Reservoir Dogs Reservoir Dogs Reservoir Dogs is a 1992 American black comedy heist film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino in his feature-length debut. It stars Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Chris Penn, Steve Buscemi, Lawrence Tierney, Michael Madsen, Tarantino, and criminal-turned-author Edward Bunker, as diamond thieves whose planned heist of a jewelry store goes terribly wrong. The film depicts the events before and after the heist. Kirk Baltz, Randy Brooks and Steven Wright also play supporting roles. It incorporates many motifs that have become Tarantino's hallmarks: violent crime, pop culture references, profanity, and nonlinear storytelling. The film is regarded as a classic
Reservoir Dogs magazine named it the "Greatest Independent Film" ever made. At the film's release at the Sundance Film Festival, film critic Jami Bernard of the "New York Daily News" compared the effect of "Reservoir Dogs" to that of the 1895 film "L'Arrivée d'un Train en Gare de la Ciotat", whereby audiences supposedly saw a moving train approaching the camera and ducked. Bernard said that "Reservoir Dogs" had a similar effect and people were not ready for it. Vincent Canby of "The New York Times" enjoyed the cast and the usage of non-linear storytelling. He similarly complimented Tarantino's directing and liked the