Introduction
Mass fan following of popular Hollywood movies and television series have become a part of the popular culture today. It has become an important feature for popular culture in industrial society. Fandom is typically associated with popular music (or pop music), television series, movies, sports stars, actors, etc. this group is a heterogeneous group of people who are bonded by their homogeneous cultural taste. Thus, fans create a community by creating a form of textual production to circulate among themselves in order to create a fan community (Fiske). Fan culture is the upcoming genre of cultural studies which presents a deviation from the earlier pathological description of a fan as a potential fanatic (usually male) or the hysterical crowd (usually female (Storey). It is said to have various dimensions and various groups who are singularly identified due to their relation and categories of taste (Jenkins). Thus, fan culture may be defined as “a complex, multidimensional phenomenon, inviting many forms of participation and levels of engagement” (Jenkins 2). Fan cultures produce a parallel economy and culture all revolving around the mass media for instance fan fictions. They also breed a consumerist culture. This definition urges for a logical extension of the audience’s involvement with the mass media with construction of alternative texts and social identities (Jenkins). This paper aims to understand the fan culture of the movie Pulp Fiction by Quentin Tarantino. The movie is considered to one of the best creations of Tarantino and has supposedly a huge fan following. This paper aims to draw a profile of the fan culture around Pulp Fiction and the different layers of the same. And to do so we try to understand the discourse of fan culture and how the different forms of culture has been adopted by Pulp Fiction fans.
Fan Culture
Jenkins describes five characteristics of fandom. First, the fan watches the movie for many times in order to capture the intricate message in each text of the script. Second, fan culture involves getting involved in the fan culture’s reading practices and producing a set of “critical and interpretative practices” (Jenkins, p. 278). Third, it opens an avenue for consumerist culture. Jenkins here suggests that even though fans can provide their criticism or opinion about the movie to the producer, their input is seldom considered seriously. Fandom is only a platform wherein they may speak up their cultural preferences. Forth, fandom creates a form of cultural production that speaks of their cultural affiliation. There are fan artists, writers, video makers, and musicians who create work that speaks of the special interest of the fan community. Jenkins here points out that the way fandom’s creation works it fails to satisfy the copyright of the popular narrative and fandom does not recognize the difference between an artist and a consumer. Fifth, fandom functions as a parallel social group or community: “Fandom constitutes…a space…defined by its refusal of mundane values and practices, its celebration of deeply held emotions and passionately embraced pleasures. Fandom’s very existence represents a critique of conventional forms of consumer culture.” (Jenkins, p. 283).
Fan culture strives to create a more participatory culture. Jenkins suggests that the active role of fans in publicizing their culture is with the sole aim to “transform many Americans into spectators” (Jenkins 284). They use their community’s power to continue the program which had been decided not to be aired through mass movement. Thus, fan culture is a parallel group of people who have a liking for a particular cultural element.
Pulp Fiction
The fan culture of Pulp Fiction can be traced to its numerous websites which can be found in the internet. They are all sites with one common motive as has been argued by Jenkins to be the primary purpose of fan culture and that is to establish a community of similar cultural tastes and promote the film to non-viewers so that more people get in the community. This idea has been reiterated in one of the web pages: “If you are already a huge fan of Pulp Fiction you will LOVE this site!” (Pulp Fiction Fan Page)
This confirms the stature of the fan following of Pulp Fiction as a cultural group who act their part as active audience and aim to increase the viewership and fans for the movie. The fan communities range from websites to community groups in social community circles like Orkut. It has numerous fans that are enlisted as members and spread across different countries. Their one discussion point is regarding the characters in the movie and various other minute details like Jules and Vincent’s revolver in the movie. The movie’s fans have identified the model of the revolver and its make. This gives us a brief idea of the “undivided attention” that Jenkins speaks about while describing the different elements of fandom.
The culture of creating a parallel cultural art or story or commodities on the basis of the original screenplay of the movie is found among the fans of Pulp Fiction. This indicates the creation of fan fiction which is actually the extension of the storyline of the original screenplay with the main characters in the movie (Cumberland). One example of such a fan fiction is titled Don’t Go There Vince (FanFiction.net) where the fan of the movie states that even though he knows what happens in the movie still feels that this could have happened wherein Vince (played by John Travolta) falls in love with Mia Wallace (played by Uma Thurman) who was the Boss’s wife. Or another fiction called Vincent Vega’s Dilemma which had Vincent, Rod Parker, Alice Preston, and Jules Winnfield (FanFiction.net). These stories apparently have little connection to the film except for the characters in it. We thus see that fan fiction in case of Pulp Fiction war limited to stories which are published in the internet. But genderization of these fan fictions for the movie cannot be positively done.
There are Pulp Fiction arts which represent the characters in cartoon created by fans of the movie. This creation is an extension of the movie’s fan following beyond just watching the movie. Re-creation of the characters in different art forms has been a part of the movie’s fan following. This follows the view presented by Jenkins that fandom has a tendency to recreate the movies through various forms and art is one of them. Thus, this takes the form of “secondary production” as described by Michel D. Certeau (Storey).
The cultural industry is said to be a supplier of commodities (Storey). Like any other fan culture, Pulp Fiction fandom has created the supply of commodities which are valued by the fans of the movie. For instance, the wallet used by Jules in the movie has become a prized commodity for many Pulp Fiction fans. One such website states the following:
“Now you can own a copy of his famous Bad Mother Fucker wallet to show everyone you’re not to be messed with either. This is a great wallet and would make a great gift for a Pulp Fiction fan or in fact for any Bad Mother Fucker!…here at www.pulpfictionwallets.com you’ll find lots of other Pulp Fiction.” (www.pulpfictionwallets.com).
Thus, we see that the fandom of the movie is not restricted to only fan fictions or movie posters but they are extended to selling of commodities that endorses the movie. This shows that the fan culture of the movie is not dormant but active to participate in art, fan fiction, and selling movie commodities.
Moreover, the websites by Pulp Fiction fans demonstrate a culture around the lingo of the movie, its social background, and the characters and the philosophical nature of the stories. The fan quiz shows that most of the fans of the movie have stated that they have watched the movie more than one time. This confirms the definition of fandom created by Jenkins wherein the fan watches the movie more than once very minutely pays attention to every word of the movie.
Conclusion
The essay on fan culture of Pulp Fiction establishes that the audience of the movie is considerably active in creating a fan culture around the movie. The culture lies around the stories presented in the movie, the cult following of the movie, its characters (especially Jules). The movie fandom follows the profile of fandom created by Jenkins wherein fan watches the movie more than one time and very minutely to pay undivided attention to its script.
Pulp Fiction has assumed the stature of a cult movie because of its fans. The fans of the movie have provided extremely good reviews about the movie to demonstrate the movie’s potentiality and originality. The fan culture around the movie is thus cannot be regarded as a deliberate attempt of the producers to publicize the movie, rather it is a voluntary initiative of the fans to make the movie a success.
Bibliography
- Cumberland, Sharon. “Private Uses of Cyberspace: Women, Desire, and Fan Culture.” Thorburn, David, Henry Jenkins and Brad Seawell. Rethinking Media Change. Massachusetts: MIT Press, 2004. 261-280.
- FanFiction.net. Don’t Go There, Vince. Web.
- Fiske, John. “The Cultural Economy of Fandom.” The Adoring Audience: Fan Culture and Popular Media. Ed. Lisa A. Lewis. New York: Routledge, 1992. 30-49.
- Jenkins, Henry. Textual Poachers. New York: Routledge, 1992.
- Pulp Fiction Fan Page. 2009.
- Storey, John. Cultural Theory and Popular Culture. Essex, England: University of Georgia Press, 2006.