Sometimes Perfect, Sometime Slow, It's a Very Tarantino Experience

Quentin Tarantino hasn’t made many films that don’t leave you feeling like you’d never seen anything quite like it before. His style is different, his writing is interesting,  and you hardly ever know exactly what is going to happen in any given sequence.  His films really aren’t commercial, when violence ensues it’s never a pretty affair, and his dialogue is plentiful. “Inglourious Basterds” is no exception, so to all that love his work this should be a treat, but for anyone else, consider yourselves warned.
The film has a magnificent opening, possibly the best 15 minutes he has ever put onto the silver screen. It’s mostly a simple conversation, but the tension is incredible, and the dialog is exhilarating. The next 20 or so minutes are also extremely promising, offering some great quirky Tarantino moments, as well as a hell of a lot of violence.
It gets slower after this, and the writer/director’s biggest strength and weakness is prevalent in this film; his inability to focus. This separates his work from others with all of its little side notes which add for some great laughs. The most interesting characters in the film are those in the ads for the film -  the band of angry Jewish soldiers - but you absolutely do not see enough of them. The product of the needlessly large amount of characters involved in the ensuing madness is uneven, but for the most part it’s still likeable.
One of the reasons you want to see the band of soldiers is because they are some of the most entertaining “basterds” the director has come up with yet. Sometimes it feels as though the director is holding them at arms length so that when they do pop up their appearance will be like a reward. There are long stretches of people blabbering on and on, which is sometimes very interesting and sometimes tedious. In the end, it was all inevitable looking back at the filmmaker’s previous work. Brad Pitt gives a hilarious performance as “Lieutenant Aldo Raine”, the leader of the band of soldiers.
While Tarantino did create a colorful and quirky southern soldier, Pitt brings the character to life in a classic performance. Some may be thrown off a bit though, because the actor is plastered all over all of the film’s advertisements, even though he doesn’t have more than a quarter of the film’s screen time. He isn’t so much the main character of the film as he is the best character.  
While I think that Pitt was perfectly cast, another performance that might be so good that the Academy will acknowledge his excellence comes from the man who plays the film’s main bad guy, “Colonel Hans Landa” of the Gustapo, played by German actor Christoph Waltz. He is smart, and insanely creepy in his amazing ability to force information out of people with an odd mix of charm and threats.
Actually, everyone in the film does an amazing job, with one odd let-down. Mike Myers, the guy from “Austin Powers” gives a rather bland cameo and does not add anything of value to the film at all.
While the second act of the film drags, the third act is too long. It builds and builds and builds, but it’s not one of those films with no pay off. Tarantino might have writer’s ADD, but he’s not stupid. He knows that a 153 minute guy movie better have one hell of a climax. When the film explodes it really explodes, but it makes you wonder why the film wasn’t a little simpler. You wish you get to see more of “Aldo the Apache’s” bloody exploits that are mostly discussed and only shown a couple times. The director is so good at making action badasses that you just want a lot more than you get.
Despite all of these deficiencies, the more I think about “Inglourious Basterds” the more I realize how much I truly enjoyed it. If you end up seeing what will surely be the most controversial film of the summer, there is only one guarantee: Tarantino. I can’t tell you for sure that you will be satisfied, but I can confidently tell you that any die-hard Tarantino fans will not be disappointed. It’s just as quirky, original, and oddly entertaining as all of his other work.
Don’t see this movie if you don’t like Tarantino. This is not anymore accessible than any of his other work. “Inglourious Basterds” is a movie that I rather liked, but I could easily see others thinking that it’s stupid garbage. Be wary of your tastes when entering the theater, but the re-imagined history of the World War II continues to grow on me. This is a classic guy movie. With flaws and all, Tarantino’s newest creation is just as loveable as those in the past -DVD sales are going to be through the roof.

Rating - 8.5/10

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