True Romance may have been directed by Tony Scott, but the better gauge of its standing among mid-'90s hip outlaw movies is that it was written by Quentin Tarantino. However, even if it predated Pulp Fiction, it feels more like derivative Tarantino than the real McCoy. Too cool by half, the film earned a cult following based on its snappy dialogue, violent chic, and countless pop culture references, though some of them are more theft than homage. The film's signature steel drum theme is straight out of another outlaw road movie -- Terrence Malick's 1973 masterpiece, Badlands. Just to give it that extra kitschy-cool flavor, Christian Slater's small-time talker has conversations with Elvis (Val Kilmer) while alone in bathrooms. Still, the guns and gags formula was new enough at the time that a lot of this material seems fresh. And with the all-star cast on board, it must have been something of a prestige project. Among the many gifted actors gleefully chewing the scenery are Gary Oldman as an unbalanced Rastafarian pimp, Christopher Walken as his usual steely eyed killer, and Saul Rubinek as a smarmy Hollywood producer. And Brad Pitt is hilarious in the role of a couch-bound stoner who's either too high or too amoral to realize he's constantly handing over information to the wrong people. The frank violence picks up where Reservoir Dogs left off -- the bloody motel room brawl between The Sopranos' James Gandolfini and Patricia Arquette has a way of lodging in one's memory. An undeniable contributor to the Tarantino legacy, True Romance nonetheless falls a bit short of true importance.