I get annoyed by the rabid fanbase for Quentin Tarantino and the film snob in me feels like it's too soon to be lauding him as the one of the greatest film directors of modern times. Maybe it's his punk attitude when giving interviews, or his genre-blurring narrative incoherence, or maybe it's just the fact that folks who worship at the altar of Tarantino usually lack the film history background to understand where his ideas are coming from.
With that in mind, I watched INGLORIOUS BASTERDS with every intention of hating it. Not only was I expecting Tarantino to mess with history, but I fully expected to find aspects of his treatment of a sensitive subject (the persecution of the Jews by the Nazis) to be offensive, and I anticipated visual delights with no real emotional attachments.
I got all of that.
I also got something else: the feeling that if you truly love the movies, you almost have to love INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, if not Tarantino himself. I have not had this much fun watching a film in quite some time, and there are a few scenes in particular that stand for me among the best I've seen this year.
Rather than writing a coherent review, I'm going to talk about this one Tarantino-style to explain what I enjoyed about the movie:
1. THE ACTING. Tarantino has a knack for working his actors into intense, comedy-tinged performances that border on vaudeville without quite slathering on the blackface. Characters such as Brad Pitt's Aldo Raine are absurd. You can't tell if Pitt is giving one of his best performances or one of his worst. The ridiculously brilliant Christoph Waltz (my pick for Best Supporting Actor so far) veers from the intense control of an A-list dramatic actor to moments of camp that border on the Mike Myers-esque. Clever segue there, too, because Tarantino had the cajones to actually cast Mike Myers in a completely straight role; he's virtually unrecognizable and reeled in more than Robin Williams was for "Good Will Hunting." The two lead female performances, Melanie Laurent as a Jew who escapes the film's opening massacre only to plot her revenge and, even better, Diane Kruger as a smokin', Veronica Lake-styled actress, are fantastic and award-worthy themselves. Hell, even film director Eli Roth, as bad as his acting is, fits right in. You have to give Tarantino credit. He gets everyone to buy into it. Actors with one scene in the movie are as memorable as the leads.
2. THE TAVERN SCENE. About halfway through the film, Tarantino stages a scene at a tavern that lasts for about a fifth of the entire film's running time. That might sound like a scene that lasts too long for many modern filmgoers, but to me, it was an exemplar sample of pace, timing and story development. In the scene, a few men affiliated with the Basterds are to rendezvous with the actress (and spy) Bridget von Hammersmark. The scene opens in classic Tarantino fashion with von Hammersmark holding court amidst a group of rowdy, drunken SS privates, all passionately engaged in a guessing game involving writing down the name of a celebrity and sticking that name on one's forehead so that everyone but the person with the card can see it and then engaging in a game similar to "20 questions." Did that game exist back in the 1940s? Shit, no. In fact, most viewers will most likely think of the now-famous episode of "The Office" that centers around the same game. But that's why it's brilliant here. Because Tarantino makes it fit in like it belongs there. I won't spoil the scene if you haven't seen the movie yet, but it evolves from this opening to intense, slow conversations of suspicion and, before it's over, employs not one but two Mexican standoffs (one of Tarantino's auteur touches) and a spray of bullets and blood (another). If I was a professional film critic, I'd have written three stars down as soon as that scene ended. That scene alone is worthy of it.
3. THE HOMAGES. Watching INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, I heard Ennio Morricone. I saw Leni Riefenstahl-inspired propaganda film footage (meticulously recreated by Tarantino himself). The film is a spaghetti Western disguised as a World War II film, with classic touches thrown in, such as an iconic through-the-doorframe shot lifted right from John Ford's "The Searchers." The plot is less non-linear than other Tarantino films like "Pulp Fiction," and yet just as "classic Tarantino": trippy, screwy, audacious, ridiculous. And perhaps the greatest tribute Tarantino pays here is to the movies themselves. Now famous as the guy who learned how to make movies by watching too many of them as a video store employee, Tarantino has certainly cemented his perfection of his own, loving blend of the classics. How can you love movies and not enjoy sifting through his final products to identify their ingredients? The fact that this particular film ends in a movie theatre and that, if you put the proper spin on it, the cinema itself (in Tarantino's rewrite of history) is what ends the terror reign of the Third Reich, is a crazy poetic justice. Even the moments where we see old fashioned film editing and how celluloid reels are operated are a joy for true movie lovers.
Now, with all of this said, you might assume that I have completely changed my opinion about Tarantino...that I've let down my guard and now finally embrace him as the master that he's gunning to be. And despite all of my foaming at the mouth about INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, which might just be my favorite Tarantino film now (though I need more time to process), it still holds the one fundamental flaw that all Tarantino films hold...the thing that keeps any of them from being true masterpieces in my mind. And that is the fact that, when it's all said and done, I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the film but never - at any time - cared what happened to any of its characters.
For as clever as Tarantino is at doing all of the things I've talked about here, he has yet to make me truly feel for a character. He seems uncapable of forging a genuine emotional connection. I think he tries. He just doesn't succeed. Yes, the girl who goes for revenge here escapes a family massacre. We can surely feel bad for her about that. But she runs out of the film at the beginning and shows up later for her revenge. None of the Basterds, as great as they are, are grounded with human backstories. The best characters are simply the most entertaining. No emotional connections are needed with Tarantino films because Tarantino seems preoccupied with demonstrating how clever he is. And he is.
All of this said, I can and will watch INGLORIOUS BASTERDS multiple times. And it takes a master of movie-making to make a film this long (over 2 1/2 hours) worth repeat viewings. And since Tarantino does this, I'd better start elevating him to the status I've denied him thus far.
3.5 out of 4
With that in mind, I watched INGLORIOUS BASTERDS with every intention of hating it. Not only was I expecting Tarantino to mess with history, but I fully expected to find aspects of his treatment of a sensitive subject (the persecution of the Jews by the Nazis) to be offensive, and I anticipated visual delights with no real emotional attachments.
I got all of that.
I also got something else: the feeling that if you truly love the movies, you almost have to love INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, if not Tarantino himself. I have not had this much fun watching a film in quite some time, and there are a few scenes in particular that stand for me among the best I've seen this year.
Rather than writing a coherent review, I'm going to talk about this one Tarantino-style to explain what I enjoyed about the movie:
1. THE ACTING. Tarantino has a knack for working his actors into intense, comedy-tinged performances that border on vaudeville without quite slathering on the blackface. Characters such as Brad Pitt's Aldo Raine are absurd. You can't tell if Pitt is giving one of his best performances or one of his worst. The ridiculously brilliant Christoph Waltz (my pick for Best Supporting Actor so far) veers from the intense control of an A-list dramatic actor to moments of camp that border on the Mike Myers-esque. Clever segue there, too, because Tarantino had the cajones to actually cast Mike Myers in a completely straight role; he's virtually unrecognizable and reeled in more than Robin Williams was for "Good Will Hunting." The two lead female performances, Melanie Laurent as a Jew who escapes the film's opening massacre only to plot her revenge and, even better, Diane Kruger as a smokin', Veronica Lake-styled actress, are fantastic and award-worthy themselves. Hell, even film director Eli Roth, as bad as his acting is, fits right in. You have to give Tarantino credit. He gets everyone to buy into it. Actors with one scene in the movie are as memorable as the leads.
2. THE TAVERN SCENE. About halfway through the film, Tarantino stages a scene at a tavern that lasts for about a fifth of the entire film's running time. That might sound like a scene that lasts too long for many modern filmgoers, but to me, it was an exemplar sample of pace, timing and story development. In the scene, a few men affiliated with the Basterds are to rendezvous with the actress (and spy) Bridget von Hammersmark. The scene opens in classic Tarantino fashion with von Hammersmark holding court amidst a group of rowdy, drunken SS privates, all passionately engaged in a guessing game involving writing down the name of a celebrity and sticking that name on one's forehead so that everyone but the person with the card can see it and then engaging in a game similar to "20 questions." Did that game exist back in the 1940s? Shit, no. In fact, most viewers will most likely think of the now-famous episode of "The Office" that centers around the same game. But that's why it's brilliant here. Because Tarantino makes it fit in like it belongs there. I won't spoil the scene if you haven't seen the movie yet, but it evolves from this opening to intense, slow conversations of suspicion and, before it's over, employs not one but two Mexican standoffs (one of Tarantino's auteur touches) and a spray of bullets and blood (another). If I was a professional film critic, I'd have written three stars down as soon as that scene ended. That scene alone is worthy of it.
3. THE HOMAGES. Watching INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, I heard Ennio Morricone. I saw Leni Riefenstahl-inspired propaganda film footage (meticulously recreated by Tarantino himself). The film is a spaghetti Western disguised as a World War II film, with classic touches thrown in, such as an iconic through-the-doorframe shot lifted right from John Ford's "The Searchers." The plot is less non-linear than other Tarantino films like "Pulp Fiction," and yet just as "classic Tarantino": trippy, screwy, audacious, ridiculous. And perhaps the greatest tribute Tarantino pays here is to the movies themselves. Now famous as the guy who learned how to make movies by watching too many of them as a video store employee, Tarantino has certainly cemented his perfection of his own, loving blend of the classics. How can you love movies and not enjoy sifting through his final products to identify their ingredients? The fact that this particular film ends in a movie theatre and that, if you put the proper spin on it, the cinema itself (in Tarantino's rewrite of history) is what ends the terror reign of the Third Reich, is a crazy poetic justice. Even the moments where we see old fashioned film editing and how celluloid reels are operated are a joy for true movie lovers.
Now, with all of this said, you might assume that I have completely changed my opinion about Tarantino...that I've let down my guard and now finally embrace him as the master that he's gunning to be. And despite all of my foaming at the mouth about INGLORIOUS BASTERDS, which might just be my favorite Tarantino film now (though I need more time to process), it still holds the one fundamental flaw that all Tarantino films hold...the thing that keeps any of them from being true masterpieces in my mind. And that is the fact that, when it's all said and done, I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the film but never - at any time - cared what happened to any of its characters.
For as clever as Tarantino is at doing all of the things I've talked about here, he has yet to make me truly feel for a character. He seems uncapable of forging a genuine emotional connection. I think he tries. He just doesn't succeed. Yes, the girl who goes for revenge here escapes a family massacre. We can surely feel bad for her about that. But she runs out of the film at the beginning and shows up later for her revenge. None of the Basterds, as great as they are, are grounded with human backstories. The best characters are simply the most entertaining. No emotional connections are needed with Tarantino films because Tarantino seems preoccupied with demonstrating how clever he is. And he is.
All of this said, I can and will watch INGLORIOUS BASTERDS multiple times. And it takes a master of movie-making to make a film this long (over 2 1/2 hours) worth repeat viewings. And since Tarantino does this, I'd better start elevating him to the status I've denied him thus far.
3.5 out of 4
No comments:
Post a Comment