Inglorious Bastards is a raucous, or at least it wants us to think it is. It's a lot of fun to watch, and you leave the cinema feeling well. It's not the kind of film you enjoy but feel was stupid, but a relatively smart film. But this is not any film, it's a Quentin Tarantino film. Quentin Tarantino who some, me included, thought of as one who will create masterpieces. One of the great new hope. As a Tarantino film, it disappoints.

It's hard for me to say it disappoints as I just came back and I really enjoyed it. Plus, it's a smart film. What then is missing? When I compare it to Reservoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction the answer becomes clearer. Yes they were fun, but they were so much more than that. It's not that they were especially smart, but they were fresh. They had something. A kind of strange energy and motion which you can't simply recreate. I guess it's harder doing such a film when stepping out of your Rolls Phantom than when you you step off your bike. Perhaps, perhaps other reasons, but where is our Tarantino, the real him?
It's tough to start up so high. Is it possible nowadays with all the media to manage to continue? I think so, but you need to have a very strong psyche, and be willing to disappoint most of your fans. Maybe the problem for Tarantino is that it's so easy for him to cop out by saying to himself he's doing B-movies, or that he likes these fringe films. The problem is that these fringe films had energy, and a certain freedom, which his films lack a bit. Don't get me wrong, I still like him a lot, and I thought his previous film - Death Proof -  was really great, perhaps his best film for a long time. But we want more, he wants more, and he knows it, and it's not easy to handle and create under such pressure.

1992 brought Clinton, Tarntino's Pulp Fiction, and Robert Rodriguez's El Mariachi (later to be expanded by him as Desperado). It was a time of rebirth, and like the early 70s had a certain freshness to it. It didn't survive for very long and while Rodriguez has clearly evolved to doing very different things Tarantino is having difficulty finding what to do. Hopefully he will as there is still a great director there.

Returning to the film. Continuing his exploration of revenge in Kill Bill, Tarantino wants to figure out this sensation of revenge and what it makes of us. What kind of Monster are we?
The Jews are said to be rats, though there is a The Jewish Bear who scares the nazis. The nazis are said to be hawks, with the hero nazi shooting from above his enemies. The SS officer is called: The Jew-hunter; a hunter and sniffs his pray. There is King Kong (in the card game), etc.

It is comfortable to choose the Nazis as everyone is happy when a Nazi head gets blown up. He uses this to get the crowd behind him, and the German crowd is apparently ecstatic. But this is an old trick - Tarantino is at the same time criticizing this will for revenge, or at least reflecting on it, and by making us happy spectators he turns the camera towards us. Bard pitt (Aldo) says in the movie: "Watching Germans get beaten to death is as close as we get to going to the movies." and we, like the other Bastards, are watching and enjoying it.


Some general comments: notice the mark of Cain which Aldo leaves on the murderers he lets live - so everyone knows they are killers.
(Spoiler Alert - The cinema scene is an obvious tribute to De Palma's Carrie, but also to De Palma's The untouchables with the running on the staircase. There is also a reversal of roles: The Nazis have turned into rats, closed and burned, while the Jews are the ones shooting from above like the hawk).

Great use of music and especially of sound. The use of the many languages is very nice and gives you a good feeling for people's personality.
The film is inspired by the 1977 film of the same name which Tarantino admires.

All in all a good film, but a not a great film. Tarantino - you can do so much better.