'Django. The D is silent.'

Rating: 9/10 (17 April 2013)

Quentin Tarantino has a style that is stylish! Few can outdo him for over the top blood and guts treatment of a subject matter that is inherently not funny. He knows how far he can push the limits and gathers together some very fine talent in all aspects of his creation. DJANGO UNCHAINED is certainly one of his finest efforts to date, and that is saying a lot. But a writer/director who can tackle a subject as heinous as our history of slavery and show all aspects of it - as vicious and cruel and inhuman as it was - while at the same time pepper it with outlandish parody and humor is a genius of cinema.
Everyone knows the story of the film by now so a very brief statement is for openers: The time is two years before the Civil War and slavery is big business in America. Former dentist, Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz who is actually the star of the film in a brilliant portrayal), buys the freedom of a slave, Django (Jamie Foxx), and trains him with the intent to make him his deputy bounty hunter. Instead, he is led to the site of Django's wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) who is owned by the smarmiest of villains Calvin Candie (Leonardo Di Caprio in an astonishingly fine turn out of his usual character), a ruthless plantation owner. How we get to Candyland via taking advantage of bounty hunter murders and money and finally arrive in the gross estate of Candie run by his own black master Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson in a brilliant cameo) in order to free Django's wife in a wily manner may take almost three hours but there is never a portion that is dull or that fails to introduce new highlights to the story.
In addition to the 'main characters' this film abounds in spectacular cameos by such fine actors as Don Johnson, Franco Nero, James Remar, Walton Goggins, Dennis Christopher, Ato Essandoh, Sammi Rotibi, Russ Tamblyn (yes, that one!), Bruce Dern, James Russo, Michael Parks, John Jarratt, among many others, and of course Quentin Tarantino himself. There are scenes such as a gathering of a Western KKK gang with maladaptive hoods that are incredibly hilarious, and scenes of torture and violent blood-gushing shootouts. It all works and even for the easily offended this is a film that entertains while it reminds us of a period in our history which is unutterably shameful.
Grady Harp