Tarantino flick takes a whole new look at WWII.
INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS (Quentin Tarantino, 2009)
Back in theaters December 4-10
Special screenings December 16-17
www.inglouriousbasterds-movie.com
Basically, Quentin Tarantino is a genre filmmaker in love with the movies. He has tackled such cinematic subjects as the heist (RESERVOIR DOGS), blaxploitation (JACKIE BROWN), Hong Kong kung fu / Japanese samurais / revenge thrillers (KILL BILL), grindhouse (DEATH PROOF), and gangsters / boxing / hit men / war / kidnapping (PULP FICTION). Inspired by a little-seen low-budget 1978 Italian film alternately known as HELL’S HEROES, DEADLY MISSION, QUEL MALEDETTO TRENO BLINDATO (THAT BLOODY ARMORED TRAIN), and THE INGLORIOUS BASTARDS — itself inspired by Robert Aldrich’s 1967 classic THE DIRTY DOZEN — Tarantino has unleashed INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS, a purposely misspelled two-and-a-half-hour love letter to WWII movies that worships the genre even as it subverts it . Brad Pitt stars as Lt. Aldo Raine (anyone remember Aldo Ray?), the leader of the Basterds — seven men, including the baseball-bat wielding Bear Jew (HOSTEL director Eli Roth), who are making their way through France killing and scalping Nazis. Meanwhile, Standartenführer Hans “the Jew Hunter” Landa (an Oscar-worthy Christoph Waltz) is sniffing out the enemy everywhere — and on a mission to capture the Basterds. Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), who escaped from Landa several years before, is now running a cinema that specializes in German films; there she meets Schütze Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Brühl), a Nazi hero who is starring in a film about his exploits (anyone remember Audie Murphy?) and falls hard for Shosanna, who has changed her name to the rather elegant Emmanuelle Mimieux (anyone remember Yvette Mimieux?). After Zoller convinces Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels (Sylvester Groth) to hold the premiere of the film, NATION’S PRIDE, at Shosanna’s theater, everyone converges for a finale that will blow your mind. As is his style, Tarantino features a slew of minor characters with their own stories to tell, plenty of scenes that go on way too long, Mexican stand-offs, inside jokes and references that few will get, and lots of close-up violence while turning cliché and convention upside down and inside out. INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS is as much about making — and watching — war movies as it is a movie in and of itself, and a damn fine one at that. Tarantino doesn’t play by the rules, so you never know what will happen next. Look for well-disguised on-screen cameos by original BASTARDS director Enzo G. Castellari and star Bo Svenson, Mike Myers, and Rod Taylor (anyone remember Rod Taylor?), listen for voice-over cameos by Samuel L. Jackson and Harvey Keitel, and please don’t ever yell “Fire!” in a crowded movie theater.
SPECIAL SCREENINGS DEC. 4-10, 16, 17
INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS is back in theaters for a special one-week engagement beginning December 4 at the AMC Empire 25 in Times Square and the Village East on Second Ave. In addition, there will be a screening with Tarantino present at the Jewish Theological Seminary on December 16 ($18, advance reservations required at 212-280-6093) that will be followed by a panel discussion entitled “Jewish Persecution and the Fantasy of Revenge,” with producer Lawrence Bender, Chancellor Arnold M. Eisen, Dr. Amy Kalmanofsky, and Rabbi Jack Moline. The film will also be shown the next night, December 17, at MoMA as part of the Contenders, 2009 series, followed by a Q&A with Tarantino and film critic Elvis Mitchell.
The Fast Runner Trilogy concludes with Marie-Hélène Cousineau and Madeline Piujuq Ivalu’s BEFORE TOMORROW, following Zacharias Kunuk’s ATANARJUAT THE FAST RUNNER (2001) and Kunuk and Norman Cohn’s THE JOURNALS OF KNUD RASMUSSEN (2006). The series, produced by Arnait Video Productions (Women’s Video Workshop of Igloolik), examines the history of the Inuit culture and people in Canada. In BEFORE TOMORROW, Piujuq Ivalu stars as Ningiuq, a community elder who shares a close bond with her twelve-year-old grandson, Maniq (played by her real-life grandson, Paul-Dylan Ivalu). After Kukik (Tumasie Sivuarapik) tells stories about his first contact with white people – including how the strangers traded sewing needles for sex – the group separates into two factions, with one responsible for drying that season’s catch. Maniq chooses to go with his grandmother to help her with the drying, but when they return, what they find sets them off on a harrowing journey, a nightmare that Ningiuq prays will end soon. Based on the Danish novel FØR MORGENDAGEN by Jørn Riel, BEFORE TOMORROW, set in 1840, is gorgeously photographed by Cohn and Félix Lajeunesse, filled with breathtaking vistas, but the simple narrative is too often obvious and heavy-handed (including the sappy music by Kate and Anna McGarrigle), although the film’s slow, meditative pace is welcoming and involving. A film festival favorite around the world, BEFORE TOMORROW will screen at Film Forum for two weeks, then will be available as a pay-what-you-can Video on Demand download beginning February 1; THE FAST RUNNER can be downloaded now, with THE JOURNALS OF KNUD RASMUSSEN scheduled for January 1.
Based on embedded journalist Mark Boal’s experiences in Iraq, THE HURT LOCKER follows a three-member Explosive Ordnance Disposal unit as they are called in to defuse a series of dangerous situations involving various kinds of bombs, including IEDs and other life-threatening explosive devices. Team leader Will James (Jeremy Renner) is an expert bomb defuser and maverick who doesn’t follow protocol and likes to live on the edge. Spc. Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty) is a greenhorn who just wants to survive the last forty days of their rotation. And Sgt. J. T. Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) likes to go by the book and take no unnecessary chances, which puts him in constant conflict with the unpredictable James. Recalling the second half of Stanley Kubrick’s Vietnam drama FULL METAL JACKET (1987), THE HURT LOCKER unfolds in a series of harrowing set pieces in which the EOD unit is called in to either safely detonate or defuse explosive devices while under the eyes of local Iraqis, any of whom could potentially be the bomber or a sniper. Director Kathryn Bigelow (BLUE STEEL, POINT BREAK) masterfully builds suspense scene after scene, beginning with the edge-of-your-seat opener through to the gripping conclusion. The experiences of the EOD unit serve as a microcosm for modern warfare in general and the U.S. involvement in the Middle East specifically, placing viewers in the midst of a tense, bitter, psychologically and emotionally draining battle that can never be won. The outstanding cast also features Guy Pearce, Ralph Fiennes, David Morse, and Evangeline Lilly in small roles; many of the Iraqis were played by actual war refugees. Shot in Jordan not far from the Iraq border, THE HURT LOCKER is a remarkable story, one of the best war films of the decade.