“True Romance” (1993)
In which Scott showed what he could do if given a really good script (this one by a then-barely-known young screenwriter named Quentin Tarantino). The film features perhaps the most passionate and poignant romance in any Scott movie, even though it’s a lovers-on-the-lam movie full of bloody violence. Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette are immensely appealing, but Scott also overstuffs the cast with overqualified thespians (Gary Oldman, Val Kilmer, Brad Pitt) and just allows them to run wild for a few minutes and step aside. Best is the quiet, unbearably suspenseful kitchen-table confrontation between Christopher Walken and Dennis Hopper, a sequence that proves Scott really could direct actors.
