The Gangster in the Director’s Chair
Taking into account the film’s tossed-about chronology, a time machine might be thought the obvious solution to the Pulp Fiction briefcase riddle. And the view that the obvious solution is the correct one is supported by how Marsellus, the gangster boss who owns whatever’s inside the briefcase, is portrayed as resembling a film director, at the same as Tarantino takes a decidedly gangster-like approach to the task of making the film.
To Marsellus first, and his first scene, in which he is making sure that Butch understands the importance of following the script and taking a dive in the fifth. Marsellus is shot from behind, emphasising that he’s in the director’s chair, is the one with the vision. A kind of grace note, there’s a plaster on the back of his head to suggest a movie screen (among other rectangular associations). There is also Mia’s first scene – watching Vincent on a set of screens – to point to how her husband likes to keep a lens on the people he’s ordering about. One supposes that even Vincent and Mia’s conversation outside the house, in which Vincent urges that it’s unnecessary for Marsellus, however long he lives, to learn about the events of the evening, is being recorded. One wonders also what instructions for the evening Marsellus might have given Mia.
As for Tarantino’s gangster qualities, the most pronounced would have to be the delight he takes in subterfuge. For example, Marvin’s head popping up after it’s supposed to have been blown off, and then Honey Bunny’s rant with it’s different endings – two crucial clues indicating the presence of divergent timelines – are disguised as continuity errors. Notice too how Tarantino uses conventions as screens. So when Bonnie returns home, a law-abiding interpretation of that footage would be that it’s a prediction of what might happen on her return. As well though there is an illicit reading, which has the footage as Tarantino showing another instance of the timeline in which Marvin’s head remains intact. Or there’s Captain Koons handing Butch-as-a-child the gold watch and Butch waking up as an adult. Normally that would be just Butch waking from a dream. But while it is primarily that, it’s also Tarantino teasing the idea of a time machine.
You even have to be on the lookout for clues in the film’s foul language. When Jimmie, talking to Jules, uses the elegant phrase – ‘You’re fucking my shit up’ – that phrase is not random. It links Jimmie (and thereby Tarantino, who plays him) to Marsellus, whom we have already seen (though it hasn’t happened yet) being raped by Zed. It’s a double-whammy – simply engineering a clue around such a phrase shows a gangster sensibility, and then there is the clue itself, placing director and hoodlum in the same ballpark, so to speak.
24 February, 2026
