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April 1995, Week 2

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Subject:
From:
Robert Burnham <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 13 Apr 1995 14:36:21 CDT
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----------------------------Original message----------------------------
On Apr 12,  4:49pm, [log in to unmask] wrote:
> Subject: Reservoir Dogs
> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
> I recently saw reservoir dogs and it has to be the most bloody movie I've
> seen. Aside from the gore of it all, I thought the acting was superb, with
> Keitel and Penn at the forefront.
> Did anyone make anything out of the colors each charater represented? For
> example, why was Keitel Mr. White...so on. I'd be interested in your
responses
>                                                           Chuck
>-- End of excerpt from [log in to unmask]
 
Chuck,
 
I've got a couple of ideas concerning the "colours" (spell it right - the
Canadian way ;)
 
1.  As a plot device to instigate the humourous scene involving the "Mr.
Pink" appelation.  On one level, Tarantino is highlighting the
ultra-masculine flavour of the movie (is the only woman with speaking lines
the waitress in the beginning?).  No one wants to be pink as it is associated
with feminine or homosexual attributes.
 
2.  Perhaps Tarantino is poking fun at the PC movement's preoccupation with
"naming" and the power therein invoked.  By chosing colours, an innocuous ,
unhierarchical (except for the pink) set of signifiers, Tarantino allows the
audience to view the character's divorced from a personal signifier.  As
stated in the movie, the colours are ostensibly to keep the characters from
"knowing too much" about each other - to avoid creating a situation where one
is caught all will be.  However, the audience too is not allowed into the
personal realm of the name and perhaps denied a fundamental way of "knowing"
them.  Again, this may also be what Tarantino is after - collapsing ways of
knowing and ways in which patterns of meaning are constructed of "others"
through somewhat arbitrary sets of signs.  Remember when the "old guy" (can't
recall his name - the boss) when he tells them their names?  Its totally
arbitrary - just like much naming is.
     A cool book on this is Tzvetan Todorov's "Conquest of America" where
he describes Cortes' and the Spanish colonization of the "New World" and how
it was accomplished as much through naming and linguistic appropriation as
through fire and sword.  "Language has always been the companion of empire".
I digress.
 
Hope this helps Chuck.
Scott
 
 
--
R. Scott Burnham                        Whatcha makin' there?
York University                         Looks like sodie-pop -
North York, Canada                      Watch it fizz...
E-Mail: [log in to unmask]                     - Foghorn Leghorn

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