In the month of november of 2008, a good friend sent me a trailer to watch containing a moustached Brad Pitt and of course my favorite director Quentin Tarantino at the helm, let's just say it was an early christmas present. Now it's finally here; I wasn't getting to excited, just in case it wasn't living up to expectations but what I got was something special, something more. Remember that little movie, I think it was called Pulp Fiction? Yeah well Quentin basically redefined cinema and pop culture with that hit and quite frankly, he has done it again. Wait a second, okay, I'm not comparing this new flick with that old one, I'm saying that this one is a new breed, something that this world of cinema hasn't seen yet, Tarantino has done it again.
This movie begins so brilliantly, it's unbelievable, we open to a lovely countryside and we meet a lovely family and the evil Nazi regime shows up; but you would think there would be guns a blazing right away right? Remember Tarantino has written and directed this so instead of having a showdown with their guns they have a showdown with some good ol' suspense and brilliant dialogue. This scene has the most incredible suspense and build up as we sit in on this conversation and we get some french, some german, and some english being spoken in this scene, it's a brilliant opening for a very brilliant film. We meet an evil general; that will soon see the wrath of the Bast*rds, yes the bast*rds, the 12 famous, angry, jewish, Nazi killing machines that only exist for one reason, killing Nazis. Brad Pitt plays the leader of this crazy clan and he only wants one thing, Nazi scalps, and "he wants his scalps." This clan is crazy and very violent; yes there is a scene where Eli Roth bashes a general's head in over and over and over again, like I said the casting was perfect.
Tarantino's play on language and dialogue is so perfect and at times satiracle; there are moments when subtitles don't match dialogue and times when we have no idea what anyone is saying and times when the characters refer to famous cinema as historical events. The director's love for cinema is at the very center of this movie as the characters use a movie premiere to kill the Fuhr, sorry, Hitler and there are many references to european film and even Tarantino's own films. Now this movie contains elements of every Tarantino movie known to man, we see classic fonts from Pulp Fiction, music from Kill Bill, random cameo's and cop references to Resevoir Dogs, and yes there is a moment for Sam Jackson to give a pleasant narration, but it is brief. This movie contains everything the director loves and he weaves it all in a very entertaining package. This movie is so charming and funny and it is also terribly violently and gleefully cavalier. I could tell as Tarantino wrote this he had a giant smirk on his face.
Well this movie is something new; it comments on a war that was brutal and violent and mocks a leader who loved himself, it also shows Tarantino's hatred for germans and pays tribute to all of cinema no matter what country it's from. The writing is uncanny and full of pop references that people can laugh at and the dialogue is witty and full of life and there is so much to listen to. Tarantino also weaves brilliant suspense throughout the film and rewards us with brutal and gleeful violence and you can really tell that this film is close to his heart. As Aldo Raine puts it at the end after carving the Nazi symbol into a general's head: "I think this is my masterpiece." Yes Quentin, I have to agree, thank you.
