MyRating: YYYYDirector: Quentin Tarantino
Cast: Brad Pitt, Melanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger, Daniel Bruhl
MPAA: Rated R for strong graphic violence, language and brief sexuality
US Gross: US$120.5 Million
Worldwide Gross: US$313.6 Million
Quentin Tarantino is one of the genius and craziest directors of our time (with his 160 of IQ). He seems to always treat new experiments as his daily meals. His movies always created two sides of audiences, the one that loves his movies so much, and another one that has difficulty to digest his movies. Sometimes I wonder, are these people really like his movies, or they just madly love the director? For Quentin, there is no such thing as old-school rules of screenwriting and directing, as he will always break all rules and replace them with his own rules. The Quentin Tarantino rules. And he likes to write and direct his films in such a way that they look weird and different. The weirder it is, the Tarantinoer it will be.
As the director and screenwriter of this movie, Quentin wrote a brilliant piece of original script, that for some people may look like a haphazard writing that he wrote for fun, in the way he wanted. However, this movie gave a bit different feeling from the normal Tarantino's pieces. It was felt more pop in the approach to the audiences, even though we still can see the thick Tarantino's styles all over the movie, with his favorite long, sometimes pointless conversations, and dividing the movie into many chapters. And the result is, a very enjoyable movie.
The story is about a band of Jewish-American guerilla soldiers led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Pitt), known as the "Basterds", who has a mission to kill as many German's Nazi soldiers as possible in Europe. Their approach is with an extreme violence, as they scalp the heads of their victims after they kill them. And because of their sadistic acts, the "Basterds" is feared by the German army.
While at another place in France, a young woman named Shossana (Laurent), an owner of a movie theater, plans to revenge the German, as her whole family was killed some years back by the Nazi soldiers under the commander of Col. Hans Landa (Waltz), a very cruel and cold-blooded Jewish hunter. When she gets an honor to play a premiere of a Germany propoganda film in her theater, which will be attended by all the high rank Nazi officers, including Adolf Hitler, she works together with the "Basterds" for a plan to kill all the Nazi officers while they are watching the movie. If they succeed, they will not only wipe out the chains of Nazi's command, but also they will end the war.
Christoph Waltz was crazy. His acting as Hans Landa was really-really damn great. Rarely I saw a performance so brilliant, without a flaw, that made me captivated with a full satisfaction. From the way he talks, the way he smiles, the way he glances, the way he shows his body languages, and the way he changes his face expressions, are all superb. It's a perfectly perfect, 10 out of 10. Even Brad Pitt, who actually has a greater role and did his best with his mouth and his Southern American accent, was outshone by this mad man. Actually Pitt gave quite a decent performance, together with Melanie Laurent, who showed a very solid acting as Shosanna, but Waltz's apperance was just flooding the screen and gave the biggest impact to the whole movie. That was a performance that will stay with us forever. No wonder he swept all the awards last year (with no loses at all). Until now, he has collected 28 awards of Best Supporting Actor/Best Actor for Inglourious Basterds. Gosh, I wonder where he put all those awards.
If anybody wants to remake this movie ten years or twenty years from now (maybe at that time will be in 4D format), I think they better take the Hans Landa character out of the movie, as whoever plays that role, will bear a very high burden and will always be compared to the great Christoph Waltz. And I don't think I want to see another Hans Landa, because he is Hans Landa.
This is a very good movie. Quentin Tarantino gave his pure understandings towards history. Which big history Icon will die, when, where and how (in this movie, Adolf Hitler). So, don't believe anything you learned at schools, because your teachers might not have told you the truth, and the whole written history could have been lies. If you want to know the real truth, then Inglourious Basterds is the answer, because only Tarantino, one of the craziest directors living on earth, who can, and dare to tell you the truth about history. (MJ)
