“This is a fun movie with a unique premise and brilliant direction. Some of the characters were a little too straight out of central casting for me, but overall I really enjoyed the ride.”

Blow Out: 3.5 out of 5

If you have been reading my reviews or know me at all you may be aware of my man crush on Quentin Tarantino. Blow Out is one of his all time favorite films and for that reason alone I have always wanted to see it. It’s now extremely apparent to me why Tarantino has such a love for this movie.

The premise is right up his ally. Tarantino has an intense passion for the history of cinema and this movie delivers a very unique, interesting, and now ancient aspect of the filmmaking process that is rarely explored. John Travolta plays a pre-digital age soundman who is responsible for creating and mixing the audio tracks of B-horror flicks for a demanding & sleazy producer. When asked to capture some new wind noise he heads to the local park and begins recording. This was easily my favorite scene of the film. There is a wonderfully edited series of interesting cuts, close-ups, and sound effects that create a slow burning build to the catalytic moment of the movie.

The story centers around the unraveling of a conspiracy and is about the feeling of helplessness when up against forces that seem too ominous to defeat. John Travolta is awesome as the paranoid soundman haunted by his past attempting to redeem himself by seeking justice against all odds. It’s one of his best performances.

Some of the other characters are a little to stereotypically written and acted for my taste, all though in a strange way it was also part of the charm. This feels very much like a b-movie that’s been elevated to cult classic through the artful direction of DePalma — which, by the way, is a pretty accurate way to describe most of Tarantino’s movies.

My favorite scenes were always when Travolta was working with his sound equipment and using his skills to recreate the inciting incident. My least favorite scenes were with his love interest played by Nancy Allen. I’m not offended by the helplessness and stupidity of her character, some people are just helpless and stupid, but it just became obnoxious. However, that is a very small complaint for such an entertaining movie.

The only reason I didn’t give this a higher rating is that I couldn’t make much of an emotional connection. That could be due to the fact that I was studying it more than I was immersing myself in it, or that it is a few decades old and I am an arrogant and entitled millennial, or maybe I am just a sociopath, but either way it didn’t have enough of an emotional punch to suck me in and force me to forget I was reviewing it.

@MattRomary