BeccaSetlockEssayExample

//Ingloroious Bastards//* almost did something impossible: it almost made me root for Nazis. More on that later. I'm sure I disagree with him about everything and although I don't know first hand, he seems like quite an unpleasant fellow; however, Quentin Tarantino is a genius and //Inglorious Bastards// ranks up there with his other great accomplishment, //Pulp Fiction.// The story is every right-thinking, historically-minded person's fantasy: avoid a past disaster by killing one or a few of the individuals responsible for the event- in this case, Adolf Hitler and his gangster friends; and to mete justice on the evil- the same as above and everybody who follows them. The American government recruits Jewish-Americans to go behind Nazi lines and terrorize the Germans. They do this successfully. The "Inglorious Bastards'" terrorist credentials in good order, //IB// changes gears and turns sharply into a //Dirty Dozen//, mission-behind-enemy-lines storyline. There are actually two plots to destroy the Nazi high command: the one by the IB and the other by an incognito Jewish theater owner. Why genius? First, the acting is phenomenally good. I've heard some criticize Brad Pitt's accent, but it sounded fine to me. Christoph Waltz as the Sherlock Holmes-meets-Heinrich Himmler SS Colonel, Hans Landa, is magnetic. It's fun to hear Teutonhottie Diane Kruger speak German. Diane Kruger

Next, Quentin Tarantino forgoes cinema conventions (while holding true to Tarantino staples). Except for one soldier, Tarantino doesn't show us the recruitment or training of any IB (I learned that it will be in a prequel). The protagonists of the two anti-Hitler plots never meet. No character growth whatsoever. Yet, he makes it work.

//IB// is really a series of verbal confrontations, starting with Landa's knowing conversation with a French dairy farmer hiding Jews, and moving on to IBs' interrogation of a German patrol, a standoff in a basement bar, and several other magnificent //tète-à-tètes// (or as Brad Pitt's character, "Aldo the Apache" might say...ahh, never mind). One might think it odd that an action movie's most exciting scenes are spoken spars, but Tarantino's conversations have the feeling of action, as if you're watching them knife fight with words. Brilliant. Risky, near-cheesy, distonal touches like super-imposed arrows pointing to Nazi hierarchy don't distract as much as delightfully surprise. Quentin Tarantino is a nihilist.** I'm not. I don't think that all violence is absurd and I make distinctions between the proper conduct of war and barbarism. In one "chapter" of the movie, the IBs act like Nazis. It's not that they eschew protocol to satisfy their rage like some soldiers do in //Saving Private Ryan// or //Band of Brothers//- they enjoy it and consider it part of their mission. Remember when liberals would criticize some of America's tactics in the War on Terror as "stooping to the level of terrorists?" I actually agreed that the United States could disgrace itself in war; I just didn't think that water-boarding spies and terrorists, as opposed to uniformed soldiers, and bombing terrorists hiding near civilians, qualified. The IBs' behavior certainly does and I just can't get behind that no matter how just the cause. I felt very uncomfortable when the audience I went to see the film with cheered IB cruelty; IB sadism almost made me sympathize with the Nazis (I was able to stop myself in time). //IB// isn't obnoxious in this regard when it deals with the anti-Hitler plot instead of the IBs' mundane Nazi hunting.
 * Politics/Message:**
 * Yes, I know it's spelled, "Inglourious Basterds," but I'm an English teacher and I don't get the joke. Thanks for making my job harder, Quentin.
 * Nobody's really a nihilist. It's impossible as it goes against our nature. Some come close, however.

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