Posts Tagged 'inglorious basterds'

No real spoilers in what I’m about to say, but if you haven’t seen the movie I can’t imagine you’ll be very interested.

So is Brad Pitt’s character, Aldo Raine, meant to be Jewish?  On the aforementioned Slate podcast, they took it for granted that he’s not, which is understandable, but the movie never spells it out.  His name and appearance are ambiguous, whereas the rest of the Basterds have black hair, nebbishy looks, and names like Utivich, Donowitz, and Hirschberg.  I agree with the people at Slate that if you read the character as the non-Jewish leader of a squad of rather stereotypical Jews, that’s a problematic element of the movie.  On the other hand, if he’s meant to be Jewish as well, that makes things a little more interesting.

Aldo has a Southern accent and an unexplained rope burn scar on his neck.  There are a few Jews in the South, and it certainly seems feasible, particularly in the first half of the 20th Century, that one might escape marked by a noose and with plenty of violent aggression toward antisemites.  That was my read on the character.  His was probably the only Jewish family in Maynardville, and one night the Klan showed up.  He likely fled with only the shirt on his back, and possibly with some dead or at least beat up Klansmen in his wake, and ended up in the army.  Unable to do much against the bigots at home, he takes the fight to Europe.

That’s the origin story I prefer, because the alternative is that he’s just another Hollywood-created WASP who rallies the oppressed minority and inspires them to fight, which they’d never do on their own.  This is Slate’s take on the character, and Tarantino offers us nothing that directly contradicts it.  Still, when a filmmaker leaves a story untold, I’d rather choose the more interesting version.  I guess that’s my pop culture idealism manifesting again.

But what do you think?

The hardest thing about reviewing Inglourious Basterds is that it took me a week to see it, and I haven’t been able to avoid the thoughts and reviews of others. So many diverse and intelligent things have been said, I have no way of knowing what I’d think if I was really going in fresh.   Karina Longworth makes a good point about how the movie depends on our knowledge of Nazi atrocities, since they’re never really discussed on screen.  But then Mark makes the argument that our culture’s near-universal hatred of Nazis is a key component of Tarantino’s message, which does make a great deal of sense.  Mark’s review is probably my favorite, so you should probably just go read it first.  Meanwhile on this week’s Slate Culturefest, there was much understandable fretting about the idea of an enjoyable “holocaust romp.”

The big question with a Tarantino movie is usually, “Just how smart is this guy anyway?”  I mean, we all know he’s a genius at synthesizing the history of cinema- making these amazing movies where every single element is a reference to or a direct swipe of something that came before, and yet the sum of the parts feels fresh.  But while he’s doing that, is he also talking to us about the real world?  Does he have something to say about life, or is he just talking about movies that have something to say about life, so a larger message trickles down?  I’m really not sure.

What I am certain of is that Tarantino continues to develop as a cinematic storyteller.  Visually, this film is gorgeous.  Even the close-up knife violence is well shot, although that doesn’t mean I enjoyed watching it.  The pacing is also excellent.  I’ve trained myself to sit through long movies, but I usually get antsy at some point during anything longer than two hours, and I never did here.  The chapter titles were a nice touch, breaking up the story and giving us a sense of things progressing.  I know some reviewers have disagreed, but I thought the disparate threads of the story were woven together perfectly- the Basterds, Shosanna, the Nazis.

The acting is also great across the board.  As everyone else has already said, Christoph Waltz is a standout, particularly in his ability to act in every language with equal comfort.  Mélanie Laurent is fantastic as Shosanna, the “face of Jewish vengeance.”  The scene of Laurent and Waltz eating pastry together, in which she knows who he is and he has no idea who she is, is amazing.  Brad Pitt does a fine job, although I didn’t believe for a second that that was an East Tennessee accent.  Samm Levine, BJ Novak, and Mike Myers were all welcome surprises in their small roles.  Eli Roth works as the burly “Bear Jew” (and I definitely like him better as an actor than as a director), but I’m a little sad the role didn’t go to Adam Sandler as I’ve heard was the original plan.  I’ve certainly never before uttered the words, “It’s a shame Adam Sandler wasn’t in this movie,” but when I think of the character’s entrance into the film, it would have been amazing to see Sandler do that, and to hear the audience reaction if he had.

So is Inglourious Basterds a gleefully violent “holocaust romp,” or is it a comment on how violence tears apart nations and individuals?  It is just an homage to Tarantino’s favorite war movies, or does it have something to say about war?  I honestly have no idea, but I’m going to keep thinking about it.  I will say that I’ll definitely see the film again, and recommend it to others.  If nothing else, I’m curious in everyone else’s opinions on these tough questions.