My first viewing of Pulp Fiction was a distinctly uncomfortable one. I didn’t know much about the movie, but I knew it had a sodomy scene that — unbeknownst to me at the time — occurs near the film’s end. Which meant that everything up until then was basically ruined for me as I watched in dread of that one moment.

Once that scene was over, though, I was actually able to get into the film’s dark humor and enjoy the performances, particularly that of Samuel L. Jackson as the cold-blooded gangster who suddenly has a moment of clarity. On subsequent viewings, the film opened up for me until I had my own moment of clarity, a veritable religious experience when I realized that all of the major characters experience moments of divine intervention.

Yes, Pulp Fiction is filled with amazing performances and production design, killer soundtrack selections, and some of the most delightful dialog ever uttered on celluloid. But seeing how each of the film’s miscreants react to their own experience of grace, and either let it change them or ignore it altogether, is what gives Pulp Fiction its lasting power and elevates it above the many copycats that emerged in its wake.