True Romance (1993)
Clarence Worley: You just said you love me, now if I say I love you and just throw caution to the wind and let the chips fall where they may and you're lying to me I'm gonna f@ckin' die.
True Romance has the somewhat rare obstacle of having an utter smorgasbord of excellent secondary characters that can and do outshine the story's leading characters.
Due, in part to clever dialogue and the capability of the actors to make their roles as memorable as they are.
Those scenes always take center stage whenever this film is talked about and quoted from by Tarantino fans. Even though Tony Scott directs it, Tarantino's writing has placed it as a Tarantino movie in the fans' eyes.
Clarence (Christian Slater), a lonely video store worker in Detroit, spends his birthday at a triple feature Kung Fu Film fest where Alabama (Patricia Arquette) spills popcorn on him. They spend the night together and fall in love. Very very fast and very, very hard.
And so begins their high-stakes adventure when Clarence confronts Alabama's pimp, and instead of grabbing her suitcase of clothes, he accidentally snatches a suitcase full of cocaine.
Deciding to hightail it for Hollywood where, they figure, they can sell it all in one shot to some Hollywood big wig they are unaware of the very, very dangerous men working for local mafia boss Blue Lou.
The makings of so many Getaway premises, an ex-video store worker/enthusiast, Tarantino unleashes what becomes his forte for glamorized violence, dangerous twists, colorful characters, and stylized, clever dialogue.
All of which is on display with all the frenzied, passionate enthusiasm of a newcomer hellbent on making a name for themselves. And he does, very, very effectively.
I've lost count on the times I've seen this and own a DVD of it that does get put to use, and since it had been a while since last viewing it, it made me smirk to see it nominated here.