Reservoir Dogs put Quentin Tarantino on the map, for which I am grateful, because his Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown are inspired if hard-edged films. But that's one of only three compliments I can pay to Reservoir Dogs. The other two are that it has some fine acting and sporadically poetic dialogue. But the story and characters are much too shallow, and the level of gratuitous sadistic violence is absurd. The result is less than pleasant. I am not surprised that Tarantino went on to make good films, but this one left a wretched taste in my mouth.