Race and Violence: A Study on Scorsese and Tarantino Films

Depictions of Race Through Violence in the Films of Scorsese and Tarantino

Hollywood seems to thrive on portrayals of violence. American audiences respond positively to violent, action-based films, which continue to perform particularly well at the box office. Some of these blockbusters glorify violence even further by highlighting patriotism in war films, making them both commercial and critical successes. These films let audiences admire American soldiers for killing their enemies and withstanding the savageries of warfare. In a nation that has arguably become desensitized to violence from witnessing recurring mass shootings and fatal racial tensions, it is no surprise that filmmakers Martin Scorsese and Quentin Tarantino manage to captivate

diverse audiences in cult-like fashion. Films such as Taxi Driver and Pulp Fiction, though extremely violent and grizzly in nature, remain popular and critically acclaimed. However, while Scorsese and Tarantino make extensive use of abrupt and shocking violence in their films, they construct the violence in opposing contexts using their own distinct and trademark film techniques. The contrasting depictions of the verbal and physical violence directed at the black characters in these two films result in complex and often conflicting commentaries on the ways in which the black man is depicted in film.
The most visceral displays of racialized violence in both films are preceded by scenes taking place within moving vehicles, so it is important to understand how each director’s visual and audial organization of these scenes influences our interpretation of their violent outcomes. These visual and audial cues also allow the audience to identify the dominant characters in the scenes. Dominance, a recurring theme in both films, allows these characters to perform violence against the black characters. In Pulp Fiction’s car scene, the dominant individuals sit in the front of the car, where the camera’s shallow focus on the faces of Jules and Vincent during their conversation indicates their authority over Marvin in the backseat. Tarantino shoots the dialogue in his car scene in a very conventional manner, using a style of editing resembling shot-reverse-shot, which allows the viewer to easily follow and engage with the conversation. In every frame, the viewer gets a close up of each character’s face as he looks and speaks in the direction of the camera. Dominance is established by these characters’ unrelenting control of the conversation. Marvin, whose face is out of focus in every shot, only speaks when called by Vincent. However, Tarantino refuses to let his face occupy the screen, so we only get Vincent’s reaction during his meek response. Even as Vincent turns around to question him further, the camera cuts to another close up of Vince, from Marvin’s point of view, with his extremely visible gun cocked directly at Marvin and the viewer. Confronted with the weapon that had just killed multiple people, the viewer knows that Vincent holds all of the power in this moment.
Nonetheless, the audience has no time to feel frightened because the gun goes off and blood is spattered across the car in an exaggerated and cartoonish manner. Tarantino prevents the viewer from feeling angry at the murder in favor of making the viewer laugh dismissively at Vincent’s “accident”. His reaction is one of nonchalance: “Oh man, I shot Marvin in the face,” he says, as if his act of ultimate violence had no repercussions. “Why the fuck did you do that?” responds Jules, incredulously. Although he poses the question the audience is thinking, his inflection and swearing provokes laughter from the audience. The ensuing argument over whether or not Jules hit a bump that caused the gun to go off only trivializes the shooting, and their struggle to find help to avoid getting noticed by the police serves to redirect the viewer’s attention away from Marvin’s nonsensical murder. Tarantino’s use of dialogue ultimately serves as a channel for comedy in order to subdue the violence of the scene; the dialogue’s actual content and message has no relevance to the implications of the irrational violence.
Tarantino maximizes this scene’s comedic effect by relying on a specific case of Murphy’s Law, where anything that can go wrong for the gangsters indeed goes wrong in outrageous fashion.

In effective comedic sequences, the audience believes they are more upstanding or morally righteous than the characters they are watching on screen. Marvin’s accidental murder is thus funny for the viewers, because the accident occurs to the film’s “bad guys” who are otherwise immune to law and order. This clears the viewer from any involvement with Marvin’s murder, for they are simply laughing at the gangsters’ plan go awry, even if it means an innocent black man is shot in the face without thought. Furthermore, Tarantino’s deliberate overuse of violence throughout Pulp Fiction undermines the significance of Marvin’s death because it erases any and all racial implications of this specific act of violence. The combination of the conventional editing techniques and conversational irony produces an entertaining atmosphere that allows the audience to watch the film in a passive mindset. Instead of allowing the viewer to question how the black character is terrorized and targeted by the dominant white characters in the film, the filmmaker uses Marvin’s death as a verbal prop, a running gag for Jimmie’s character to poke fun at in his own

home.
In the following scene, Tarantino uses references to Marvin’s murder for humorous effect. For example, as the characters literally (and figuratively) wash their hands of the murder inside Jimmie’s bathroom, Jules emasculates Marvin by feminizing his blood when comparing the blood-soaked towel to a “Maxi Pad”. Again, Tarantino’s pop culture references serve as a humorous diversion from the grotesque and senseless violence against the black character. When Tarantino’s character Jimmie appears on screen, he sarcastically asks Jules whether his garage serves as a “dead nigger storage” space. His deliberate repetition of the slur once again attempts to draw laughter from the audience in favor of interrogating the moral implications of Marvin’s death. Tarantino further emphasizes the black body as an object rather than a human being, referencing it as something to store. Jimmie sees Marvin’s body as a burden; his main concern is making sure his wife does not see the body, not why Marvin was killed in the first place.