The Offenders: Destiny Turns on the Radio, Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead, 2 Days in the Valley, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, Seven Psychopaths. Himself heavily inspired by his own cinematic interests, in the mid-nineties Quentin Tarantino proved to be the upstart to beat. Reservoir Dogs, itself a copy/homage of Hong Kong actioner City On Fire, already had led to some films aiming for the same whip-smart script and heightened violence (amongst them double Oscar winner The Usual Suspects), but it was after Pulp Fiction when everyone really tried to copy his style. Boasting a non-linear narrative full of oh-my-god-so-cool moments and characters who would spend entire conversations blabbering on about things entirely unimportant to the plot, it felt like a wholly fresh movie. And, rewatching it twenty years later, it still does, although the same can't be said of the copycats. In the years after its release a bunch of blatant imitators with supposedly witty dialogue and ensemble casts tried to match the height of Pulp Fiction to laughably poor results. Even though the direct imitators eventually stopped, the influence can still be seen in modern crime films. It's interesting to see Tarantino an oft-mimicked director. His work is almost entirely rooted in homage, so to copy him po-faced seems to be missing the point a little.
