Inglourious Basterds - Shakespeare?

Okay my husband and I like Quentin Tarantino. We saw Reservoir Dogs way before all our friends even heard about it and Pulp Fiction ranks one of my all time faves, so when my husband walked out of Inglourious Basterds Saturday and asked me what the movie was about I had to think a minute.

I mean his expectation was a movie about the Brad Pitt character and based on the title and the movie trailers I think most people would have the same expectation. In reality it is about Shoshanna, the single survivor of a family that Landa, a high ranking Nazi, killed and her opportunity to take revenge on the Nazis.

Brad Pitt's character, Aldo Raine, is in effect a one dimensional caricature of a quality/action that is necessary to move the plot along. I've heard that some critics panned his performance, but I think he was quite effective at portraying the backwoodsman who psychotically and sarcastically is able to see that Nazi=death and enjoys carrying it out. He didn't need to be anything more for the film.

Taranatino's success in his movies many times involves layering characters in time around the main story line and magnifying character traits in them. It was quite intricate in Pulp Fiction. Inglourious Basterds boils it down to a science. Each side character really embodies a trait. The young actor is greed for flesh and fame, the black man is love, Hugo Stiglitz is hate. Okay maybe I'm being toooo literal, but you see what I mean. In this distilling of the characters you get the quirkiness that Tarantino is known for. So, Tarantino like Shakespeare? Well when you get right down to it Lady Macbeth is just guilt isn't she? College Professors spend whole semesters trying to make you realize that one!

Now I'm getting wordy but I really liked the movie. Gory, yes, for the weak of stomach, this one is pretty bad. And Tarantino does go some places that most wouldn't with some racial comments and his usual irreverence. So this movie is not for everyone. Use your own judgement, but don't go if you are looking for a movie that features a story revolving around Brad Pitt's character, you won't find it!