Pulp Fiction has one of the most memorable dance scenes in film history, and it’s revealed moments later that Mia and Vincent’s dance moves helped them win the dance contest… but they might have actually gotten that shiny trophy through other methods. Quentin Tarantino’s career as a filmmaker began in 1992 with the crime movie Reservoir Dogs, and while it was a critical hit and opened many doors for him in the film industry, his big break arrived two years later with Pulp Fiction, also a crime film but told in a non-linear style.
Pulp Fiction is divided into segments told out of order, with each one focusing on one or two characters and all of them crossing paths at some point. The characters leading these segments are hitmen Vincent Vega (John Travolta) and Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson), their boss Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames), his wife Mia Wallace (Uma Thurman), and boxer Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis), and while they all star in at least one segment, the ones often considered the leads of the movie are Mia and Vincent, and they are also at the front and center of one of Pulp Fiction’s most memorable scenes.
Vincent and Mia are the stars of one segment as Vincent agrees to escort Mia while Marsellus is out of town. Vincent and Mia go out for dinner at Jack Rabbit Slim’s, a 1950s-themed restaurant, where after ordering some food and milkshakes and chatting for a while, they decide to take part in the restaurant’s twist contest. Neither Mia nor Vincent are professional dancers, but their choreography made it one of the most iconic scenes in film history, and it's assumed that those strange but fun dance moves are what made them win the contest, as they went back to Mia’s house with the trophy… but a hidden detail in Pulp Fiction reveals that they actually stole the trophy.
The segment that comes after Mia and Vincent’s adventures is the one led by Butch Coolidge (Bruce Willis), a boxer who double-crossed Marsellus and is now on the run. As his girlfriend forgot to pack his father’s watch, Butch makes a quick trip to his apartment, and on his way there, he walks through an alley, next to a building. When walking past one of the apartments, an ad or news report about Jack Rabbit Slim’s can be heard, and very faintly (as Butch keeps walking), it says that the trophy was stolen. As Butch’s part of the story is, chronologically, set the day after Mia and Vincent’s night out, this checks out. Mia and Vincent stealing the trophy is not out of character, and it actually makes their night out more interesting and fun.
Mia and Vincent’s night took a turn as when they got back to her place, she overdosed on the drugs she found in Vincent’s jacket, and their night ended with Vincent rushing to his dealer’s house and saving Mia with an adrenaline shot to the heart. Mia and Vincent’s night out in Pulp Fiction was full of ups and downs, and while the other contestants weren’t shown, they surely didn’t have dance moves as fun as those of Mia and Vincent.