“Nazis, I hate these guys!”
-Harrison Ford from “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade”
“You know somethin', Utivich? I think this might just be my masterpiece.”
-Brad Pitt as Lt. Aldo Raine
Could this truly be Tarantino’s masterpiece? Hard to say, but it is indeed his most ambitious movie to date. “Inglourious Basterds” is another brilliant love letter to all things cinema from Quentin Tarantino, and it ends this rather crappy summer of movies on a high note. With this film, Tarantino has created his own version of World War II and has given it the ending many of us would have preferred to have seen. It is also his tribute to movies like “The Dirty Dozen” and other war movies of its ilk. It is not a remake of the film of the same name, but it has the same title of it out of respect.
“Inglourious Basterds” is told in a series of chapters, and it features several different threads of story that eventually intersect at the film’s fiery climax. We meet our chief Nazi villain, Col. Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) as he questions a family as to whether or not they are hiding any Jews, but we soon realize that he is asking questions he already knows the answers to. Then we are introduced to the Basterds themselves, and they are lead by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) who announces that they are being dropped into Nazi occupied France to do one thing and one thing only, killing Nazis. Not only that, they plan to take souvenirs to show Germany they mean business. Then we meet Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent), the only Jew to escape Col. Landa’s deadly grasp, who has found a safe hiding place as the owner of a German cinema which will soon host the most powerful members of the Nazi party for a film opening gala. Little do they know of the act of brutal vengeance which will eventually greet them…
At a running time of 153 minutes, “Inglourious Basterds” is one of those rare movies that really takes its time. There’s no big rush to get from one big action set piece to the next which has been the case with just every movie that gets released in the summer. Even while The Weinstein Company had to work with Universal Pictures to get this film, Tarantino still gets full creative control which is a blessing for those of us who love his films. We also get the great dialogue we have come to expect from Mr. Tarantino, and there are moments where words speak louder than actions. There are many verbal duels between characters as each one tries to outdo the other, and what is implied by them ends up generating an amazing amount of tension.
Tarantino also retains his keen eye for casting, and he has said that one of the actors he chose had in fact given him back his movie. That actor would be Christoph Waltz who plays the intelligent but deadly Col. Hans Landa. Christoph won the Best Actor award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and the way I see it, they should just hand him the damn Oscar come next March. Brilliant almost seems too subtle a description to describe his performance. His role is an extremely difficult one to pull off because he has to come off a certain way while allowing us to see in his eyes what he already knows. Christoph comes off with simple gestures that has us unnerved, and a key moment where he deals with another one of the main characters is great cat and mouse moment where he is trying to figure out the person he sees before him while she tries to remain calm and hide who she really is. Waltz’s opening scene with the French farmer is remarkable in how he psychologically tears him down to where he finally reveals what Landa already knows.
I’m not sure if I have seen Christoph Waltz in any other movies before, but I look forward to seeing more of his work in the future. Seriously, his character is to “Inglourious Basterds” what Heath Ledger’s Joker was to last year’s “The Dark Knight.”
Then we have Brad Pitt who I am glad to see get down and dirty after being all cute and cuddly in the very good but somewhat overrated “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” As Lt. Aldo Raine, he starts off by giving a speech to his men that makes him come off like George C. Scott in “Patton.” It is clear from the start that Pitt is having a ball playing this character and saying the dialogue Tarantino has written. Brad looks like he managed to save some of the manic energy from “Burn After Reading” for this role, and while his performance comes close to caricature at times, he has rooting for him throughout as he manages to outsmart the devious Nazi’s.
Quentin also continues to prove great at writing strong roles for women. Mélanie Laurent does great work here as Shosanna Dreyfus, the Jewish woman who is the only survivor of one of Landa’s murderous rampages. Throughout the movie, she goes from playing it cool around the Nazis to being terrified as she comes under close examination from them. She has managed to maintain her cover as a German while running her own cinema, and she also has to fend off the advances of Pvt Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Brühl) who is something of a pop star in the Nazi party when he meets her. She also has a strong relationship with her boyfriend projectionist Marcel (Jacky Ido) which allows her to show compassion she would otherwise have to keep hidden from the prying eyes of those out to eliminate the Jews. Mélanie gets to portray many different facets of her character throughout the movie’s running time, and her performance is every bit as memorable to me as was Christoph Waltz’s.
I also got a big kick out of Diane Kruger’s highly entertaining performance as film star Bridget von Hammersmark, a Marlene Dietrich of sorts. She is a wonderful performance as she goes from an outgoing actress who always seems to enjoy the company of others to a tough woman who shares in the Basterds passion of doing in the Nazis, most especially Hitler. Best known for her work in “National Treasure” and “Troy” among other movies, she really comes into her own here and gives a performance unlike any she has previously given.
“Inglourious Basterds” has a great cast overall with other memorable turns from actors like Michael Fassbender as a British spy posing as a German officer and from Sylvester Groth as the irrepressibly snooty Joseph Goebbels. It’s also a hoot to see Mike Meyers here in a “guest starring” role as a British general, and it almost fully makes up for the mess he inflicted on us last summer with “The Love Guru.” Eli Roth, the “torture porn” director of movies like “Hostel” is also on board as Sgt. Donny Donowitz, aka “The Bear Jew.” Although this role was originally intended for Adam Sandler who had to decline because he was making “Funny People,” it almost makes sense that the “Hostel” director would play a soldier who beats Nazis to death with a baseball bat.
Many of Tarantino’s favorite movie devices are on display here like the “Mexican standoff” and all the talk about movies. But here, they feel much more fresh and exhilarating to watch in the way they are portrayed. The scene in the German bar where one Nazi soldier is celebrating the birth of his son may seem almost too long, but Quentin builds the scene to a fever pitch of tension as everyone has their gun on the other, and you watch in terrifying anticipation of who will shoot first. With the character of Shosanna, Quentin takes the time to express his love of foreign cinema. In his other movies, especially the “Death Proof” portion of “Grindhouse,” he mostly speaks of his affection for American movies and pop culture, but his love of cinema certainly does not stop there.
Quentin also gives us another one of his great soundtracks that is a collection of film scores from other movies, and songs that capture the essence of the characters to the letter. Interestingly enough, much of the music is not of the WWII period, and Tarantino even uses David Bowie’s theme song from Paul Schrader’s 1980’s remake of “Cat People” to perfectly capture Shosanna in her final preparations for revenge. As with the “Kill Bill” movies, he makes effective use of the film scores of Ennio Morricone who remains a big influence on his own work. It didn’t take me long after seeing the movie to buy the soundtrack (I wish it was on sale though).
Many will complain of how inaccurate this film is to the historical facts of Hitler and WWII, but they are just wasting their own time. We should all know by the time we head into the theater that Tarantino is not out to be anymore historically accurate than Michael Mann was with “Public Enemies.” Every once in a while, you need a movie that breaks the rules, and it is such infectious fun to see “Inglourious Basterds” break down the normal conventions of how a WWII is made. So many of them over the past couple of years tend to be depressing affairs over the humanity lost, but Quentin is out to do the exact opposite of that. His WWII movie is a fantastic genre movie that borrows from many movies and Quentin is still genius at taking elements from them all and making them all his own.
2009 has been a bad year for movies so far, but “Inglourious Basterds” is one of the best of the year and is yet another cinematic triumph for Quentin Tarantino that shows he is no one trick pony. I just hope we don’t have to wait another six years for his next one.
**** out of ****
-Harrison Ford from “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade”
“You know somethin', Utivich? I think this might just be my masterpiece.”
-Brad Pitt as Lt. Aldo Raine
Could this truly be Tarantino’s masterpiece? Hard to say, but it is indeed his most ambitious movie to date. “Inglourious Basterds” is another brilliant love letter to all things cinema from Quentin Tarantino, and it ends this rather crappy summer of movies on a high note. With this film, Tarantino has created his own version of World War II and has given it the ending many of us would have preferred to have seen. It is also his tribute to movies like “The Dirty Dozen” and other war movies of its ilk. It is not a remake of the film of the same name, but it has the same title of it out of respect.
“Inglourious Basterds” is told in a series of chapters, and it features several different threads of story that eventually intersect at the film’s fiery climax. We meet our chief Nazi villain, Col. Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) as he questions a family as to whether or not they are hiding any Jews, but we soon realize that he is asking questions he already knows the answers to. Then we are introduced to the Basterds themselves, and they are lead by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) who announces that they are being dropped into Nazi occupied France to do one thing and one thing only, killing Nazis. Not only that, they plan to take souvenirs to show Germany they mean business. Then we meet Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent), the only Jew to escape Col. Landa’s deadly grasp, who has found a safe hiding place as the owner of a German cinema which will soon host the most powerful members of the Nazi party for a film opening gala. Little do they know of the act of brutal vengeance which will eventually greet them…
At a running time of 153 minutes, “Inglourious Basterds” is one of those rare movies that really takes its time. There’s no big rush to get from one big action set piece to the next which has been the case with just every movie that gets released in the summer. Even while The Weinstein Company had to work with Universal Pictures to get this film, Tarantino still gets full creative control which is a blessing for those of us who love his films. We also get the great dialogue we have come to expect from Mr. Tarantino, and there are moments where words speak louder than actions. There are many verbal duels between characters as each one tries to outdo the other, and what is implied by them ends up generating an amazing amount of tension.
Tarantino also retains his keen eye for casting, and he has said that one of the actors he chose had in fact given him back his movie. That actor would be Christoph Waltz who plays the intelligent but deadly Col. Hans Landa. Christoph won the Best Actor award at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, and the way I see it, they should just hand him the damn Oscar come next March. Brilliant almost seems too subtle a description to describe his performance. His role is an extremely difficult one to pull off because he has to come off a certain way while allowing us to see in his eyes what he already knows. Christoph comes off with simple gestures that has us unnerved, and a key moment where he deals with another one of the main characters is great cat and mouse moment where he is trying to figure out the person he sees before him while she tries to remain calm and hide who she really is. Waltz’s opening scene with the French farmer is remarkable in how he psychologically tears him down to where he finally reveals what Landa already knows.
I’m not sure if I have seen Christoph Waltz in any other movies before, but I look forward to seeing more of his work in the future. Seriously, his character is to “Inglourious Basterds” what Heath Ledger’s Joker was to last year’s “The Dark Knight.”
Then we have Brad Pitt who I am glad to see get down and dirty after being all cute and cuddly in the very good but somewhat overrated “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.” As Lt. Aldo Raine, he starts off by giving a speech to his men that makes him come off like George C. Scott in “Patton.” It is clear from the start that Pitt is having a ball playing this character and saying the dialogue Tarantino has written. Brad looks like he managed to save some of the manic energy from “Burn After Reading” for this role, and while his performance comes close to caricature at times, he has rooting for him throughout as he manages to outsmart the devious Nazi’s.
Quentin also continues to prove great at writing strong roles for women. Mélanie Laurent does great work here as Shosanna Dreyfus, the Jewish woman who is the only survivor of one of Landa’s murderous rampages. Throughout the movie, she goes from playing it cool around the Nazis to being terrified as she comes under close examination from them. She has managed to maintain her cover as a German while running her own cinema, and she also has to fend off the advances of Pvt Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Brühl) who is something of a pop star in the Nazi party when he meets her. She also has a strong relationship with her boyfriend projectionist Marcel (Jacky Ido) which allows her to show compassion she would otherwise have to keep hidden from the prying eyes of those out to eliminate the Jews. Mélanie gets to portray many different facets of her character throughout the movie’s running time, and her performance is every bit as memorable to me as was Christoph Waltz’s.
I also got a big kick out of Diane Kruger’s highly entertaining performance as film star Bridget von Hammersmark, a Marlene Dietrich of sorts. She is a wonderful performance as she goes from an outgoing actress who always seems to enjoy the company of others to a tough woman who shares in the Basterds passion of doing in the Nazis, most especially Hitler. Best known for her work in “National Treasure” and “Troy” among other movies, she really comes into her own here and gives a performance unlike any she has previously given.
“Inglourious Basterds” has a great cast overall with other memorable turns from actors like Michael Fassbender as a British spy posing as a German officer and from Sylvester Groth as the irrepressibly snooty Joseph Goebbels. It’s also a hoot to see Mike Meyers here in a “guest starring” role as a British general, and it almost fully makes up for the mess he inflicted on us last summer with “The Love Guru.” Eli Roth, the “torture porn” director of movies like “Hostel” is also on board as Sgt. Donny Donowitz, aka “The Bear Jew.” Although this role was originally intended for Adam Sandler who had to decline because he was making “Funny People,” it almost makes sense that the “Hostel” director would play a soldier who beats Nazis to death with a baseball bat.
Many of Tarantino’s favorite movie devices are on display here like the “Mexican standoff” and all the talk about movies. But here, they feel much more fresh and exhilarating to watch in the way they are portrayed. The scene in the German bar where one Nazi soldier is celebrating the birth of his son may seem almost too long, but Quentin builds the scene to a fever pitch of tension as everyone has their gun on the other, and you watch in terrifying anticipation of who will shoot first. With the character of Shosanna, Quentin takes the time to express his love of foreign cinema. In his other movies, especially the “Death Proof” portion of “Grindhouse,” he mostly speaks of his affection for American movies and pop culture, but his love of cinema certainly does not stop there.
Quentin also gives us another one of his great soundtracks that is a collection of film scores from other movies, and songs that capture the essence of the characters to the letter. Interestingly enough, much of the music is not of the WWII period, and Tarantino even uses David Bowie’s theme song from Paul Schrader’s 1980’s remake of “Cat People” to perfectly capture Shosanna in her final preparations for revenge. As with the “Kill Bill” movies, he makes effective use of the film scores of Ennio Morricone who remains a big influence on his own work. It didn’t take me long after seeing the movie to buy the soundtrack (I wish it was on sale though).
Many will complain of how inaccurate this film is to the historical facts of Hitler and WWII, but they are just wasting their own time. We should all know by the time we head into the theater that Tarantino is not out to be anymore historically accurate than Michael Mann was with “Public Enemies.” Every once in a while, you need a movie that breaks the rules, and it is such infectious fun to see “Inglourious Basterds” break down the normal conventions of how a WWII is made. So many of them over the past couple of years tend to be depressing affairs over the humanity lost, but Quentin is out to do the exact opposite of that. His WWII movie is a fantastic genre movie that borrows from many movies and Quentin is still genius at taking elements from them all and making them all his own.
2009 has been a bad year for movies so far, but “Inglourious Basterds” is one of the best of the year and is yet another cinematic triumph for Quentin Tarantino that shows he is no one trick pony. I just hope we don’t have to wait another six years for his next one.
**** out of ****
Bloody brilliant!!
I'm kind of confused why so many people are not on board with this. I'm with you, it was great.