Inglourious Basterds [sic]

[Kal]

It was two and a half hours long??

153 minutes

[matt35mm]

Wow.  I had to pee for most of it and still it only felt like 2 hours tops.

[MacGuffin]

Soundtrack:

http://hotfile.com/dl/10942227/d91b643/Quentin_Tarantino_-_Inglourious_Basterds.rar.html

[NEON MERCURY]

this was excellent
jackie brown is still his masterpiece but
this is either second or third - depending
the basement scene is one of QT's finest works
im sure even he jerked 0ff to it
........the only negative was that it was short
i hope the blu ray is 3hrs and twenty minutes long

[Kal]

Wrote a review on my blog, if anyone cares...

http://bit.ly/otBIO

[RegularKarate]

the basement scene is one of QT's finest works

Really?  Why do you think so?

This was probably my least favorite scene just because it felt like canned Tarantino... the end was pretty-much reservoir dogs.

[NEON MERCURY]

RK, my man!


i can see why u call it canned QT


<>SPOILS<>

but i fell for it.  the dialogue was smart, funny, witty, and all of his usual junk.
i enjoyed the card game device. i loved how these characters interacted w/each other
i could watch them for hours...i liked how they were trying to help the scottish dude not blow his cover,
i liked how he did blow his cover /german 3 / 
in fact i was upset that they all got capped - i didnt think the film would work w/o them
that why i want QT to fatten the blu ray up - gimme more basterds - the film was amazing
BUT if it had more backstory - more basterds - it would have been epic and knocked Jackie Brown
off her pedestal

[RegularKarate]

BUT if it had more backstory - more basterds - it would have been epic

I can get behind this.

[Gold Trumpet]

Well, I considered this film to be a piece of shit. If you want to discredit my opinion, know I am not a Quentin Tarantino fan because you can't be a fan and hang your hat on only liking Pulp Fiction. I went into this film expecting to really like it because I thought the Sergio Leone aspect of the movie would translate to me. Everyone has a sense of genre the same way they have a sense of humor and action is my cup of tea, but Tarantino made an action subject very boring and dry to me.

I think the main problem is that Tarantino tries to inject all of his conversational temperament into this film. Instead of adapting his style into the genre of the story and toning down all the dialogue, he writes the film as if he was still writing Pulp Fiction where he has a plot that is so open ended it really isn't a plot. The conversations do not work here because there are structures and mechanisms at work that are building up to a conclusion. The point is to challenge the patience of someone with a slow story by keeping the story on a continual upward movement to a dramatic conclusion, but Tarantino allows his everyday conversational tone dominant the scenes so much that I felt there were different stories at work here. They all came together by the end, but the scenes would go on for so long I would forget about all the other subplots.

Then the subject matter isn't appropriate for all this dialogue. It was cute to see the quiet niceties of the one SS officer at the beginning because it was unnerving with what happens at the end of the scene, but Tarantino repeats the stale Nazi niceties all through out the film.  They dominate the story because many scenes are the resistance characters dealing with Nazis in their immediate presence so they are reacting to the dominating Nazi tone. I enjoyed the back and forth dialogue when the Basterds were by themselves or controlling the pitch of a scene, but that happens so very little. Most of the time it is the Nazis asking the same questions, doing the same salutes and greetings and finally, raising the same suspicions. The Nazi soldier or officer is a dead character devoid of any interesting individuality, but the way Tarantino allows their characters to talk for the majority of the film, you'd think he thought their banalities were the most interesting.

I know Tarantino isn't trying to copy Leone, but he should take a few more lessons from Leone. Inglourious Basterds reminds me of a Western in that it deals with image driven figures like a Western does. The Western is based on the image and actions of a gunslinger. These figures do not talk at length because there is little to really say about them. Their presence speaks for the majority of their personas. I think the Nazi soldier has the same limitations, especially when you structure the story to make them the primary villians. The image of who they are and what they represent is brought out well enough in their uniforms and look. Tarantino tries to make interesting conversation out of them, but they are monotonous creatures.

If Tarantino was going to do a heavy dialogue film, then he needed to center the story around more independent characters with independent motives and independent histories. He didn't need his characters best characters mainly react to circumstances around them because (as evidenced by the film) that just stunted their output. I know most people here like the movie, but I find it intriguing that the common wish is for more of the Basterds. I also don't think he needed to be so heavy to the detail of every scene. There is no new suspense with showing how a stupid card game is played twice. There is no reason with showing how an SS officer is overly nice before he gets cruel and repeating it at the original long length every time. These things (and others) just kill the motivation to see the film as a gradual build up to a huge conclusion. Leone tested patience with Once Upon A Time in The West, but his slowness wasn't a continuing repetition of actions and things. I think it's easier to stomach a slower story when new things are being shown at all times, but repition is the easiest way to kill interest.

Like I said, I really thought I would like this, but I don't think Tarantino does well with either plot or stories that focus on action before dialogue. With that said, I hope he never does the Western film he dreams of making.

[B.C. Long]

LOL.

[SiliasRuby]

Who really thought GT would like this?

[Pozer]

Well, I considered this film to be a piece of shit.

LOL.

couldnt get past that line. didnt want to be let down. was the rest of it this good?

[martinthewarrior]

Saw this tonight. Will write more tomorrow, but I liked it a great deal. A propaganda film about the screening of a propaganda film! All I could think about while watching it was those old "captain America battles Hitler!" comics of the 40's. I found it to be a very creative concept. I had problems with some of it (the Jew hunter's continually extended questioning of his victims, etc.) but for the most part, I thought it was just dandy. It was the last temptation of world war two films. No one but Tarantino could've gotten away with it. I don't really understand how anyone could claim that his dialog weighed it down. It was a WW2 fantasy, certainly not a WW2 movie. I was unimpressed with Kill Bill and Death Proof but I thought that this movie did just what it should do. Tell a "non-fiction" story through a singular, distorted voice.

Not a movie I'll go back to very often, but a movie that makes me happy to go to the theater. One director's fucked up, entertaining vision.

[modage]

Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds is perhaps his most deft handling of reference and homage yet. The video store nerds at Scarecrow Video would like to present to you an unofficial and in progress footnotes companion to Basterds. Some of these films are directly referenced in the film, others are only evoked, while others still are films we simply felt should go on the list. All titles will be available for rent in a special section except where noted. 

http://www.scarecrow.com/2009/08/27/before-they-were-basterds/

[Pas]

nice link mod!