Review: Inglourious Basterds

You probably heard, but Quentin Tarantino ain't in the prisoner takin' business. He's in the killin' Nazi business, and boy, business is a-boomin'. Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds could be described as a spaghetti western wrapped in a war film and sprinkled with a touch of B-movie cliche. One of my biggest issues with QT is that I often felt he was a bit too beholden to the genres he idolizes so much. But in recent years he's broken out of that shell, and Inglourious Basterds, while not a perfect film by any means is the finest example yet that he's started truly making movies that aren't simple mimicry. Don't get me wrong, Basterds probably homages more movies here than any of his previous films, but it's never to the detriment of the story nor is it as obvious.

The opening sequence is ominous from the word "go", as we're introduced to two of the few central characters of the story, Shoshanna(Melanie Laurent) and Nazi Colonel Hans Landa(Christoph Waltz). Affectionately referred to as "The Jew Hunter", Lands is interrogating a tough, bearish dairy farmer over suspicion of hiding Shoshanna and her family. At first, Landa appears to be outmatched by the stoic farmer, but like any real villain, his defeat was simply a ruse, and he quickly breaks the man down with a few subtle threats and promises that likely won't be kept. Everyone inside is quickly murdered with the exception of Shoshanna, who flees into the countryside.

Years later, and Shoshanna has made a new life for herself in France under a new name. She's now the owner of a movie theatre, and found herself a lover. All appears to be well until until one day her life suddenly crashes headlong with the Nazis and Landa yet again, who want to use her theatre as the venue for a premier of their latest propaganda film, A Nation's Pride. This provides her with the perfect opportunity to exact revenge.

Tarantino breaks Basterds down into chapters, which to me felt like an unnecessary flourish to a fairly straight forward story. The second chapter introduces us to the Basterds and their enigmatic leader, Lt. Aldo Raine(Brad Pitt). Aldo is like if John Wayne were plucked from El Dorado and transplanted into the crazy world of Tarantino. He's the punch first, ask questions later type of field leader who speaks in a gravelly drawl that sounds like he's been gargling battery acid. His Basterds are sent to do "terrible things to the German", and for one glorious scene we actually get to see them do it. Pity we don't actually see them do a helluva lot else.

The Basterds become embroiled in a parallel plan to kill the entire Nazi heirarchy at the premier. The plan involves...well, a lot of talking and plotting. If this were written by anybody else I'd be screaming about how dull it was. But Tarantino is nothing if not a master of the written language. He's got the undeniable gift for movie dialogue, and every word pops and is as exciting as the adrenaline fueled final chapter. There are a wealth of characters here that on their own I would be interested in seeing followed up, not the least of which is Til Schweiger's Hugo Stiglitz, a nearly silent German psycho who joins the Basterds so he can kill other Germans. For the most part, only a handful of Basterds play any sort of role in the story, but I'm assuming that will be rectified if and when Tarantino's proposed prequel sees the light of day. Blink and you might miss a brief appearance by Paul Rust, the star of Punch Drunk Critics' fave Sex Drive as one of the under utilized Basterds.

One of the biggest strengths of any Tarantino film is that he always gets the most out of his actors, particularly when using actors who some would categorize as B-level or unproven. With so many characters involved it becomes imperative that every character be highlighted for the brief amount of screentime they might receive. Eli Roth's Donnie Donowitz is probably the Basterd who stands out the most. Roth, who's made a career off producing low budget horror porn flicks like both Hostel films and Cabin Fever, has a look that would fit in perfectly with most police line-ups. To put it simply he looks like a psychopath, and his character nicknamed "The Bear Jew" is a hulking, obnoxious head cracker who wields a baseball bat. He's also sorta Aldo's right hand man, which is sorta like hiring John Spartan to be your strategist. Not all of the characters work, however. Mike Meyers shows up in a brief cameo as a high ranking British official, and he sticks out like a handful of sore thumbs. He can't not sound like he's imitating somebody, even when he's clearly not trying to. Thankfully he's not there long.

My biggest problem with Basterds perhaps has more to do with my own expectations than anything else. I expected a Dirty Dozen/Magnificent Seven type story I guess. I was looking for a bit more comraderie amongst the Basterds, and seeing a story where they actually had to overcome some overwhelming odds to accomplish their mission. That's not the story we were given, and while the story we got was engrossing I couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed. Disappointment is something I've never felt about any Tarantino film up to this point. That's not to say I haven't liked all of his films, but the only I have any particular disdain for is Jackie Brown, but I wasn't expecting much from that one anyway.

With Basterds, I still feel like this is lesser-Tarantino. Now let me frame that by saying that "lesser Tarantino" is better than 90% of what anybody else is producing. I like this film a helluva lot. It's fun, huge, and sprawling full of bigger than life characters that I would pay good money to see again and again. But was I as into it the way I was Kill Bill? No. Or Death Proof? No. Or even Pulp Fiction? Ok, it's definitely better than Pulp Fiction. Basterds atleast has some sort of point to it, which is to create a screwball world of revisionist history. Tarantino's convinced me that history needs a good make-over. Sign me up for another tour.

7/10