The most overrated film ever?

Rating: Null/10 (12 September 2009)

"Inglourious Basterds" is supposed to be Quentin Tarantino's homage to the Spaghetti Western. And here's what is interesting: Tarantino has had 40 years to improve on Sergio Leone's 1960s masterpieces. And he's failed miserably.
"Basterds" is a rambling, incoherent mess of a movie. It's obvious that Tarantino desperately wants to be the ultimate "bad boy" of cinema who makes "controversial" films. But if Tarantino really wanted to be controversial in making a war film, he'd tackle the horrors of the Iraq War, instead of World War II, a long-ago war that already has been re-hashed over and over from every conceivable angle over the decades.
Tarantino deeply wants to shock us, to outrage us and to create disturbing art. And he fails miserably. The fact is, Leone was infinitely more daring and controversial way back in 1968 than Tarantino ever has been. When Leone depicted the vicious cold-blooded gunning down of a child in "Once Upon a Time in the West," he created a scene that Tarantino would never, ever have the courage to film. Compared to scenes like that, everything in "Basterds" is tame and predictable (as is the case with all of Tarantino's work).
Last, but not least, I really can't understand why anyone would be interested in Tarantino's take on the 1960s Spaghetti Western film genre. I mean, why not just watch the stunning originals? The original Italian directors did vastly more with their tiny budgets than Tarantino can do with his bloated $80 million budgets.
If you want truly challenging and original film-making these days, I urge you to check out the best of what East Asian cinema has to offer. (Takashi Miike is infinitely more daring, dangerous and talented than Tarantino). Tarantino is a grossly overrated director and the fact that his work is praised in the U.S. shows just how utterly creatively bankrupt Hollywood is these days.