Inglourious Basterds

Last night I ended up watching ‘Inglourious Basterds’ which I have seen a few times before and forgot how much I enjoy the film. It also helps to watch a film late at night when it quiet and there is little to distract you.

I like a good war based film and the fact that this one is no way factual still it’s a boys own adventure with some interesting scenes. First, I don’t think Adolf Hitler was gunned down in a cinema in Paris but director Quentin Tarantino simply knows how to tell a damn good story at almost two and a half hours long. Ok the film also takes many liberties with history but I don’t care if entertained.

The film follows two converging stories to a spectacular end. You have Lt. Aldo Raine played by Brad Pitt leader of a group of Jewish-American soldiers ‘The Basterds’ in Nazi-occupied France running amuck. They scalp many Nazis and are very joyous in there killing well they are Germans and they is even a German among the ranks of the Basterds.

Shosanna Dreyfus played by Mélanie Laurent takes the lead in the second after escaping the murder of her family by a devilish Nazi SS Col. Hans Landa known as ‘The Jew Hunter’ played by Christoph Waltz she is out for revenge.

Some criticize the length of some of the scenes, long periods of dialogue and drawn out sequences create an uncomfortable atmosphere and unremitting tension that at those points, fits the film perfectly.

With Brad Pitt in the ranks, you’d be right to expect a great performance from at least him and despite pulling off somewhat ridiculous accent, it is Christoph Waltz that steals the show. As the aforementioned ‘Jew Hunter’, Nazi Col. Hans Landa is transformed into an electrifying and devilish character. Waltz gives the character an unerring sense of confidence and sincere belief that nothing will ever go wrong and that he will get the job done, without fail.

This film is no ‘Band of Brothers’, hardly any actual fighting and shootouts are few and far between, meaning aside a handful of violent scenes. The two strands of this film comes together in a violent road crash when propagandist Joseph Goebbels plans to screen his latest pro-Nazi film for the party’s elite at a small Parisian theatre and owner Shosanna Dreyfus planning to burn it down. That the same time the Basterds have plans for the same event, which turns into a bloodbath.

It was an enjoyable way to while away the evening until bedtime.