roger Avary. It tells four intertwining tales of crime and violence in Los Angeles, California. The film stars John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Bruce Willis, Tim Roth, Ving Rhames, and Uma Thurman. The title refers to the pulp magazines and hardboiled crime novels popular during the mid-20th century, known for their graphic violence and punchy dialogue.
Speed is a 1994 American action thriller film directed by Jan de Bont in his feature directorial debut, with a screenplay by Graham Yost. The film stars Keanu Reeves, Dennis Hopper, and Sandra Bullock in lead roles, with Joe Morton and Jeff Daniels in supporting roles.
Gary Leonard Oldman is an English actor and filmmaker. Known for his versatility and intense acting style, he has received various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, three British Academy Film Awards, and nominations for two Primetime Emmy Awards. His films have grossed over $11 billion worldwide, making him one of the highest-grossing actors of all time.
Kill Bill: Volume 1 is a 2003 American martial arts action film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It stars Uma Thurman as the Bride, who swears revenge on a group of assassins and their leader, Bill, after they try to kill her and her unborn child. Her journey takes her to Tokyo, where she battles the yakuza.
Battle Royale is a 2000 Japanese action film directed by Kinji Fukasaku from a screenplay by Kenta Fukasaku, based on the 1999 novel of the same name by Koushun Takami. The film stars Tatsuya Fujiwara, Aki Maeda, Tarō Yamamoto, Chiaki Kuriyama, Kou Shibasaki, Masanobu Andō, and Beat Takeshi. It follows a group of junior high school students forced to fight to the death by a Japanese totalitarian government.
Patricia Arquette is an American actress. She made her feature film debut as Kristen Parker in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987) and has starred in many film and television productions. She has received several awards, including an Academy Award, two Primetime Emmy Awards, and three Golden Globe Awards.
Hannibal is a 2001 American horror film directed by Ridley Scott, based on the 1999 novel by Thomas Harris. A sequel to the 1991 film The Silence of the Lambs, the plot follows disgraced FBI special agent Clarice Starling as she attempts to apprehend the cannibalistic serial killer Hannibal Lecter before his surviving victim, Mason Verger, captures him. Anthony Hopkins reprises his role as Lecter, while Julianne Moore replaces Jodie Foster as Starling and Gary Oldman plays Verger. Ray Liotta, Frankie R. Faison, Giancarlo Giannini, and Francesca Neri also star.
Inglourious Basterds is a 2009 war film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Brad Pitt, Christoph Waltz, Michael Fassbender, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger, Daniel Brühl, Til Schweiger and Mélanie Laurent. The film tells an alternate history story of two converging plots to assassinate Nazi Germany's leadership at a Paris cinema—one through a British operation largely carried out by a team of Jewish American soldiers led by First Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Pitt), and another by French Jewish cinema proprietor Shosanna Dreyfus (Laurent) who seeks to avenge her murdered family. Both are faced against Hans Landa (Waltz), an SS colonel with a fearsome reputation for hunting Jews.
The Mack is a 1973 American blaxploitation crime drama film directed by California native Michael Campus and starring Max Julien and Richard Pryor. The film also stars Oscar-nominee Juanita Moore and Tony-nominated actor Dick Anthony Williams. Filmed in Oakland, California, the movie follows the rise and fall of Goldie, who returns from a five-year prison sentence to find that his brother is involved in Black nationalism. Goldie decides to take an alternative path, striving to become the city's biggest pimp.
Crimson Tide is a 1995 American submarine action thriller film directed by Tony Scott and produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer. It takes place during a period of political turmoil in Russia, in which ultranationalists threaten to launch nuclear missiles at the United States and Japan.
Performance is a 1970 British crime drama film directed by Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg, written by Cammell and filmed by Roeg. The film stars James Fox as a violent and ambitious London gangster who, after killing an old friend, goes into hiding at the home of a reclusive rock star.
The Street Fighter is a 1974 Japanese martial arts film produced by Toei Company, directed by Shigehiro Ozawa, and starring Sonny Chiba. It was released in the United States by New Line Cinema and became one of the first films to be a commercial success for the distributor. It is notable as the first film to receive an X-rating in the US solely for violence.
Grindhouse is a 2007 American double bill. It consists of two films, Planet Terror, a horror comedy written and directed by Robert Rodriguez, about a group of survivors who battle zombie-like creatures, and Death Proof, a slasher film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, about a murderous stuntman who kills young women with modified vehicles. The former stars Rose McGowan, Freddy Rodriguez, Michael Biehn, Jeff Fahey, Josh Brolin, and Marley Shelton; the latter stars Kurt Russell, Rosario Dawson, Vanessa Ferlito, Jordan Ladd, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Tracie Thoms, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and Zoë Bell. Grindhouse pays homage to exploitation films of the 1970s, with its title deriving from the now-defunct theaters that would show such films. As part of its theatrical presentation, Grindhouse also features fictitious exploitation trailers directed by Rodriguez, Rob Zombie, Edgar Wright, Eli Roth, and Jason Eisener.
Death Proof is a 2007 American slasher film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It stars Kurt Russell as a stuntman who murders young women with modified cars he purports to be "death-proof". Rosario Dawson, Vanessa Ferlito, Jordan Ladd, Rose McGowan, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Tracie Thoms, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and Zoë Bell co-star as the women he targets.
Quentin Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter and film producer who has directed ten films. He first began his career in the 1980s by directing and writing Love Birds In Bondage and writing, directing and starring in the black-and-white My Best Friend's Birthday, an amateur short film which was never officially released. He impersonated musician Elvis Presley in a small role in the sitcom The Golden Girls (1988), and briefly appeared in Eddie Presley (1992). As an independent filmmaker, he directed, wrote, and appeared in the violent crime thriller Reservoir Dogs (1992), which tells the story of six strangers brought together for a jewelry heist. Proving to be Tarantino's breakthrough film, it was named the greatest independent film of all time by Empire. Tarantino's screenplay for Tony Scott's True Romance (1993) was nominated for a Saturn Award. Also in 1993, he served as an executive producer for Killing Zoe and wrote two other films.
Vista Theatre, formerly Lou Bard Playhouse and Bard’s Hollywood Theatre, also known as The Vista, is a historic single-screen movie theater in Los Angeles, California, located in Los Feliz on the border with East Hollywood.
"Robbers" is a song by English rock band The 1975, released as the sixth single from their self-titled debut on 26 May 2014.
The Hateful Eight is a 2015 American Western film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. It stars Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demián Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, and Bruce Dern as eight dubious strangers who seek refuge from a blizzard in a stagecoach stopover some time after the American Civil War.
The following is a list of unproduced Quentin Tarantino projects in roughly chronological order. During his career, American film director Quentin Tarantino has worked on a number of projects which never progressed beyond the pre-production stage under his direction. Some of these projects were officially cancelled and scrapped or fell into development hell.
Next from Tarantino were scripts that led to True Romance (recently shown here in a chopped-up edition and retitled Breakaway)...