Chix Chat on Film Review: A new kind of western.

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2012)

I thought that the most intriguing thing about Django Unchained, was going to be figuring out how could a Black man in America during slavery possibly become a bounty hunter and most importantly would the constructed tale be plausible. Not only did Quentin Tarantino (writer/director) make it believable he made it worth sitting through the 2 hour and forty-five minute running time. Initially as seen in the trailer Django (Jamie Foxx) is requisitioned by Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) a German dentist to assist him in his current trade, from there the adventure begins and includes the task of reuniting Django with his wife. The dialogue was filled with far too many nickels for my taste, but there were consequences for its usage which shows that there is a cost for speaking ugly words. Uncle Ruckus, I mean Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson) was the character that you immediately love to hate, the portrayal was so convincing that I watched him in every scene with a measure of contempt. I have become accustomed to the signature excessive blood spatters when flesh is injured typical of a Tarantino film, but the gore and carnage in this film was a bit much even for Mr. Tarantino. I guess that pushing the envelope with the savagery is his way of being explosive. This film had shocking moments that took me to the limits of disgust like the Mandingo fights and there were moments that took me to the opposite end of the spectrum by Django's love for Broomhilda (Kerry Washington). Ms. Washington is a natural beauty but her acting chops were only challenged here by anguish, I guess a man's man has a hard time thinking up what a slave woman would say so she had very little dialogue, but she did emote well. I don't know what the emotional response was that was expected from the viewing of this film, but I was left somewhere in the middle. The middle of the scale for those two extremes is indifference. The final scenes were a payoff and I especially liked the horse tricks, but I'm trying to decide if it was a big enough pay off to lean more towards favoring the story or reviling the violence. This one was difficult to gauge, it was entertaining but I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit that I laughed at some of the uncanniest things like the klan. I will linger on the middle ground with an amber light.