Tarantino on slavery

Rating: 6/10 (2 August 2015)

Let me start this review by saying that I am quite a fan of writer and director Quentin Tarantino. I love some of his and like almost all of his works. "Django Unchained" was his latest movie so far and it came out 3 years ago. Apparently he had so much fun making it that he made another western movie right afterward, which is going to come out later this year. We'll see if this one is a bit into political conflicts such as slavery as well. His film before this one here dealt with Nazi Germany, so he seems to have a tendency right now to make political films. Still, they are as outrageously over-the-top and fun to watch as his older movies. I enjoyed watching Django, but not as much as "Inglourious Basterds", the movie he made before that. I wish he could have won the Screenplay Academy Award for that one, even if his Django script is not weak at all either. The second Oscar for this film went to Christoph Waltz for portraying Django's loyal friend and mentor Dr. King Schultz. I thought Waltz gave a good performance here and there is some irony to it that his biggest rival for Oscar glory was probably Tommy Lee Jones (who was actually supporting in contrast to Waltz), who played a White man in another slavery-centered drama as well. Still I believe, Waltz was superior in his first Tarantino film, for which he also won an Oscar.
"Django Unchained" really is an actors movie. Waltz was good. Leonardo DiCaprio was a lot of fun to watch as well in a pretty uncommon role for him, but my absolute favorite performance here came from Samuel L. Jackson, who was amazing as the whitest Black man you could ever imagine. Excellent performance. Now, Jamie Foxx' Django wasn't bad either, but I preferred other performances here I must say. Not sure if it was the way the character was written or the way Foxx played him, but he was not the one who carried this film, even if he was the title character. Oh yeah and Tarantino himself has a fun little role as well near the end and he goes out like a boss. In general, this film can be divided into 3 parts. The first would be the way Django and Schultz meet and work together while becoming friends. The second would be the action at Candyland. And the last part would be everything that follows the deaths of two main characters. My favorite part was certainly the middle. Parts one and three were okay, but this middle part is where the movie is really great. Waltz, DiCaprio (the skull scene was outstanding) and Jackson get the best out of each other. Of course, Tarantino movies are always pretty graphic and violent, so you know what to expect when he makes a western movie, although I must say apart from the shootout scenes and near the end it was not that heavy. All in all, this was a pretty good watch for its entirety of over 150 minutes and I recommend it.