Your Behind-the-Scenes Guide to Quentin Tarantino Movies — From ‘Reservoir Dogs’ to ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’

‘Reservoir Dogs’ (1992)

DALE SHERMAN: Quentin Tarantino originally conceived this heist-gone-wrong movie as a low-budget film using friends and acquaintances and budgeted with the money he made from selling his script for True Romance (directed by Tony Scott and released in 1993). Instead, thanks to the hard work of Tarantino and others, and especially after actor Harvey Keitel agreed to be in the film, the budget rose to over $1 million. The film was a critical and financial success, but also controversial due to its violence, especially a torture scene that saw several distressed people walk out of early showings of the movie. At the 1992 Toronto International Film Festival, Tarantino saw famed horror director Wes Craven (Nightmare on Elm Street, Last House on the Left) walk out of a showing of Reservoir Dogs for this very reason, which both surprised and pleased Tarantino in how effective his work had been.

Although we didn’t realize it at the time, Reservoir Dogs was the start of Tarantino using fake product-placement that would recur in all his other films. Jackrabbit Slim’s – the restaurant/club where Mia and Vincent dance in Pulp Fiction – and Big Kahuna Burgers got brief mentions in Reservoir Dogs, while the radio station heard playing “Stuck in the Middle With You” is one made-up for Tarantino’s abandoned comedy, My Best Friend’s Birthday. Big Kauna Burgers would reappear in several later movies, as do Red Apple Cigarettes, Teriyaki Donuts, Acuna Boys Tex-Mex Food, and G.O. Juice. All made-up just for Tarantino’s movies, but so common that you’d swear they must be available somewhere to buy.

‘Pulp Fiction’ (1994)

DALE SHERMAN: The critical and financial success of Reservoir Dogs, along with having two of his earlier scripts — True Romance and Natural Born Killers (1994 and directed by Oliver Stone) — being made into films right after Reservoir Dogs helped to show that Tarantino was very bankable. The studio Tri-Star first set-up a deal for Tarantino’s next film, only to balked at the usage of heroin in one scene and the overall violence in the script. New Line Studios next considered the film but passed, leading to Miramax taking on the project and finding themselves with a huge success on their hands; proving Tarantino was more than a “one-hit wonder” and making Miramax his studio for many years afterwards.

It was clear with Pulp Fiction that Tarantino liked hiring two types of actors, the first being those that he had worked with before and knew could produce excellent work. Besides the return of Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, and Steve Buscemi from Reservoir Dogs, Tarantino brought in two men who had auditioned for Reservoir Dogs but didn’t make the cut: Ving Rhames — so memorable as Marsellus in Pulp Fiction — and Samuel L. Jackson, who would make some type of appearance in nearly every Tarantino film after this one. Tarantino also sought out established actors that he knew were good in earlier films or television, but had not been given enough opportunities to shine in recent years. This can be seen with the way Tarantino fought the studios in defending his pick of John Travolta for Vincent, a role that re-established Travolta’s star-power after a dip in the 1980s, while Bruce Willis was an inspired choice for the boxer in the film. Tarantino would continue his pursuit of such actors in other films, such as Robert Forster and Pam Grier in Jackie Brown, and David Carradine in the Kill Bill films, among others.

‘Jackie Brown’ (1997)

DALE SHERMAN: Although it would be three years before Tarantino would direct another film, it was hardly a case of being on vacation. Amongst other projects, Tarantino filmed a comedic segment of the film Four Rooms (1995), as well as co-starring in Robert Rodriguez’s From Dusk Til Dawn (1996), which featured a script by Tarantino.

Jackie Brown would be the only movie so far by Tarantino based on a novel; in this case Elmore Leonard’s 1992 tome Rum Punch. Tarantino changed the main character of the novel, Jackie Burke, from a white woman to that of African American and cast Pam Grier in the role. Grier, who had gained fame in the 1970s for her appearances in several “Blaxploitation” action movies, had settled into playing secondary roles in movies by the 1990s to the point that Tarantino had to convince her he wanted her for the lead role. The film featured the return of Samuel L. Jackson, along with Michael Keaton, Robert De Niro, Bridget Fonda, and Robert Forster — another case of a popular actor who received a career boost after appearing in a Tarantino movie (and who was nearly cast as the gang’s leader in Reservoir Dogs). The film did not do as well at the box-office as Pulp Fiction, yet has grown in popularity over the years and is usually considered one of Tarantino’s better films. As a side note, Michael Keaton would play the same character from Jackie Brown in Steven Soderbergh’s film Out of Sight (1998), which was another Elmore Leonard adaptation.

‘Kill Bill Volumes 1 & 2’ (2003 & 2004)

DALE SHERMAN: While Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2 were released as two separate films over a six-month period, Tarantino has always considered the two volumes to be the fourth movie in his filmography (although some movie posters did advertise Kill Bill Volume 2 as his “5^th movie”). The two parts would eventually be edited together as Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, which has been seen rarely over the years. Uma Thurman, who had appeared as Mia in Pulp Fiction, returned as the lead in the movie(s), although with the return of Michael Madsen and even Samuel L. Jackson (in a small role as Rufus, the piano player at the ill-fated wedding in Volume 2). Michael Parks had earlier played a character called Sheriff McGraw in the Tarantino-written film From Dusk Till Dawn and returns to the same role in Kill Bill Volume 1 (he’ll play the character again in both Death Proof and the film Planet Terror). Parks played a second role, as Esteban Vihaio, in Volume 2, much like how Gordon Liu played two different roles in Volume 1 (as Johnny Mo) and Volume 2 (Pai Mei).

Tarantino first began writing the villain, Bill, with Samuel L. Jackson in mind, but then switched the role to be more of a “James Bond villain.” Tarantino eventually went after Warren Beatty for the role, but delays in filming and Tarantino’s suggestions that Beatty play the role like David Carradine led to Beatty suggesting that Tarantino simply hire Carradine. As with previous films featuring actors who had seen dips in their careers, Kill Bill helped briefly resurrect Carradine’s career before his death in 2009. There was talk for years of Tarantino possibly doing another movie in the Kill Bill series, which would feature the grown-up daughters of Thurman’s and Vivica A. Fox’s characters in the movie. While it is always possible, at this late point in time, it is probably not going to occur.

It was around the time that Tarantino was making the Kill Bill movies that he hit upon a theory in interviews about his films — namely that many of his movies take place in what he called a “Realer than Real Universe,” while some, like the Kill Bill films, are in a “Movie Movie Universe,” meaning that they would be movies that characters from his “Realer than Real Universe” would go see at theaters. The films typically considered part of the “Movie Movie Universe” are those that have a fantastical/magical/horror element, such as seen in the Kill Bill movies and From Dusk Till Dawn. There have been arguments by fans as to what films should be placed in each category, but it creates one fan-based theory: Kiddo’s gang is set-up in a very similar fashion to the team of women from Mia’s failed television pilot in Pulp Fiction. If Kill Bill is a movie made in this “Realer than Real Universe,” could it be Mia starring in a sequel to the pilot that somehow got famous through fans on the internet? Probably not, but that’s what fan theories are all about.

‘Death Proof’ (2007)

DALE SHERMAN: This film was part of an experiment in packaging, with a condensed version of the film first released with a shortened version of Robert Rodriguez’s Planet Terror in a ready-made double-feature (featuring ads and trailers for non-existent movies by other directors), called Grindhouse. Death Proof is about Stuntman Mike, played by Kurt Russell, who is stalking women and then using his “death proof” stunt car to kill them. The initial concept of Grindhouse was to see a return of the double-feature to movie theaters, with hopes that the combo’s success would lead to follow-ups by other directors. Unfortunately, due to various elements, Grindhouse did poorly at the box-office.

Later, the two movies were re-released as separate movies; both with additional footage added to flesh out the films. This re-editing was always the intention of the filmmakers after Grindhouse had ran its course; by doing so, however, it gave fans a chance to see the subtle changes Tarantino made in editing when producing a longer cut of one of his movies (which he had previously done with Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair and later would do with his extended version of The Hateful Eight). This would not only include scenes and dialogue added back in the longer cut, but even alternate takes of scenes (such as Stuntman Mike’s deadly serious reaction when threatening one woman in the Grindhouse version of the film changing to a humorous grinning one in the extended version).

‘Inglourious Basterds’ (2009)

DALE SHERMAN: Tarantino’s return to box-office success came with this surprising alternate-universe version of a World War II action movie. Starring Brad Pitt as the leader of soldiers hunting down Nazis behind enemy lines, the movie would also introduce American audiences to Christoph Waltz as the villain Col. Landa — leading to Waltz winning an Academy Award for his performance. The film features a lot of twists and turns — such as introducing characters that normally would be the leads in such a film, only to kill them off in intense, violent scenes, but perhaps was most shocking in its ending, which involves (spoilers) the violent death of Hitler much earlier in the war than in reality. As mentioned, the film was a box-office success and led directly in Tarantino’s next film, Django Unchained.

‘Django Unchained’ (2012)

DALE SHERMAN: Tarantino borrowed the name of the hero from a series of Spaghetti Westerns that used the name for the gunslinging hero, although Franco Nero only played the “authentic” version of the character twice (thus the in-joke in Django Unchained where Franco Nero appears briefly and mentions that he knows how to pronounce Django’s name). The film [which starred Jamie Foxx in the titular role] would see the return of Christoph Waltz from Tarantino’s previous film, as well as Samuel L. Jackson, Zoe Bell and Michael Parks (with Kurt Russell nearly returning in a part that was later written out of the script). It would feature the first appearance of Bruce Dern in a Tarantino film, who would go on to play roles in The Hateful Eight and Once Upon a Time in … Hollywood, and several familiar faces, such as Jonah Hill, Don Johnson, Tom Wopat, in brief roles as well. Leonardo DiCaprio also made his first appearance in a Tarantino film as the villain Calvin J. Candie, and returns in Tarantino’s new film, Once Upon a Time in … Hollywood.

‘The Hateful Eight’ (2015)

DALE SHERMAN: Tarantino originally planned to jump right back into making another western after Django Unchained, when in 2014 his initial script for The Hateful Eight was leaked online. At first Tarantino was adamant that he would not make the film after having the early draft leaked, but after a script-reading with Samuel L. Jackson and Kurt Russell, amongst others, Tarantino decided to rewrite the script and go ahead with production of the film. Starring with Jackson and Russell were Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, and Bruce Dern — who had all previously appeared in Tarantino movies (Zoe Bell and James Parks also returned from earlier Tarantino movies, albeit in smaller parts), along with Jennifer Jason Leigh and Walton Goggins filling out the main cast.

The tense movie, with most of its violence appearing near the end of the film, was released in two forms — a regular cut and a “roadshow” cut with some additional footage. The “roadshow” version would later be re-edited into four episodes and shown on Netflix in 2019, which is a concept Tarantino had been toying with since 2005 when he directed an episode of CSI in part to see how television production could benefit some of his story ideas in the future that would be too long for a traditional theatrical cut.

‘Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood’ (2019)

DALE SHERMAN: The ninth Tarantino film features Leonardo DiCaprio as a popular television actors of the 1960s struggling to regain his footing in Hollywood, along with Brad Pitt as his stuntman and friend. The movie dips into the changing mores of the film industry in the late 1960s and early 1970s, where many were trying to figure out how to survive the changes in audiences’ taste during the turmoil of the hippie culture, while also reflecting upon Tarantino’s personal quest to showcase actors that were once sought after but then reduced to taking smaller and smaller roles.

Once Upon a Time also digs into the horrors of the Charles Mansion cult that led to the murder of Sharon Tate. Will Once Upon a Time go the route of Inglourious Basterds and once again alter the known timeline? Will we see the use of Red Apple Cigarettes and other fake products used in other Tarantino films? Will the movie fall within the “Realer than Real Universe” or the “Movie Movie” one? Will we eventually see an extended version like that of Kill Bill, Death Proof, and The Hateful Eight? We’ll all find out soon enough, and then anxiously wait to see what Tarantino will do next on the big or even small screen.