Inglourious Basterds: The Fear & Conquest of Modern Cinema

Quentin Tarantino. Violence. Same sentence, usually. Some people aren't even sure what a Quentin Tarantino is, but they usually know what it entails. Really, Tarantino (director of cult classics such as Pulp Fiction, True Romance, and Kill Bill, for those not in the know) has become so consistent with the violence within his films that he's carved a nice, bloody niche for himself -- and in his most recent film, Inglourious Basterds, he doesn't disappoint.

Inglourious Basterds is a Tarantino remake of the original film Quel maledetto treno blindato (Enzo G. Castellari). It is set in Nazi-occupied France, centering on three sets of characters, as all WW2 movies inevitably do: The oppressed, and the oppressors, and the Americans. Brad Pitt takes center stage as Lieutenant Aldo Raine, leading a team of Nazi-killing soldiers. They're up against Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) and equilibrium is brought by Shoshanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent), a Jewish girl who has been in hiding as a theatre mistress since the mass murder of her family by Col. Landa. The plot begins in separate places and, as they are like to, eventually spirals together to climax within Shoshanna's theatre.

The opening scene takes place in a country home, where Landa is interrogating Perrier LaPedite, a farmer who is hiding Jews. The silence and the "Don't move or talk or make noise" was eerily like the breath-holding silence in a proper theatre, so at this point the audience has been put in the shoes of the fugitives. This trend of audience-in-hiding is generally the tradition with any genre of "scary" films, generating the response that cinema-watching is a masochistic practice. However, as Basterds progresses, the audience is (arguably) slipped easily into the mindset of the sadistic, violence-loving Jewish soldiers.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that Basterds begins to put us past the American sadism and begins to drop us into the boots of the Nazis. Landa, as "evil" as he is, has a certain charisma which is characteristic of Tarantino villains. This "classy" interpretation of Nazi-ism has been criticized by many who feel that the film touted itself as sympathetic to the Jews when, in actuality, it was not sympathetic to anyone. The amount of controversy that has been roiled up from the film's purported perspective has become political in some forums, but I feel the upset is missing the mark: Tarantino wasn't and never will write a film to sympathize with any specific class of people; he writes films about one thing and one thing only: Violence.

What exactly is a film about violence about, then? Well, we could look at a large lot of movies, but let's stick with Tarantino for the time. I'll return to my earlier comment: Tarantino and violence are practically tautological when it comes to cinema keywords, and if Tarantino is aware of anything, it's this. Violence is a powerful player in the cinematic arena, keying in almost every genre of film analysis, particularly in the Freudian and psycho-analytical classes. Violence is Tarantino's topic of choice -- it is his style and his passion, and he knows the reputation it comes with. I'm sure he is aware that people refuse to watch his movies on the basis that he directed them; I'm sure he's proud of it, particularly after Basterds. The glamorizing of violence is the Tarantino Way -- a way that has been frowned upon and criticized by movie-watchers of all breeds as hollow and outrageous.

The metacinematic Inglourious Basterds is his answer to this. Despite the negative stigma his films have garnered from many casual and critical movie watchers, Basterds grossed $38kk and was #1 in the box office its opening week. It has also been nominated for 8 Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. But why? Why indeed would over 3300 theaters worldwide make bank on a film that is simply about violence? The question has been one of the core queries about cinema for the history of cinematic review. Tarantino has taken the time to answer all these interview questions in the form of this film.

I'll begin by bringing up the physical appearance of Hans Landa coupled with the fact that this is one of the only films where Tarantino has no cameo. See below:

Tarantino (left) wishes he looked this good (right). Maybe it's just the nose.

Am I saying what you think I'm saying? Yes. Christoph Waltz is actually playing the role of Quentin Tarantino in this film (and yes, for those of you thinking ahead, Diane Kruger is playing Uma Thurman. Ha ha ha, just kidding. She's playing Nicole Kidman.). So, put on your metaphor cap and let's embark on a metaphor journey: The opening scene of Basterds is Quentin Tarantino interrogating the timid and casual citizen about what he has hiding in the closet. Will the hider protect the hidden guilt and thus sacrifice his own safety and shame, or will he betray them to save himself?

Tarantino plainly shows us what he thinks is the answer. The farmer gives it up, the violence and danger are displaced, the farmer's family spared, and we suddenly have our premise: People would rather see others under fire than take the violence upon themselves. Thus is born a story about the threesome marriage of cinema, violence, and voyeurism.

After all, what else were all those people doing in a movie about WW2 while we're in the middle of the middle east? Watching movies has always been an escape, most relevantly for this essay during the Great Depression and during and after the war. There is a poignant loss of self in any cinematic vacation, which I've always thought to be more voyeuristic than vicarious. What happens on the screen is distant, a pastoral fantasy, and an escape.

Basterds moves on to introduce us to Brad Pitt, a hard-headed, stubborn, violent, unstoppable American who is sticking around Europe for one reason, and one reason only: To make a killing. Get it? Brad Pitt is playing himself. His role is to get people in the theater and keep them there; that's his business. He can get away with almost anything; though he's technically a mercenary under hire, he's clearly running the show -- he's the simultaneously lovable and detestable public face of modern cinema. And here he is, the Brad Pitt, ready for business... And let me tell you, business is a-booming.

While Brad Pitt's role is standing in for the active, perceived personification of the modern actor, the converse, reflective notion of the actor's role in cinematic politics is literalized in the character of Private Frederick Zoller (Daniel Brühl). Zoller is a Nazi soldier whose feats in snipery have been so phenomenal that it has been made into a movie to boost Nazi morale. Unlike Brad Pitt('s character), Zoller is a gear in the machine. He uses his pseudo-fame to try to pick up chicks, but his ultimate feelings about the situation are shown as he is viewing himself murdering hundreds of enemy soldiers, even if they are only actors. His intense, troubled reaction to seeing himself on the screen indicates Tarantino's cinematic displacement theme again -- Zoller can handle his feelings about his own deeds until they are on the big screen, where suddenly what should be a fantasy experience becomes all too real.

The displacement of reality is a cornerstone of cinematic voyeurism. In some cases, the audience is asked to displace their troubles of the "real world" into the dangers, thrills and other emotions of the silver screen. However, the act of "watching" and thus surrendering your own sense of reality to a projected fantasy can often lead to an unreal sense of reality. A classic example of this comes from Alfred Hitchcock's metacinematic Rear Window (1954), wherein Jeffries (James Stewart), the main character, is confined to his apartment due to an injury. His would-be love interest Lisa (Grace Kelly) is uninteresting to him for the most part of the movie, failing miserably in her attempts to woo him out of his snooping voyeurism as he spies on his neighbors with his telescope. The emotional attachment turns, however, as soon as Lisa leaves his apartment and becomes part of Jeffries' distal, metaphorical stage. The projection of his voyeuristic interest -- motivated by a lack of interest in his "real" reality -- is displaced onto Lisa once she enters this stage and at this point the romantic tension begins.

In the case of Inglourious Basterds, this projection of real investment is expected of the audience. Tarantino's expectation that the viewer is prepared to take on a sadistic role is mirrored in Zoller's anticipation of the screening of his film. In fact, that's the entire point he's making, that people go to emotionally ravaging, viscerally gory films and thereby displace themselves from their own emotionally troubling realities. The turn, however, is how disturbed Zoller is by his own film -- and this single reaction is the crux of the meaning Tarantino is attempting to convey.

Zoller's sudden, unnoticed nausea at his film foreshadows the massive scene that follows. The theatre in which his film is being shown falls under attack by both the American soldiers and the Jewish theatre mistress. The soldiers have explosives and guns, but Shoshanna takes one step further: She screens her final message to the men she is about to kill. The immense projection that overtakes her otherwise discreet, quietly wrathful character during the broadcast is vital in interpreting the film -- in what other arena can one single, unknown, otherwise harmless person exercise so much power over so many people in so little time? Were she standing on the stage giving her message, she would have had little effect -- yet the audience is so transfixed by the screen that they are utterly bound by her spell. This is the power of the cinema.

Shoshanna's final broadcast throws the entire theatre into terror and chaos. The audience has been entranced by the screen and now it is time for the cinematic coup de grace, the climax we have all been waiting for. Off-set, Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino strike a deal -- and back in the theatre, history is changed as Adolf Hitler is brutally assassinated in an extended, bloody, gruesome shot.

This shot is the most important in the film. While most shots of this type last only long enough to drive the message home that so-and-so has been shot and killed, the history-changing Hitler murder shot lasts well over twice as long as it probably would under any other director. The shot is so gruesome and extended that it feels like it will never end. It is the culmination of the entire film, where an entire world of watchers who, in some way or another, want to see such a terrible, sadistic thing happen to one of the most infamous people in world history, suddenly get what they want: A target for the displacement of their various hatred, anger, fear and wrath -- a target who, due to his historical reputation, can be accepted as a deserving villain almost universally. In simpler terms, there is no reason that anyone should feel "bad" for wanting to take out all of their vengeance on Hitler, and here, Tarantino gives the people what they want.

And he gives it to them longer than they want. The shot drags on. Unexpectedly you feel, as Zoller did, a sudden nausea. A sudden self-repulsion.

It passes. Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino exchange some funny lines, solidify their deal, and the audience is awash with cool, green relief as the scene changes away from the blazing theatre drenched in red. The audience is allowed to forget the fleeting instance of self-doubt, beckoned to continue on in the cinematic fantasy. Instead of taking responsibility for sadistic pleasure in witnessing the death of Hitler, the audience is invited to convert this uncomfortable feeling into hatred for Hans, easily channeled through the anti-heroic Lt. Raine.

Thus, Tarantino offers himself up as the self-aware martyr-director. So far as he's concerned, call him a sadist, call him a director of unnecessarily gory films -- hell, call him the villain of film. He doesn't care. No one can get rid of him because he -- er, Hans -- is too damn smart. In the crowning scene, Brad Pitt leans over and peers into the camera-eye and, with a perfect American drawl, says, "I'm gonna give you a little something you can't take off."

Tarantino does seem to feel that he bears a mark on his brow, or at least one that could be likened to Hermann Hesse's alternative Caine story in Demian -- that the mark was not the sign of evil, but rather an interpretation by those who are afraid of someone who is stronger than they are. Tarantino's self-righteous, smug finish in Basterds reeks of "I told you so" -- he's well aware of the movies he makes, the violence he glorifies, the stigma he will receive for it... and that, most importantly, it was what people wanted. Inglourious Basterds is a revenge film, but it is not the revenge film of a movie unto other movies, of a subclass unto a superclass, or a historically impressive era unto another: Inglourious Basterds is about the revenge of one man unto his nervous, defiant audience -- the revenge of Quentin Tarantino unto every Perrier LaPedite -- unto every would-be fearless man who dreams of altruism and the integrity of the movie viewer's soul.