The Cult King|B 级之王

by Marcus Maurice

How many cult films have you ever watched?

　　Director Quentin Tarantino first wanted to be an actor. He took classes at an acting school and dreamed of making it big. Dreams do not pay rent, and he needed money to survive, so he took a job as a clerk at Video Archives, which ended up being the best thing he ever did up until that time. Because the store stocked so many cult movies, he would watch and study them, as well as recommend them to customers depending on the movies they liked. Tarantino spent his days discussing the quirky idiosyncrasies of these cult films with people, which soon contributed to his screenwriting abilities and amazing style of making cut and paste movies.

　　There is no set definition of cult movies, but they are generally weird, surreal, offbeat, unique, and only appeal to certain people. An example of this would be the films of director Ed Wood. They were cheesy, the monsters were more laughable than scary, and the dialogue was strange. There are people that love Wood's movies, and there are people who think they are wastes of time. Another trait of cult movies is that they did not make much money when they were released, but now they are thought of as legendary. The Sound of Music is a great example of this as it was only greeted lukewarmly at theaters, but now it is looked at as a classic and is played yearly on TV.

　　Quentin Tarantino's first film, Reservoir Dogs, is a cult classic. After that, he became one of the most popular directors of all time with greats like Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, and Kill Bill. Even though Tarantino does not make cult movies anymore, his films are still highly influenced by the ones he watched when he worked at the video store.

你曾经看过几部非主流电影？

　　昆汀‧塔伦提诺导演起初想要当演员。他曾在表演学校上课并梦想自己能够大放异彩。梦想无法付房租，他需要钱才能继续维持生活，因此他在 Video Archives 影音出租店担任店员，直到那时为止，这个经历最终成为他所做过最棒的一件事。由于该店库存许多非主流电影，因此他会观赏并研究这些电影，也会根据顾客的电影喜好推荐给他们。塔伦提诺终日与他人讨论这些非主流电影的古怪特质，此举很快地造就出他的编剧能力和制作剪贴电影的绝妙风格。

　　非主流电影没有一个固定的定义，但是这些影片一般来说都很奇怪、超现实、另类、独特而且只会吸引某些特定族群。这其中一个例子就是导演艾德‧伍德执导的电影。它们都很俗套，里头的怪物与其说是可怕倒不如说是可笑，而且对话更是奇怪。有人热爱伍德的电影，也有人认为他的电影只是在浪费时间。非主流电影的另一项特质便是它们发行时并没有赚进大把钞票，但是如今却被视为是一则传奇。《真善美》就是一个绝佳例子，因为它在电影院获得的反应平淡，但如今它却被视为经典之作而且每年都在电视上播放。

　　昆汀‧塔伦提诺的第一部电影《霸道横行》就是一部非主流经典电影。在那之后，他就成了有史以来最炙手可热的导演之一，他的大作有《黑色追缉令》、《黑色终结令》和《追杀比尔》。虽然塔伦提诺不再制作非主流电影，可是他的电影仍然深受他在影音出租店工作时观赏的影片所影响。