Inglorious Bastards

Booksteve and I were talking last night and he reminded me that the film 'Inglorious Basterds' by director Quinton Tarentino is a supposed remake or re-imagining of the 1978 starring Bo Svenson (I never miss me a Bo Svenson movie) and Fred Williamson which has gone on to be a b movie cult favourite - a poor man's 'Dirty Dozen' if you will. Both the new version and the old version involved condemned army prisoners who get a second change to do something good in WWII. From there the films sharply diverge. In the 1978 version it is through a series of lucky circumstances that the soldiers are freed on way to a military prison. Once free they attempt to get to neutral Switzerland but are sidetracked along the way by having to complete an important mission that they, themselves ruined by accidentally killing an group of American soldiers. They are forced (by their strong willed leader - Swenson)to take over the mission and through it gain some redemption for their past deeds. At first they are resentful of the idea but with more and more success they start to gel as a unit and gain the respect of the Colonel in charge. I really enjoyed a lot of things about this movie. The action moves at a good pace, the music and settings are fantastic as are all of the performances with Peter Hooten being a standout as the group's scrounger. Each soldier has a fully realized character and in such movies like this you know that someone you like is not going to live to the end of the picture. Another thing that impressed me were the subtitles. The French spoke French and the Germans spoke German and this added to the realism. I hate it when everyone speaks English because someone underestimated the audiences ability to read along. The script provides the soldiers ample opportunities to think on their feet as conditions or circumstances change. And you got to love those slow motion Peckinpah-esque deaths. It was worth seeing and there are so few of these 'grind house' movies that are as fun to watch. If you want to know more you can find a great write-up by Booksteve here: http://booksteveslibrary.blogspot.com/2009/04/inglorious-bastards.html





The remake/re-imagining by Tarentino is about condemned soldiers who get a second chance at freedom by becoming a death squad whose sole mission is to kill Germans. I am sure it will have all of Tarentino's legendary flourishes (by that I mean plenty of gruesome killings done with great flare). Say what you will about the man, he never put out a boring movie and this one has been in development for a long time so we have every reason to believe that he got it right once again. I am really looking forward to Brad Pitt's performance. For a pretty boy he is one of the great actors of his generation like DeCaprio (yeh I said it) or Matt Damon. Even Mike Myers is in it and is almost unrecognizable as a British officer.