Tarantino finally topped Pulp!

Rating: 10/10 (1 September 2009)

I've been anticipating this movie for a long time. Basically, the impression I had of this movie was that it was supposed to be a Dirty Dozen style action movie of Jews on a mission to kill Nazis. This sounded similar to Valkyrie which just came out at the end of 2008, but I would see it because I consider myself to be a Tarantino fan.
I've seen Pulp Fiction which is one of my favourite movies of all time because it's so awesome. I've seen Jackie Brown which was rather entertaining and a good movie, but it didn't live up to Pulp Fiction's standards. I've also seen Death Proof which was the second half of Grindhouse. I definitely preferred Planet Terror to Death Proof because I thought the dialogue in Death Proof was rather boring. Tarantino kills off every character after hearing them chat about pointless things. I did, however, enjoy the second half of Death Proof.
Inglourious Basterds is the first time that I feel that Tarantino has come close to the quality of Pulp Fiction. I will even go as far as saying that Inglourious Basterds is my favourite Tarantino film.
The plot of Inglourious Basterds isn't as simply as you might have seen from the trailer. There is a subplot about a Jewish girl whose family is killed early into the movie by Nazis for hiding under the floorboards of their neighbours. She escapes from Col. Hans Landa (played by Christoph Waltz) and we see her four years later when she owns her own theater that is hosting a Nazi premiere. The main subplot involves a group of Jewish American soldiers called The Basterds who are just killing and scalping any Nazi they meet. When they find out that Hitler is attending the premiere, the subplots eventually meet which is closer to the end of the movie. When this happens, I can honestly say that it is the most entertaining scene in any movie I've ever scene.
Everyone assumes that the movie is all about The Basterds and Brad Pitt, but they don't even get a lot of screen time. I think the real star of the movie is Christoph Waltz who plays The Jew Hunter. He's such a great antagonist and is convincingly evil, even when he's just drinking a glass of milk. Everyone in the movie gave a great performance, and many were surprisingly comedic. But we've come to expect that from Tarantino movies.
The most important thing is not to expect an action film, or you'll be severely disappointing because it's a 2 ½ hour movie and 2 hours and 15 minutes of that is probably pure dialogue. Even the dialogue itself is mostly in subtitles translating German, French or Italian. It was my major complaint with Death Proof but for Inglourious Basterds it managed to improve the movie. Still, when there is an intense action scene it doesn't disappoint especially with the final 20 minutes of the movie.
To conclude this review, I strongly believe that Tarantino made an exceptional World War II film, the best one I've ever seen, as well as for Tarantino and I think this will be known as one of the classic films of the decade.
It's hilarious when it needs to be, it's tense when characters are talking for 20 minutes at a time, and when it's gory it's exciting. Seriously, you can be on the edge of your seat throughout the whole movie, if you're enjoying. I know this is sort of a love it/hate it type of movie and hopefully more people will love it and see the movie in the way I did. I saw it twice and this is actually one of the rare times where I feel that I enjoyed it even more the second time. The second time, you are aware that people are eventually going to stop talking and when. You know the purpose of it all and the main timeline of the movie. You may even be able to spot things that you never noticed before.
I won't hesitate in giving Inglourious Basterds a 10/10, it's a perfect movie and easily my favourite film of the year.