Netflix pick for 3/31/14 – ‘Reservoir Dogs’

Here is another one for the kids. You know, all you folks born in 1990 or after, far too young to even realize back in 1992 that a new hot young director had just exploded on to the scene with “Reservoir Dogs,” his first movie which just peeled back faces and made a lot of people sit up and take notice. Now that you folks are older, you may think of Quentin Tarantino as this dude who has been making crazy movies for the last twenty years. But once upon a time, he was the new kid on the block with a fresh new movie and if you haven’t seen this directorial debut from one of our finest filmmakers, then you need to do yourself a favor and rectify that quickly!

As for the rest of you out there, perhaps you just need a reminder to go back and check this out again because “Reservoir Dogs” just crackles with energy from start to finish, a bold movie about a diamond heist, but which refuses to show the heist. Instead we get the planning and build up, and we get the aftermath, and we get it all in a mostly non-linear fashion, which of course is now a Tarantino staple and has become expected, but at that time just blew people away because it wasn’t a move that was in vogue at the time (it has been for years now, thanks in large part to Tarantino and movies precisely like this one). Great actors, with Harvey Keitel holding it down in the middle and Tim Roth just about being one of the best, most underrated actors ever, great dialogue (obviously), a tight story and superb direction, there is a reason by this is considered to be one of the greatest indepedent films ever made. Kinda hard to argue with that, if you ask me.

So check out “Reservoir Dogs” on the Netflix Instant and be prepared to learn the meaning of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin.”