Review: Inglorious Basterds (2009) Directed by Quentin Tarantino

Inglorious Basterds was Tarantino's Avatar, having had the script practically written by 1998, it was put on the back burner for lack of a suitable ending. Of course, in the intervening years Tarantino has produced two notable classics, namely Kill Bill 1 and 2, so the years that Inglorious has been lying in wait have not been for nothing. Inglorious's patient wait for production has also been worthwhile in the sense that it has gained a great deal from the earlier works, one senses that the scope and historical magnitude of Inglorious, a venemously stylish account of a renegade band of Jewish 'Nazi Hunters' in World War 2 occupied France, would have been simply overwhelming to a pre-Kill Bill Tarantino. The timing, it would seem, was perfect.

Ironic, then, that one of the main flaws of this film (though there are not many) is timing. At 153 minutes it isn't short, but you get the impression that Tarantino wants to make it a long 153 minutes. Scenes are presented as chapters, each one a self contained film miniature with its own individual identity. It is an interesting concept, and one that Tarantino toyed with to rather more success in the Kill Bills, for the long scenes simply don't fit the wartime context.

The opening scene witnesses the fearsome SS Colonel Landa (played brilliantly by Christoph Waltz) interrogating a French peasant as to the whereabouts of a Jewish family, which, as it transpires, are hidden underneath the Frenchman's floorboards. The scene, as a pressure pot and highly intellectual and typically stylish game of cat and mouse, does work, but one senses that the opening scene could have been a bit more explosive, audacious and shocking, especially given the wartime context. The fact that gunfire is not heard in a film of this sort for a good 30 minutes is something of an oddity.

However, the opening chapter is quickly redeemed by the introduction of the Basterds, a renegade group of American-Jewish soldiers sent to France with the sole aim of killing as many Nazis as they possibly can. Headed by Aldo Raine (played by Brad Pitt, who again illustrates his ever more impressive versatility here) the slack jawed, morally dubious, but brilliantly endearing lieutenant, the Basterds wreak havoc, ambushing Germans and subjecting them to 'scalpings' in the style of native Americans of yore. Becoming a notorious and much feared force amongst the German Troops (the jewel in the Basterd's crown is 'The Bear-Jew' who has a particularly gruesome method of dispatching his victims) they become Hitler's prime target. Little does Hitler know that the Basterds have infiltrated the Nazi organisation, and have hatched an elaborate Oceans 11 style plot to kill the parties main leaders and 'end the war'...

The Basterds inject a huge dose of comedy in the film, I will say no more than Aldo Raine's attempt at italian for those who have not seen the film, but the dense scenes of Inglorious are punctuated by much needed comic lifts in the form of the Basterds. It is somewhat surprising, and disappointing therefore, to learn that the group featured on the DVD cover, and after which the film is named, feature so sparingly.

It is at this point, one realises, that Tarantino is perhaps trying to do something quite different from what we have seen before, both in Tarantino movies and in War films. Though Inglorious is packed full of the style, innovation and all American sass that you expect from the mercurial and highly regarded director, there is an apparent sincerity and grit in the film which is a far cry from the slick, smooth 'all style, no substance' that one witnesses in Jackie Brown or Death Proof. More significantly, the film's refusal to commit to any sort of moral or historical framework is a challenging, but hugely refreshing development in the War film genre.

Tarantino, grand master in the fine art of shocking, really goes for the jugular in this film. He achieves the 'shallow shocks' a-la Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction with ease. Suffice to say that the audience, quite literally, gets their pound of flesh in the form of the fastest and most furious bar room brawl you are ever likely to see. But the real shock, and it is something that is only really felt once one is released from its fierce grip, is that Inglorious is boldly redefining the high budget World War film. The fact that it pays scant regard for accuracy of any sort is enough to make this film a revolutionary development in the genre, which is often slave to, and overwhelmed by, the historical facts upon which it is based. It needed a bold director like Tarantino to inject a good deal of vitality into the War film genre, and the marriage between kooky direction and historical context is certainly a happy one, teaching that War films do not have to be one dimensional, emotion raping tour de forces all the time, they can also be funny, sexy, most importantly, morally ambiguous.

Which brings me to Inglorious Basterd's major strength, it's subversive morality. World War 2 is a moment in history that, thanks to numerous polemical books, films, and TV programmes, has been cast in a certain moral light. The allies were good, the Nazis were bad, the Jews were the victims. But this film puts a brilliant twist on all the moral expectations of this moment in history. Here is a film where Jews are going around mercilessly killing Germans with the relentless brutality we usually associate with Nazis. The allies, so prolific and righteous in the books of history, are hardly ever seen in the occupied France of Inglorious, and the Nazis, though by no means angelic, show more traces of humanity than most other accounts would permit. Tarantino creates a brilliantly unsettling world, a subversive fantasy of the war according to the gospel of St. Tarantino.

The ending, and the reason for which the film was so heavily delayed, is a really thrilling climax. The final scene, in which Hitler is smashed to a bloody pulp by one of the Basterds and in which scores of Nazis are shot like cattle in a ranch, suggests that Tarantino wants to move beyond the kind of moral and historical puritanism that has dominated the genre, and use wartime contexts to make entertaining, stylish and innovate art rather than yet another historical polemic that pushes the war film genre even further into a morally prescriptive corner. Inglorious Basterds is a very good film in its own right, but as an example of the ways in which the high budget war film can and should evolve, it is a considerably impressive achievement.

Verdict: Though the film is needlessly long, and suffers from a few superficial weaknesses; Inglorious delivers everything you would expect from a Tarantino classic. A seminal work and a brilliant example of artistic innovation, it was certainly worth the 11 year wait! 8/10