Well I’m a bit late to the party. Frankly I had almost forgotten that I had wanted to see Basterds when it came out but one thing led to another and I didn’t get around to it. So when I saw it was advertised as coming out on DVD/Blu-Ray – well I jumped on Netflix and had them send me a copy.

I’m really glad I did.

Quentin Tarantino is quickly becoming one of my favorite working directors. In some circles who enjoy seeing his failure as he climbs up the ladder this might be very much a passe thing to say. But say it I will. His dialogue isn’t just quirky to be quirky. Although I will admit there are a few scenes in Basterds that should have been trimmed down a bit – every scene contains so much subtext between the characters that when it does finally boil over – it explodes.

It’s refreshing and I think something that aspiring filmmakers and writers are told NOT to do.

Quentin lets his characters talk. And he lets a scene breathe. That’s something that coming from a TV commercial background where it’s all about shoving in more in less, is so novel.

Let the characters talk. Let them be them.

Which brings me to my favorite Basterds character. The SS Officer, Hans “the Jew Hunter” Landa. Christoph Waltz really brings a lot of maniacal charm to this bad guy. Every scene he’s in is just gushing with this subtext I was talking about.

Brad Pitt was good as Lt. Aldo – bringing a sort of simplistic comic relief to the film. He’s one man with only one mission.

And here’s where the film sort of becomes just about average. The rest of the characters seem rather weakly built. Even though the film is called “Inglourious Basterds” there’s really not much about the Basterds themselves. It’s really about the three leads, Landa, Aldo and Shoshanna.  Although Shoshanna was a beauty, I found her story to be the least interesting, probably because her character although having the most clearly defined motivation (she was a Jew who’s family was hunted by Landa himself), I just didn’t feel a connection to her. Perhaps she played the part too coldly.

And a lot of other characters that we meet before they briefly get killed…

I think what drives a lot of filmmakers to Tarantino is the adolescent styled violence. QT trades in stories in a world when people get killed as a plot point. Violence and death holds no real consequence other than having one less character on screen.

And that’s perfectly okay… I like those stories once in a while.

What draws me to Tarantino is watching the subtext under his scenes. It seems like he’s doing more and more of it as he matures – much to the shagrin of those that preferred the more mindlessly violent  QT.

I also very much appreciated the Sergio Leone approach that Tarantino takes on violence in this film. There’s a long draw up of tension, then zing, bam, pow… the violence is over.

Inglorious Basterds although not a perfect film by any means, would rank about an 8.3 out of 10 which I think at this point puts it into my top ten of the year (sucky year)

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