Reviews by Matt

There are times when watching a movie that you can tell a director truly loves what he does. This is not to say that the others do not love what they do, just that there are some who are movie geeks. The king of these is Quentin Tarantino. His past few movies have been tributes to the films he grew up watching. “Kill Bill” was his homage to Japanese kung-fu movies, “Death Proof” was his version of the grindhouse movies he watched and now there is “Inglorious Basterds” his war/western movie.

There are a couple of stoylines in the movie so I will do my best to address them.

During World War II a group known as “The Basterds” had a mission: kill Nazis. Led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt), they go around Nazi-occupied France and kill and scalp any Nazi they come in contact with.

Shosanna Drefyus (Mélanie Laurent) is a young woman who owns a movie theater in France. When she was younger Nazis killed her family, but she managed to escape. She soon finds herself with the opportunity to get revenge on those who murdered her family.

Then there is Col. Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) is hunting down Jews and killing them.

All three of these storylines cross and intersect in many ways throughout the movie.

This has been marketed as an action movie and that is not completely accurate. There are very few scenes of traditional action.
What it does is very tense scenes that need know action. Tarantino writes some of the best dialogue scenes in movie history and there are plenty here. The opening scene is just dialogue but it is riveting. I cannot get into details without spoiling the tension that I felt. Many scenes in the movie involve deception. Much of the tension comes from wondering if the truth will come out and the liar will be killed.

The star of the movie is not Brad Pitt. It is Christoph Waltz. Landa is so evil, but he is smart and has a charisma about him. He does not really have loyalty to the Nazis; he does what he does because he is good at it. He says in the first scene that he has an ability that other Nazis do not; he can think like a Jew. He knows where they hide is able to flush them out. Everything he says or does in the movie is for him and no one else. He is truly evil, not because he is a Nazi, but because he has no loyalty to anyone but himself.

Besides taking place during WWII, there is nothing historically accurate about this movie, and as a viewer you could not care less. The enjoyment of watching these intense scenes of pure dialogue is what makes this movie what it is. If you are a fan of Tarantino’s work, you will love this movie, I know I did. If you have never seen a Tarantino movie before you might enjoy it (I know my Dad loved it).

9 out of 10
Rated R for strong graphic violence, language and brief sexuality.
153 min