INGLORIOUS BASTERDS 3.0***


Inglorious Basterds (IB) makes no apologies, asks no forgiveness… it's a no holds barred assault on the senses. The director, Quinton Tarantino, doesn't care if he offends… he’s a master of cranking up tension and suddenly mixing it with laugh out loud moments. It’s not for everyone and if you’re not a fan of Tarantino’s style, this may not be for you.
"Inglorious Basterds is a "The Dirty Dozen" meets “Pulp Fiction” and partly tells the story of a small band of about 10 Jewish-American guerrilla soldiers who are dropped behind enemy lines in German-occupied France with one purpose in mind… to kill as many Nazis as often and as brutally as possible so as to strike fear and terror in the hears of Hitler's military. Led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt), the group accomplishes this by raids in which many German soldiers are killed and scalped ( Lt. Raine is part Cherokee) and allowed survivors have swastikas carved into their foreheads. There are really only a few scenes of such carnage. Instead the story revolves mostly around an SS Colonel, Hans "The Jew-Hunter" Landa (Christoph Waltz) and a French Jew, Soshanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent)), whose family was brutally murdered in 1941 by Landa. Four years later she owns a movie house in Paris and meets a Lt. Frederick Zolle , a young German war hero who is smitten by her and persuades Nazi Minister of Propaganda, Josef Goebbels, to hold the premier of the film about his war exploits at her movie house. What a terrifically tempting target the premier audience will be as almost all the most important Nazi Generals and Officials will be there.

Since the real heart of this movie lies in Shosanna and for purposes of realism, about 80% of the dialogue in this movie is subtitled… from French and German. But it all plays out quite well and I don’t fault but, in fact applaud, the use of the subtitles. Also, despite this being a QT film, it has less-than-the-expected number of brutal moments, and they're so sudden, so few and so far between, you’ll find them all the more dramatic…but they are violent, graphic and bloody.
The acting in this film is superb ….. with his thick Tennessee accent, Brad Pitt is gut-bustingly hilarious as Aldo Raine Mélanie Laurent, a French actress, is exceptional as Shosanna . However, the real show-stealer here is Christoph Waltz, a German actor, as Colonel Hans Landa. On top of being able to act well in several different languages, he manages to do what almost every great, classic villain manages to do, and that is to accomplish being both charming and menacing at once. He should, without question, get a Best Supporting Actor Oscar Nomination for his performance.

Clark