Daily Dialogue — August 8, 2011
Jules: Hey kids! How you boys doin’?
[to man laying on the couch]
Jules: Hey, keep chillin’. You know who we are? We’re associates of your business partner Marsellus Wallace. You do remember your business partner don’t you? Let me take a wild guess here. You’re Brett, right?
Brett: Yeah.
Jules: I thought so. You remember your business partner Marsellus Wallace, don’t you, Brett?
Brett: Yeah, yeah, I remember him.
Jules: Good. Looks like me an Vincent caught you boys at breakfast. Sorry about that. Whatcha havin’?
Brett: Hamburgers.
Jules: Hamburgers! The cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast. What kind of hamburgers?
Brett: Ch-cheeseburgers.
Jules: No, no no, where’d you get ‘em? McDonalds? Wendy’s? Jack in the Box? Where?
Brett: Big Kahuna Burger.
Jules: Big Kahuna Burger. That’s that Hawaiian burger joint. I hear they got some tasty burgers. I ain’t never had one myself. How are they?
Brett: They’re good.
Jules: Mind if I try one of yours? This is yours here, right?
[Picks up burger and takes a bite]
Jules: Mmm-mmmm. That is a tasty burger. Vincent, ever have a Big Kahuna Burger?
[Vincent shakes his head]
Jules: Wanna bite? They’re real tasty.
Vincent: Ain’t hungry.
Jules: Well, if you like burgers give ’em a try sometime. I can’t usually get ’em myself because my girlfriend’s a vegitarian which pretty much makes me a vegitarian. But I do love the taste of a good burger. Mm-mm-mm. You know what they call a Quarter Pounder with cheese in France?
Brett: No.
Jules: Tell ’em, Vincent.
Vincent: A Royale with cheese.
Jules: A Royale with cheese! You know why they call it that?
Brett: Because of the metric system?
Jules: Check out the big brain on Brett! You’re a smart motherfucker. That’s right. The metric system. What’s in this?
Brett: Sprite.
Jules: Sprite, good. You mind if I have some of your tasty beverage to wash this down?
Brett: Go right ahead.
Jules: Ah, hit the spot.
Jules: You, flock of seagulls, you know why we’re here? Why don’t you tell my man Vincent where you got the shit hid at?
Marvin: It’s over th…
Jules: I don’t remember askin’ you a Goddamn thing! You were saying?
Roger: It’s in the cupboard.
[Vincent starts looking in the upper cupboard]
Roger: No, no, the one by your kn-knees.
Jules: We happy?
[Vincent continues staring at the briefcase’s contents]
Jules: Vincent! We happy?
Vincent: Yeah, we happy.
Brett: I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name. I got yours, Vincent, right? But I didn’t get yours…
Jules: My name’s Pitt. And your ass ain’t talkin’ your way out of this shit.
Brett: No, no, I just want you to know… I just want you to know how sorry we are that things got so fucked up with us and Mr. Wallace. We got into this thing with the best intentions and I never…
Jules: [Jules shoots the man on the couch] I’m sorry, did I break your concentration? I didn’t mean to do that. Please, continue, you were saying something about best intentions. What’s the matter? Oh, you were finished! Well, allow me to retort. What does Marsellus Wallace look like?
Brett: What?
Jules: What country are you from?
Brett: What? What? Wh — ?
Jules: “What” ain’t no country I’ve ever heard of. They speak English in What?
Brett: What?
Jules: English, motherfucker, do you speak it?
Brett: Yes! Yes!
Jules: Then you know what I’m sayin’!
Brett: Yes!
Jules: Describe what Marsellus Wallace looks like!
Brett: What?
Jules: Say ‘what’ again. Say ‘what’ again, I dare you, I double dare you motherfucker, say what one more Goddamn time!
— Jules (Samuel L. Jackson), Brett (Frank Whaley), Marvin (Phil LaMarr), Vincent (John Travolta), Pulp Fiction (1994), written by Quentin Tarantino, based on stories by Quentin Tarantion & Roger Avary
http://movieclips.com/e/D4b2z/
The actual scene is here.
The Daily Dialogue theme for the week is interrogations, suggested by Teddy Pasternak. Today’s suggestion by Sean Z P Harris.
Trivia: Speculation abounds as to the nature of the mysterious glowing contents of the case:
* Could it be Elvis’s gold suit, seen worn by Val Kilmer (as Elvis) in True Romance?
* The most persistent theory (most usually attributed to a friend of a friend who saw it posted on a message board by someone whose brother had read a report of a radio interview with Tarantino himself) is that it is Marcellus Wallace’s soul. The story goes that when the Devil takes a person’s soul, it is removed through the back of the head (this isn’t part of any known religion, but this is what the message board posters say). When we see the back of Marcellus’s head he has a Band-Aid covering the precise spot indicated by tradition for soul removal. Perhaps Marcellus sold his soul to the devil which would also explain why the combination to open the briefcase is 666.
* Quentin Tarantino has said that the band-aid on the back of Marsellus Wallace’s neck had nothing to do with an allusion to the Devil stealing Marsellus’s soul… but that the actor Ving Rhames had a scar on the back of his neck he wanted to cover up.
* Or could it be simply a 20-watt light bulb?
* According to Roger Avary, who co-wrote the script with Quentin Tarantino, the original plan was to have the briefcase contain diamonds. This seemed neither exciting nor original, so Avary and Tarantino decided to have the briefcase’s contents never appear on screen; this way each filmgoer could mentally “fill in the blank” with whatever struck his or her imagination as best fitting the description “so beautiful”. The orange light bulb (projecting shimmering light onto the actors’ faces) was a last-minute decision and added a completely unintended fantastic element.
* In a radio interview with ‘Howard Stern’ in late 2003, Quentin Tarantino was asked by a caller the contents of the briefcase, and he answered, “It’s whatever the viewer wants it to be.”
Dialogue On Dialogue: Tarantino needs no prompt when it comes to his dialogue. What’s your take on this exchange?