Is Quentin Tarantino an Auteur?
I’ve been wanting to talk about films, but that is rather hard on a book review publication. A way around this, is to find a good book about film theory, and use that as a springboard. There are various good publications on the subject, for example, Signs and Meaning in the Cinema by Peter Wollen, The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era by Thomas Schatz, Film Studies by Andrew Butler, Schirmer Encyclopedia of Film edited by Barry K. Grant, A Short History of Film, by Dixon and Foster, Film Theory and Criticism by Leo Braudy, and many more, but I chose Cinema Studies : The Key Concepts, by Susan Hayward because it seemed to me a good introductory book that is neutral yet more thoughtful than the run-of–the mill film dictionary.
I’m going to try and squish two things into this article. Firstly I’ll give a bit of historical background to some film theory, and in particular, auteur theory, and then I want to apply it to Quentin Tarantino’s oeuvre. To me, Tarantino, (even though I dislike some aspects of his work, the violence in particular), seems to me the director with the most pizzazz, the director who, out of all directors I can think of, creates movies that has very specific hallmarks that make them almost immediately recognizable of being “Tarantino” films. I confess that I do have an ulterior motive for choosing Tarantino’s films, being that they have so many fun aspects to discuss!
So let’s kick off with a bit of the history of film theory, starting with auteur theory:
Auteur theory has a substantial history and divergent interpretations. According to many film theorists, auteur theory originated in the 1950’s with, among others, the realist theories of André Bazin and Jean-Luc Godard, which was popularized in the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma .
In 1951, André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Joseph-Marie Lo Duca founded the influential French film magazine, Cahiers du Cinéma (Notebooks on Cinema). Cahiers du Cinéma was originally the manifesto for “la politique des Auteurs” (the philosophy/methodology of the authors (in this case, film “authors”) ) which developed into auteur theory as we know it today. At the origin of the magazine, these theories resulted in the re-evaluation of Hollywood films and directors such as Alfred Hitchcock, Howard Hawks, Robert Aldrich, Nicholas Ray, and Fritz Lang. Cahiers du Cinema authors also championed the work of directors Jean Renoir, Roberto Rossellini, Kenji Mizoguchi, Max Ophüls, and Jean Cocteau, by centering their critical evaluations on a film’s mise en scène.
In order to fully understand auteur theory, one needs to clarify exactly what the term “mise en scène” refers to.
To quote from Susan Hayward’s book, Cinema Studies : The Key Concepts, the term mise en scène refers to :
” Originally a theater term meaning ‘staging’, it crossed over to signify the film production practices involved in the framing of shots. Thus, first it connotes setting, costume and lighting, and second, movement within the frame. It became endowed with a more specific meaning by the Cahiers du cinéma group who used it to justify their appellation of certain American film-makers as auteurs .” (Hayward p.231)
We see the term “auteur”emerging in the writings of French film critics and directors of the silent era in the 1920’s. Hayward traces the roots of the idea of “authorship” back to earlier than the 1950’s and earlier even than the 1920’s, showing that it was an idea that existed before Cahiers Du Cinéma had popularized it. She points out that the term ‘author’s film’ (Autorenfilm) had already been coined as early as 1913 in Germany.
Autorenfilm emerged partly as a response to the French Film d’Art (art cinema) movement which began in 1908 and which proved extremely popular. Film d’Art was particularly successful in attracting middle-class audiences to cinema theaters because of its appearance of respectability as art cinema.
Lotte H. Eisner, in her book The Haunted Screen: Expressionism in the German Cinema and the Influence of Max Reinhardt, points out that the German term Autorenfilm, is associated with the controversial issue of the authorship of a film. Some of the authors of film scripts started claiming authorship not just of the script but of the film itself, which is traditionally an honor accorded to the director of a film. In contrast to the German point of view, in the French concept of autuerism during the 1920’s, the director, or “maker” of the film was unambiguously considered the auteur, irrespective of who had written the script.
The term developed further later on with regard to Hollywood directors and films. Given that these directors were working under the aegis of Hollywood, they had no control over the script but they could stage their shots and so be deemed to have a discernible style. As Hayward points out, “Mise-en-scène is the expressive tool at the film-maker’s disposal which a critic can read to determine the specificity of the cinematographic work. That is, the critic can identify the particular style of a specific film-maker and thereby point to it as an authorial sign.”
As auteur theory extended to art cinema as well, it rounded out even more, arguing that the film-makers that could be identified as auteurs could be seen as generators or creators rather than merely producers of films. This further widening of its frame of reference has meant that, although art cinema is considered primarily a European cinema, that international cinema, such as Japanese, Indian, Australian, Canadian and Latin-American film-makers could also be included in the canon — as well as certain films made by representatives of some minority groups.
There has been widespread criticism of the cult of auterism, especially the way that the idea was developed by Andrew Sarris — which elevated certain directors to cult status.
Sarris argued that auteurism was a way to show up “good” directors who made “good” films, as opposed to “bad” directors who make “bad” films.
The modern attitude to auteurism appears to be that only directors with a very distinctive personal style can be classed as auteurs, especially when it applies to the mise en scène of the film.
Several critics have criticized the entire notion of auteurism on the grounds that such a philosophy tends to grade art and the work of an individual artist, whereas art is something that is subjective and an individual expression of the artist, and that creators of art should therefore not be compared to one another.
One could add to this argument the fact that a film is a complex work of art which consists of many factors and the contributions of many artists among the crew and cast, and that at least some of what makes the whole, comes from the other contributors — after all, it would be much more difficult to make an excellent film when you have to work with abysmal actors or camera crew, for example. (Although casting is of course part of the director’s contribution.)
I personally feel that although the latter criticism holds some water, comparing films, actors and directors is inevitable. We do it with books, we do it with all forms of art. And in doing that, we can discern that there most certainly are directors who have a style and specific hallmarks characteristic of that specific director. (So, to me, not necessarily ‘good’, but ‘distinctive’.)
…which brings me to Quentin Tarantino. (Finally!)
Not only does Tarantino’s themes and mise en scène bear his distinctive style, but Tarantino qualifies for the literal meaning of “authorship” in the sense that he writes his own screenplays, and tends to be involved in the production of his films as well. Therefore, although the auteur status of a director is usually based mainly on a unique or personally characteristic use of mise en scène, in Tarantino’s case, these common characteristics extend wider, to the actual script itself as well.
Most of Tarantino’s well-known films have features in common which I shall discuss with reference to Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill 1 and 2, Death Proof, Jackie Brown, Inglorious Basterds, and Django.
Reservoir Dogs shows certain exceptions to the distinctive style that Tarantino eventually developed. Although it was Tarantino’s first ‘big’ mainstream film, it was produced on a very small budget, since he was not well-known enough to receive extensive financial backing at that point in time.
A recurring theme in Kill Bill 1 and 2, Inglorious Basterds, Deathproof and Django, is the theme of revenge. It is in fact the main theme in all of the latter mentioned films. It is a smaller theme in Reservoir Dogs; when a sadistic killer is gunned down by a policeman, and where betrayal is met with pain and rage, and inferred revenge.
Although themes do not usually in themselves establish auteurship, I would like to argue that there is a similarity in how Tarantino’s themes, and in particular the revenge theme is presented, that is quite a distinctive feature of Tarantino’s style. The most well-known aspect of this style, is the way in which Tarantino makes use of gratuitous violence. Tarantino uses extreme violence in both establishing a ‘reason’ for revenge to be taken, as well as in the revenge itself. An aspect of Tarantino’s revenge themes, is that it is the victims themselves who take revenge, the most direct and personal example being The Bride in Kill Bill.
Another thing that Tarantino does, is to subvert the realities of social structures; he makes the traditional underdog appear strong, able, and moreover, motivated to take revenge for violence visited upon them as an individual and /or a group: in Kill Bill and Deathproof, it is women who have been the victims of male violence, who then take revenge on their oppressors. In Inglourious Basterds, it is Jews taking revenge on Nazi’s, even blowing up Hitler himself in a visually direct and fantastical moment of gleeful wish-fulfilment playing out on the cinema screen. In Django, it is a black man who takes revenge on a bunch of inhuman predominantly white slavers. In Reservoir Dogs, the traditional “cop vs robber” tables are turned, and the “mole” policeman who infiltrated the robber’s nest begs forgiveness from a robber for his role as betrayer.
Tarantino’s films are morally ambiguous. They tend to show raw emotions rather than to take a philosophical or ethical stance as to whether it is indeed morally correct or permissible to take violent vigilante revenge. It is taken for granted that violence will be reciprocated with violence.
Another characteristic of Tarantino films, is that the characters tend to make constant use of foul language and to a lesser extent make racial slurs and racist and sexist remarks. This would seemingly be done in an effort to make the dialogue more realistic; and yet Tarantino’s dialogue has a very characteristic, almost stilted style; often contrasting strangely with the situation, and thereby tending to inject (usually black) humor and give it an almost absurd, surreal, folklore-ish feel.
For instance, one of the crooks in Reservoir Dogs, while being briefed for an armed robbery, becomes involved in an argument with his boss about his codename being “Mr Pink”. In Pulp Fiction, the crooks discuss the difference between French and American hamburgers. In the same film, in a noisy cafè, the crime boss’s employee discusses “uncomfortable silences” with the crime boss’ wife.
Even more characteristically of Tarantino dialogue, the characters, usually criminals, would in a blackly humorous ironic way become involved in discussions about their code of ethics: In Reservoir Dogs a bunch of crooks sit arguing in a diner before attempting an armed robbery heist, about whether one should tip a waitress or not.
In Pulp Fiction, the criminals argue about whether giving another man’s wife a foot massage is enough justification for having the massager thrown off a fourth story balcony.
Another aspect of Tarantino’s films, is that they tend to show many postmodernist hallmarks, such as being referential towards other films.
The following passage from The Routledge Companion to Postmodernism can be applied closely to Tarantino’s films:
“… in the postmodern condition, … a loss of a sense of reality and so the emergence of ‘a new kind of flatness, of depthlessness, a new kind of superficiality in the most literal sense’.
This effacement of the real through the ‘commodification of objects’, aesthetic and otherwise, has ramifications across the entire culture: not only in painting, architecture and the perceived organization of space but also in film, novels, poetry, and indeed in theory itself.
Loss of historical reality in what has now become ‘a field of stylistic and discursive heterogeneity without a norm’ leads to the replacement of parody by pastiche. Whereas formerly parody imitated another style with the firm intention of mocking, satirizing or at least making a judgment on it, today pastiche reproduces formal features for the pleasure of citing them…”
Tarantino, a great lover of cinema, tends to pastiche genres to the point of parody. In Django, he does a tongue-in-cheek pastiche of the typical Western movie, right down to the folksy theme song and hero-silhouetted-on-a prancing-horse, that almost seems to make it a parody to the point of mockery.
In Kill Bill, he also does a skit on Eastern Martial Arts films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, to the point of a cartoon-like parody, that would have been humorous if it hadn’t been so graphically violent.
Tarantino also often mixes up the chronology of his narrative, in typically postmodern style. Reservoir Dogs and Kill Bill especially, tend to jump from the current action, back to flashbacks in the narrative history of several of the characters’ lives, and back to the present again, and back and forth to and from events leading up to the current action, quite frequently.
Regarding “loss of historical reality” as mentioned in the aforementioned quote from the Companion to Postmodernism, Tarantino applies revisionist techniques to bolster the wish-fulfillment aspect of some of his revenge themes, going as far as revising a huge chunk of Second World War history in Inglourious Basterds, by having the protagonists of the film kill Hitler and Goebbels among a bunch of other Nazi’s in a burning cinema theater.
Tarantino makes frequent use of the role of “fate” or “accident” in his screenplays, starting as early as Reservoir Dogs where the “mole” policeman is shot on a pure off-chance by a civilian.
He makes frequent use of bathroom scenes, where a character is alone in the bathroom, perhaps the most memorable one being where John Travolta is sitting on the toilet with a book and is subsequently “accidentally” shot into smithereens with a shotgun, which also happens to be an example of a Tarantino situation born out of pure chance or “accident”, as one of the characters had gone back to his apartment to fetch a treasured watch and then stays a bit longer to eat something while the gangster looking for him just happened to choose that specific moment to go to the toilet.
One of the hallmarks of Tarantino’s mise en scène style is varying camera movements, distances and camera angles. Especially where extreme violence is portrayed, Tarantino tends to vary his camera distance, angle and focus, and the camera often moves while the action is taking place. For instance, in a scene where a man’s ear is being cut off, (in Reservoir Dogs) the action is not directly shown; the camera moves and the viewer is only shown an oblique shot of the severed ear. Often, the camera blurs and pans away when someone is being shot or tortured — perhaps a necessary maneuver to make the films more bearable to watch, since the violence tends to be very gory, often with bits of gore and bodily fluids blowing out of a body that is being shot.
I’d like to argue that this technique makes the violence more, rather than less intimate and immediate, almost as if the viewer was present at the scene, but cannot bear to watch and keeps looking away, and then back again. For instance, in Django, Tarantino uses montage (a technique in film editing in which a series of short shots are edited into a sequence to form a continuous whole), while showing snippets of a man being torn apart by dogs. Most Tarantino films have so much violence, that even with some of the scenes only showing implied violence, the sum total of the violence is enough to label his films in total as “very violent”.
Another common aspect of Tarantino’s mise en scène, is the point of view shots that are shot from where the viewer would be if he or she were part of the action. This includes ‘Corpse’ Point of View, which is where the viewer would be if they were dead, (or in the case of Inglourious Basterds) a victim (when a Nazi cross is carved onto Landa’s forehead).
Besides in Inglourious Basterds, ‘Corpse’ shots are also seen in :
Pulp Fiction : When Marsellus wakes up after being hit by Butch’s car, and later when Butch hits Maynard.
In Four Rooms : While Chester listens to Ted’s monologue.
In Jackie Brown : Jackie and Ray looking at a dead Ordell .
In Kill Bill: Volume 1: The Deadly Vipers and Sheriff McGraw looking at The ‘dead ‘ Bride.
In Kill Bill: Volume 2 : Budd burying The Bride alive, and also Elle Driver looking at Budd suffering.
In Death Proof : Pam looking at Stuntman Mike, and Stuntman Mike being hit by Abernathy.
In addition to ‘Corpse POV’, Tarantino is also famous for featuring ‘trunk’ shots, which is rather similar to the “corpse” point of view, but with the camera looking out of an enclosed space, most often as viewed from the trunk of a car. These are seen (literally from the trunk of a car) in Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill 1 and 2, Death Proof, Jackie Brown, and possibly more.
Tarantino is also fond of using 360 degree tracking shots.
He often focuses on feet, apparently due to him having a foot fetish.
He is also known for his “God’s Eye” point of view, where the scene is filmed with the camera directly above the actors.
Other aspects that frequently appear in Tarantino films:
• Mirror shots where actors talk to themselves in the mirror.
• Extremely discomfiting torture scenes.
• Car scenes with medium shots and close shots of the characters in the car.
• Restaurant and bar scenes.
• Dark suits with ties and white shirts worn by the characters
• Anachronistic sets and costuming, for instance the fifties cum eighties style “look” in hairstyles, costuming, lighting and set in Pulp Fiction, as well as Elvis glasses for Django.
- Characters having phone conversations.
- Mexican standoffs , which is where more than two opponents aim at each other with guns.
I am sure that there are more features characteristic to Tarantino films, but hopefully I have mentioned enough features common to his films to confidently assert my conclusion that his films definitely do wear a stamp characteristic to his work, and that he therefore most certainly qualifies as an “auteur”, for those inclined to credit auteur theory.
